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When
I visited the 33's territory this afternoon and
saw what a mess the service was in (an hour's
observation in Barnes showed just one northbound
bus and two southbound) I thought of titling this
update 'Challenger Disaster'. If nothing else, it
would be an amusing cheap shot at the naff name
chosen by this subsidiary of National Car Parks -
and one that's already been used, despite its
connotations. Due to the rugby taking place this
afternoon at Twickenham, where NCP's base is
located right across the road from the stadium,
the 33 started disintegrating, just like the
ill-fated Space Shuttle of the same name. The
419, NCP's other conquest from today, wasn't
appreciably better, with pairs seen - however,
where the archetypal angry passenger stood
waiting at stops throughout the route might not
have given the new operator the benefit of the
doubt, I'll let them off, not least because it
let me get a better photograph at Barnes where
I'd messed up my shot of the previous bus ninety
seconds earlier. It's much as you'd expect
vehicle-wise, with 26 new Edinburgh-registered
Pointer Darts in unimaginative all-red, fitted
with the atrocious Urban 90 'crippler' seats to a
dark blue moquette which looks like the old video
game Defender (TGM had the same moquette, but in
a lighter blue). I'm told NCP's management is
made up of former London United staff, so the 33
and 419, which used to be theirs, ought to settle
down after the obligatory teething troubles. This
is the first new operator to surface in quite
some time; TfL are desperate to award tenders to
smaller companies, but have to hope against hope
that that they won't crash and burn (Sovereign
pre-London United, Mitcham Belle, the infamous
London Easylink, and very many others recently).
I'm not sure how car parking organisations like
NCP and Centra have become fascinated by
operating buses, a field which you'd think would
be antithetical to their core business, and
especially when London is conspicuous by its
distinct lack of park & ride networks by
comparison with other British cities, but don't
forget out of whose pockets the subsidy for all
of this comes from!
Coded in an
'NCP' class (thank God, not another duplicate set
of DPs!), NCP 14 (SN55 HKV, above)
is seen at Barnes, Red Lion, on the 33, while
later in the day, as services got back to normal
(assisted by on-site supervisors at Richmond), NCP 09 (SN55 HKM, below)
lays over at the Richmond terminus of the 419.
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