One Door or Two? Pt 1

RC169 considers an age-old question by looking at historic operations in central southern England—what are the merits or otherwise of a dual door bus? He looks at and compares policies at Hants & Dorset, Provincial and Southampton City Transport but first starts in Bournemouth…

Definitely not for the first time, this question arises, this time from my recent contributions regarding wheelchair friendliness (or otherwise!), and some of the subsequent comments. I thought it worthwhile to consider the question from a more general perspective. The part of the UK with which the owner of this blog and I are most familiar provides some interesting examples over the last sixty years, so I trust you will understand my concentration on central southern England.

Bournemouth Corporation

Bournemouth Corporation espoused the dual door concept for double deckers from the early 1930's, with front and rear doors, and two staircases, and a 'passenger flow' system – boarding at the rear and alighting at the front. With a few exceptions (wartime utilities and a few second-hand trolleybuses) the same configuration was used for many years.

The concept had been abandoned, however, in favour of conventionality when the first Atlanteans and Fleetlines arrived in 1964. One can only speculate as to the reasons why, possibly the economies of scale that would be available by making more space for passengers to travel outweighed the advantages that reduced dwell-time at stops that the multi-door layout theoretically offered.

Or was it that the inability to include a rear door and staircase in the rear-engined deckers so substantially altered the concept that it was not worth pursuing? The passenger flow concept would certainly not work so well when the two doors are not placed at the respective ends of the vehicle. I have come across rear-engined double deckers with multiple doors and staircases, but they have been considerably longer than the Atlanteans and Fleetlines of the early 60's. Since then, so far as I know, there have been no more dual door buses in the Bournemouth Corporation fleet.

Next instalment… Hants & Dorset and Wilts & Dorset…