Mike Rhodes – författare

Bus garages, or depots if that is your preferred nomenclature, come in all shapes and sizes and have their origins in the tram depots that were established by the various tramway companies of the pre-electrification era. Tram depots were originally built for horse-drawn and steam-hauled tramcars and, in the case of the former, often had stables attached.Hardly any two bus garages were the same as they varied in both size and type of construction. Some, such as London Transport’s Stockwell garage (which is still in use) and Salford Corporation’s Frederick Road tram/bus depot, could be considered architectural gems. The capacity of a garage could vary enormously; examples of this were Ribble Motor’s outstation at Bowness-on-Solway with space to garage just one bus and Oldham Corporation’s Wallshaw Street garage, which when built was designed to hold 300 buses under one roof.There are still a significant number of former tram depots functioning as bus garages, but they are on the decline. The deregulation of bus services in 1986 changed the course of the bus industry forever. As undertakings were privatised and sold off during the 1990s, the new operators moved out of their inherited garages and set up more low-cost establishments. These generally consisted of a moderately sized maintenance building and a large open-air parking area.

The Blackpool Electric Tramway Company commenced operation of a conduit system of railed vehicles along the Promenade between Cocker Street and Station Road on 29 September 1885. By the 1930s the rolling stock was becoming somewhat worn out and, following the appointment of Walter Luff as General Manager in November 1932, the fleet was revolutionised. Over the next few years Luff introduced a fleet of eighty-four streamlined cars and built a new depot at Rigby Road in which to house them. These formed the backbone of the fleet for several decades and a considerable number, although significantly altered, continued in service until the end of conventional tramway operation on 6 November 2011. Following a substantial injection of government funding in January 2008 the failing tramway was revitalised and like a phoenix from the ashes the whole system was modernised and reopened as a Light Rail Transit system in April 2012, with a fleet of new LRT articulated vehicles, which were housed in a new depot at Starr Gate. This book features a wide cross-section of trams that have operated at the seaside resort over the past forty years and follows the line from Starr Gate to Fleetwood, with many comparisons made between the old and new systems.

Preston Corporation Tramways began operation of electric trams in June 1904, and they exclusively served the town until 1922. Additional tram routes to Frenchwood and Fulwood had been mooted several times, but the latter had been rejected on a number of occasions due to the narrowness of some of the highways on the proposed route. Consequently, the route to Fulwood was inaugurated on 23 January 1922, using motorbuses.The trams were abandoned between 1932 and 1935 when the six routes were converted to motorbus operation. Before the Second World War additional bus routes were started to serve new housing developments. Post-war routes were commenced to serve further new housing at Brookfield, Ingol, Larches, Lea, Moor Nook and Ribbleton.A Joint Operating Agreement was entered into with Ribble Motors (and Scout Motors) on 1 January 1948. There were initially four routes involved, with three more being added over the next twenty-five years. This agreement continued in diminished form until deregulation in 1986, following which the route network rapidly expanded.In more recent times, following the brief tenure by Stagecoach, Rotala Preston Bus has also operated a diverse number of services on behalf of Lancashire County Council, which over recent years has involved routes to many of the surrounding Lancashire towns.

As electricity became more widely used to power and light Britain’s towns and cities a number of municipal boroughs built their own power stations. In the early years these were inevitably fed by coal, of which the UK had a plentiful supply.In the 1960s and early 1970s the government embarked on a programme of constructing new power stations. The majority of these were constructed with direct rail-connected on-site coal handling facilities and thus was born the Merry-Go-Round, or MGR, coal train.The book features a UK panorama of a wide variety of coal trains on the move, with previously unpublished images from across many years and locations.

A visitor to one of the principal cities of the East or West Midlands during the 1970s would not have failed to notice that all the incumbent local bus operators were still running buses that still resembled types which could be seen throughout Britain between the two world wars – that is double-deck buses with the driver seated in his own cab area with an open space over the adjacent engine shroud. Whilst the vast majority of these also had an open entrance at the rear, there were some types that the passengers could board or alight through a doored entrance at the front.With a wonderful selection of photographs that will delight enthusiasts of all ages, Mike Rhodes looks back on the twilight years of half-cab buses in the Midlands.

