MidlandRed.net

Thanks for updating this Adam !!

This remains the best website for anyone who has worked for Midland Red, or travelled on their buses, and there must be hundreds of us STILL who could share their recollections (good and bad) !! --

Midland Red played a part in MILLIONS of everyday journeys made by Midland people !!

I guess that "chason" is the oldest member of the forum, - but is there anyone who is a regular at the museum who is older ??

What a depressing thought (for me at any rate)! I'd not really thought about myself in those terms but DD12 may well be right. I am actually 77 but they say you are as young as you feel which on some days is well over that but, fortunately for me, on most others very considerably less. It certainly doesn't seem almost 70 years ago since my daily journey on the144 from Malvern Link to school in Worcester clutching my 6d (2.5p in today's money) for my daily Scholars Return ticket.
I agree with DD12s comment about the part played by Midland Red in so many lives. Very few had cars so depended on the local bus company for almost every trip to get to school, work, shopping or pleasure and I think, generally speaking, were very satisfied withe the service provided. I think one of the biggest mistakes made by the big groups as they began to corner the market was to do away with the local identity and to go for the national corporate image. The 'friendly' Midland Red, as most of the local bus companies, was held in high regard by very many of their passengers and that brand loyalty was quickly lost.

DD12 wrote: ↑

19:37 Sunday 16th August 2020

I guess that "chason" is the oldest member of the forum, - but is there anyone who is a regular at the museum who is older ??

Steady on, you can't go insulting fellow members like that!

I can't remember the exact date it went public, but this website is now over twenty years old. It was started to document the "new" Mercedes O.814 Varios that had recently arrived ar Worcester, so that probably makes it more like 21-years old now. It's a shame that early digital cameras were so rubbish as all of those early photographs are too poor to use, by modern standards. Luckily some people were still using good old film so other photos have replaced them.

While at Wythall on Saturday we got talking about the age of the exhibits there (the buses, not the staff) and it always seems odd to me that National 544 has been established there for many years, yet I drove that in service at Worcester depot back in the mid-1990s.

BMMO D9 5016 ("The Rain Maker") was doing a fine job on the trips to and from the Maypole, yet that is about 58-years old now... That's older than me by over ten years!

Hi Everybody,
I've just found this site again after a few years in the wilderness!
Not many forums around these days where you can talk about the past!
I don't do"facecloth" or "twatter"
Anyway, nice to see some of the old uns still talking buses even though my old garage ( Coalville ) never made many conversations! Last time I was anywhere near the old place it was up for sale!
You'll have to excuse me if I wander off a bit, I'm not yet as old as your oldest member "chason" but I'm quickly catching him up and the sun out here ( it's been 18 years now ) starts to fry the old memory banks!
I hope to pop in once in a while and maybe someone else who remembers Coalville garage or even Leicester and Wigston between 1968 - 1986 can get in touch!

Hi Pete

Its Karl Brailsford, remember me?

Hi Karl, have sent you email to old addy.
Do not want to speak here and cannot send PM