April 3rd 2020: From the archives…. 18 years ago

3/4/2020

The year is 2002 and HM The Queen was celebrating her Golden Jubilee. Gold buses appeared across London whilst in the provinces Stagecoach opted for a gold and royal purple version of its’ corporate ‘Beachball’ livery.
First we head to London where RM650 (650DYE), carrying the fleet number SRM3 shows off its Gold livery. The and bonnet area as well as around the windows was painted which gave a bright gold finish, however, the remainder of the bus had vinyl applied which have an almost matt finish appearance. Then as a contrast we see Arriva’s V157 (H157XYU), a Volvo Citybus B10M-55 with Alexander RV bodywork. It also carries advertising from Surf as part of a sponsorship deal.

Now we move to Peterborough where Stagecoach gave its two Bristol FLFs a Golden Jubilee look - 52 (JAH552D) and 453 (JAH553D) are pictured whilst operating services to the East of England Show.

Finally for today, we have Stagecoach Cambus 224 (P324EFL), a Plaxton Pointer-bodied Dennis Dart, which proclaims its Low Floor accessibility and has an interesting application of the red in the Stagecoach stripes livery at the rear of the bus.