Edinburgh is reputed to have more buildings designated as of ‘special architectural or historic interest’ than any other city in the world. These range from rows of Georgian terraced houses and individual Victorian tenement blocks to such diverse structures as the diminutive Greyfriars Bobby sculpture and the Forth Rail Bridge. Many of the buildings were constructed from sandstone, from a proliferation of local quarries and which could be found in a variety of different colours.The city’s local transport system has a similarly rich history, and this book looks to celebrate these two popular elements in the city’s contemporary setting. Featuring unique and previously unpublished images of Lothian Transport buses sharing the scene with some of these historic buildings, this book will delight anybody who shares a fondness for Auld Reekie.

Following on from his volume focusing on the final years of half-cab buses in the Midlands, Mike Rhodes looks at the major bus fleets employing half-cab buses in North-West England in the 1970s, including those located around Manchester, Liverpool and beyond.Packed with previously unpublished images, this is an evocative and interesting record of a fascinating period in the region’s transport history.

The first railway to reach Preston was the North Union (NU), with a line from Wigan in October 1838. By the turn of the nineteenth century there were some seventy stations within a 15-mile radius of Preston, with approximately half of these still in use in 2022. The variety of motive power to be seen at Preston over the years would rival any station in the entire UK railway network.Mike Rhodes has recorded the railway scene in the locality for over sixty-five years and has been active with a camera since just before the curtain came down on BR steam in 1968, with nearby Lostock Hall MPD being the last functioning steam shed on BR. Here he explores the rails around Preston through fascinating images and informative captions.

Manchester is steeped in railway history going back almost 200 years to the opening of Liverpool Road station in September 1830. The line from Liverpool was widely regarded as the first ever inter-city railway in the world. The railway network around the city greatly expanded in the second half of the nineteenth century with new lines opening to the surrounding Lancashire towns and beyond. At one time the city also supported an extensive dock railway system based around the Manchester Ship Canal and Salford Docks.Manchester’s current rail network sees lines radiating out from all points of the compass and with 262 km of route mileage it boasts the largest provincial railway network outside of London. A number of groundbreaking schemes have been implemented in recent years which have radically changed the pattern of service operations across the city. These have included the Hazel Grove Chord, the Windsor Link, the Airport Extension and the Ordsall Chord. Manchester also had the largest new tram system in the UK in 2023 with nine lines operated by a uniform fleet of 147 Bombardier-built trams.This book is packed with information about the workings of the city’s railways going back as far as the final years of the steam age.

Ribble Motor Services emerged from humble beginnings but expanded rapidly through the 1920s and 1930s before becoming part of the British Electric Traction group (BET) in 1942 and being nationalised in 1969. Over the years, the fleet expanded to over 1,200 buses and coaches based at 30 garages across a vast operating area stretching from Carlisle to Merseyside. The company weathered nationalisation but was snapped up by Stagecoach in 1989 following deregulation.This nostalgic collection of rare and previously unpublished images celebrates the fleet of this iconic and much-loved company.

The Leyland Atlantean was in production from 1958 until 1986 and around 15,300 buses of the type were built over this period. Whilst over 3,500 were exported abroad, the remainder gave sterling service to over a hundred different operators in the UK. These ranged from the transport authorities of Glasgow and Liverpool, both of which accumulated large numbers of the type, to the small independent operators which bought them in penny numbers. The progression of this revolutionary bus, which placed the engine at the rear of the vehicle, went through an exhaustive development programme throughout the 1950s. The first production models were bodied by Alexander’s, Metro-Cammell and Weymanns. In total eighteen different body builders were used by the mixture of operators with three builders completing just one bus each. Towards the end of the 1960s the bus was substantially re-engineered and was redesignated as the AN68 (with progressive variations), the first of which came off the production line in May 1972 and it proved to be even more reliable than the earlier versions. The last of the type were taken out of service in the 2010s but examples still survive in open-top form and can be seen around the UK.Lavishly illustrated with a fascinating selection of previously unpublished images, Mike Rhodes documents the career and evolution of this groundbreaking bus.

