Picture Archive Post 77

Tower Transit VNW32374 on Route 23, St Paul's, 13/06/2016
© Aubrey Morandarte

Route 23 started as a route to replace the western end of Route 15 as part of the major Central London changes in 1992. Ironically, most of the route was covered by a previous iteration of Route 23 from 1981 to 1985. Running between Westbourne Park (Mon-Sat)/Ladbroke Grove (Sun) and Aldwych (weekends)/Liverpool Street (weekdays), it used Routemasters from Westbourne Park (X) in the Centrewest sector. Sundays were one person operated with MCW Metrobuses. The one person operated part was increased to evenings too in 1993, and converted to low-floor operation in 1999 when the 18 was converted to low-floor with Dennis Trident/Plaxton Presidents. 15th January 2003 saw the route converted to full low-floor operation with Transbus Trident/ALX400s, with the whole route being operated daily. The night service was integrated into the 23 in 2004. 2008 saw new Enviro 400s introduced to the route, although they were soon off in 2012 by newer Enviro 400s and hybrid Enviro 400Hs, as the older buses became part of the allocation of the 607.
22nd June 2013 saw the route transfer to Tower Transit as this part of First Centrewest was sold to Transit Systems.

30th September 2017 saw the route withdrawn between Aldwych and Liverpool Street due to the first stage of Central London cuts. 24th November 2018 will see the route withdrawn further to Marble Arch, instead rerouted to "replace" the western end of Route 10. However, as the western end of the 10 is mostly paralleled by the 9, it has led to the 23 being relegated to a linking route, as the 27 and 295 covers a more direct routing of where the 23 goes. This means it is an awkward C shaped route which only covers shorter links, and being the link to Marble Arch to Kensington & Hammersmith.

VNW32374 was ordered for the 28, 31 and 328 as part of their double decker conversion in 2004, allocated to Westbourne Park (X). It moved to Atlas Road (AS) in 2011 along with the routes due to the temporary shrinking of Westbourne Park for Crossrail works. It returned back to Westbourne Park in May and June 2016 for its final days in London service. The bus was then retired from London service, moving within the Transit Systems group to Whippet in Cambridgeshire.

Post by Aubrey Morandarte

All rights reserved © WLTMTB 2018

Released: 31/12/2018