The earliest recorded operators of buses in Preston were pioneers who provided services from nearby surrounding villages in the 1910s. The local town services were initially provided by the Corporation’s tramway system with buses only being introduced in 1922. From 1919, Ribble Motor Services gradually became the dominant operator connecting the town to the rest of Lancashire and beyond. Other significant operators were J. Fishwick & Sons, Scout Motors and Viking Motors. The various out-of-town operators established their own bus stations in the town centre while the Corporation bus services used on-street stands. This situation prevailed until 1969 when a new central bus station was opened in the city, and all bus services were transferred accordingly. This book also details special services such as football and works buses and holiday traffic, which used to snake along the Arterial Road (Blackpool Road) in the postwar boom years carrying holidaymakers to the Fylde coast in their tens-of-thousands. The once-every-twenty-years Preston Guild and its impact on local services over the years is also featured.Mike Rhodes documents the bus operators who have served Preston with many rare and unpublished photographs and informative captions.

The Daimler Motor Co. Ltd and the Lancashire Steam Motor Co. (Leyland Motors Ltd from 1907) were formed in 1896 and produced motor vehicles in the early twentieth century. Daimler established works in Radford, Coventry, where a range of high-end cars and buses were assembled.Leyland introduced the revolutionary Atlantean in late 1958 and in August 1960 Daimler’s equivalent, the Fleetline, appeared. The Fleetline possessed many of the attributes of the Atlantean but had one advantage: a drop-centre rear axle fitted as standard, eliminating the need for low-height bodywork. Also, apart from a few early models, the bus was mainly powered by the Gardner six-cylinder engine.The two builders went toe-to-toe during the 1960s and early 1970s. Jaguar Cars, acquiring the company from BSA in 1960, was keen to divest itself of the Bus Building Division and a merger with Leyland Motors followed. Fleetline production was transferred to Leyland’s Farington site in 1973. However, it wasn’t until 1976 that the Daimler name was dropped in favour of Leyland Fleetline, which continued to be available until 1981. Over 8,700 Fleetlines were produced under the Daimler name.With a striking selection of images, Mike Rhodes charts the fortunes of the Fleetline under the Daimler name.

When mainline steam finished in the UK in 1968 many rail enthusiasts put their cameras away. A few dedicated followers continued to record the industrial scene as many small tank engines of various builds could still be found at work in collieries and the like.There was, however, another alternative. Steam was still very active in many countries around the world and could be seen in great numbers in such places as China, India and Pakistan and some of what were then Eastern European countries behind the Iron Curtain. It was not easy to reach these far-flung destinations, but there were organisations that specialised in arranging trips to observe and photograph the different types of locomotives operating in these countries. Mike Rhodes embarked on a series of these overseas jaunts during the first half of the 1980s, visiting China, East Germany, Pakistan, Poland, Portugal, South Africa, Turkey and California in the United States. Closer to home, he also made trips to some of the Welsh narrow-gauge railways, capturing their rich historical industrial heritage on camera.Mike Rhodes presents stunning images that showcase the workings of steam railways across the globe, creating a nostalgic collection that celebrates a world that no longer exists.

Covering Cheshire, Cumbria, Greater Manchester, Merseyside, Lancashire and the Isle of Man, this book showcases the eighty functioning bus stations in the North West, as well as many more long-lost stations. Bus stations, comprising at least two bus stands where buses start, end or pause their journey, first appeared in the 1920s. In the ensuing decades through to the 1970s many buses still had rear entrances, which dictated the design of the typical bus station with buses parking parallel to their stands. From the 1980s boarding arrangements were from the front of the bus and required a different design of station. The introduction of low-floor easy-access buses from the late 1990s required a level platform adjacent to the bus entrance, largely influencing the design of the many bus stations that have been built and modernised in the twenty-first century.Over the years some iconic bus stations have closed in the region, including Blackburn Boulevard, Bolton Moor Lane, Morecambe Euston Road and Salford Victoria Bridge. Some have been modernised or completely rebuilt and continue to serve their local communities, such as Lancaster Damside, Preston, Skipton and Stockport. A wide variety of architectural styles are on show across the North West, including Whalley bus station which has remained unaltered since it opened in April 1954.Mike Rhodes explores the rich and diverse range of bus stations in the region through his collection of vibrant images.

Companhia Carris de Ferro de Lisboa, known as Carris, was formed in 1872 and has been operating the municipal transport in the Portuguese capital of Lisbon ever since. Starting with horse-drawn and cable-car trams, these were gradually replaced by electric trams in the early twentieth century.Lisbon is a hilly city with narrow cobbled streets that twist and turn and the tramway system was built to serve these torturous thoroughfares. Trams reigned supreme for almost seventy-five years before buses were introduced which were almost universally of British origin. The authority amassed a large fleet of single- and double-deck AEC types which mirrored their UK counterparts and were mainly used to expand services to the new suburbs.The British influence waned in the early 1970s and from 1975 the authority invested in a large fleet of Iveco, Scania and Volvo single-deckers to replace their ageing fleet of Regals and Regents. During the 1960s Carris also embarked on a comprehensive programme of bus rebuilding which included the conversion of fifty single-deck types to double-deck types to increase their passenger-carrying capacity. In 1972 Carris was operating a fleet of 560 buses out of three garages which had increased in size to 724 by 2021. In addition to buses and trams, Carris also operated a public lift and three hill-climbing funicular railways, all of which were still in use in 2024.With fascinating images, Mike Rhodes documents Carris buses during the 1980s.

Companhia Carris de Ferro de Lisboa, known as Carris, introduced the first electric trams at the turn of the twentieth century and Lisbon’s tram system gradually expanded over the following decades, reaching its zenith in 1959–63. At this time the fleet comprised 344 four-wheel trams, sixty-one bogie trams and 100 trailers (non-powered) which served twenty-seven main routes.As with the buses, Carris constructed their own trams. In the period 1947–63 ten new bogie cars and around eighty four-wheel cars were built at the Santo Amaro workshops. From the mid-1960s the route network had started to shrink and by 1980 it had been reduced to eighteen routes which required 199 four-wheel cars, fifty-nine bogie cars and just thirty trailers. Only two of the bogie cars had succumbed to fatigue but the type was usually employed on the busy coastal services 3, 15, 17 and 19. Further decline ensued during the 1990s and the network retracted further such that by 2024 only six routes were operated.To operate these services another programme of tram rebuilding was undertaken in the mid-1990s when forty-six of the older cars were substantially rebuilt and were known as ‘Remodelado’ trams. In addition, ten new articulated trams built by Siemens were added to the fleet in 1995 to work route 15. In 2023/4 a further fifteen CAF Urbos trams joined the fleet.With fascinating images, Mike Rhodes documents Carris trams during the 1980s.

Preston Corporation Tramways was formed in 1904, later becoming Preston Corporation Transport Department. Electric trams, the majority of which were built in Preston, were operated until1935. The first buses entered service in January 1922. The department bought nothing but Leyland chassis until 1976, when three Bristol LHS midi-buses entered the fleet. The first ‘OPO’-equipped buses were introduced in December 1968 and consisted of fifteen Leyland Panthers. Preston was a staunch advocate of the Leyland Titan and operated an assortment of PD1, PD2 and PD3 models over the years. Between 1959 and 1967 eight rear-entrance PD2s were famously rebuilt as front-entrance PD3s. A large fleet of Atlanteans was assembled between 1974 and 1983 and these formed the backbone of the fleet for many years.Following bus deregulation in 1986 the company fought a bitter battle with United Transport (Zippy) as both operators went toe-to-toe with large fleets of minibuses. Preston won the day as United Transport was absorbed by Ribble in March 1988 and what had been a chaotic couple of years eventually settled down. In April 1993 the company was sold to a management and employee consortium.Here, rare and previously unpublished images document the years surrounding deregulation in Preston.

The Routemaster is the iconic London bus, recognised around the world.This pictorial account features previously unseen pictures of the ubiquitous RM far and wide throughout the network during the period 1976–83, which included the year of the Queen’s Silver Jubilee, when twenty-five of the type were specially painted in an all-over silver colour scheme.By the end of this period buses formerly allocated to the country garages had mainly gravitated back to the central area, some of which saw further passenger service while others were converted to driver training buses. It was also around this time that London Transport began to dispose of its RMs in significant numbers.