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Publisher : The PSV
Circle |
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Review 1
If you are interested in buses you
may wish to know of a new
publication detailing the fleet of
Algoa Bus.
This has been prepared by Andrew
Johnson who has made regular visits
to Port Elizabeth over the past few
years. The fleet list has the
benefit of access to Algoa's records
and those of the U.K. enthusiast
organisation The PSV Circle, of
which Andrew has been the Treasurer
for 50 years and has recently become
the President. The relevant records
of
Bus Bodies/Busaf are also
incorporated.
The fleet history comprises 36 A5
pages and includes a short
introduction, full details of all
buses owned and 39 pictures, mostly
black and white.
Please
me for details on how to obtain this
book.
Reviewer: D. C. |
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Review 2
Trainspotting is an extremely
popular pastime all over the world,
and one enterprising UK gentleman,
Ian Allan, began his successful
railway publishing business by
producing a booklet which listed all
the SR locos, and to this day these
booklets are still published with up
to date lists of all the UK railway
locos.
Busspotting however, falls a bit
behind its train cousins, especially
in South Africa, something that
Andrew Johnson's new booklet 'Algoa
Bus' may just help to change. This
extremely informative and detailed
booklet on Port Elizabeth buses
lists all the current buses and
includes many withdrawn ones. The
extract below was taken from a
review in the April 2006 issue of
Truck & Bus magazine.
"The booklet bulges with
incredible detail, listing every
current vehicle at - and many
withdrawn from - the Algoa Bus
company by fleet and registration
number (both original CB and CCN
prefix, plus later EC suffix
series), in addition to chassis and
bodybuilder’s numbers, rebodying
data (where applicable), seat and
standing capacity, number of decks,
door location, date new and previous
owner details – not forgetting their
fleet and registration numbers, too.
The previous owner category is
impressive, represented by Leyland
Victories ex-Putco, Durban
Transport, United (including
Greyhound) and Ciskei, Ciskei ERFs,
a Pretoria Atlantean and a
Johannesburg AEC Regent V.
Johnson includes data on vehicles
sold to Cape Town after Algoa Bus
superseded the PE Tramways company
in 1990, few of which survive today.
Prominent in the present fleet of
more than 300 are 100 MAN Explorers
(nos 501-600), none more than 5
years old, and 48 ex-Putco Leyland
Victories (901-948) with
characteristic Dubidgeon bodies. A
feature of contemporary Port
Elizabeth buses is the high standing
capacity – as much as 46 on an ERF
Trailblazer or Leyland Victory with
53 or 54 seats.
Astonishingly, in a production as
comprehensive as this, the author is
not South African, though he made
successive visits here in the course
of his research. Chairman of the PSV
Circle, an active UK enthusiast
group, he is now busy with a
companion volume for Cape Town – an
even more daunting challenge.
Algoa Bus is profusely illustrated,
reflecting a rich variety of
different vehicles, reminiscent of
municipal fleets like that at
Pretoria, six decades ago. Many
vehicles have been rebodied, making
it difficult to identify individual
buses by visual inspection. The
photographs include visiting buses
that happened to be in Port
Elizabeth when the book was being
put together (such as an SA
Roadliner double-deck intercity
coach), and also typical
minibus-taxis.
Enthusiasts interested in a copy of
Algoa Bus (£9 or a R100 note which
will also cover postage) should
write to
Andrew G Johnson, 30 Bonnersfield
Lane, Harrow HA1 2LE, England."
I was lucky enough to receive a copy
of the booklet from a friend and
have found it invaluable. Living in
Port Elizabeth means that I see the
Algoa buses everyday, and now having
the information about the buses on
hand I am encouraged to take photos
of them at every opportunity, at
last I need only look up a number in
the booklet to get all the details.
Reviewer: D. C.1 |
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Double-Deck Trolleybuses of
the World
-
Beyond the British Isles |
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Publisher :
Adam Gordon, 2004 |
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ISBN:
1874422508 |
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Of the 861 double-deck trolleybuses that
ran outside Britain, no less than 522
were to be found in South Africa.
Spain came next, with 172;
Portugal had 50; Sydney and
Adelaide operated 59 between them;
Sri Lanka ran to 35.
With the exception of Moscow (12 AECs
from the UK), the remainder - including
Germany and Malaya - could be counted on
one hand. Germany did have 28
unusual one-and-a-half-deck
trolleybuses, though strictly speaking
they fall outside the range of the
book's title.
Trolleybus enthusiasts will be lucky to
get their hands on this desirable
96-pager, its publication limited to
only 700 copies. Along with 32 systems
in other lands, those of Bloemfontein,
Cape Town, Durban, Johannesburg and
Pretoria are described in detail,
profusely illustrated with rare photos
that few will have seen before. Many
were taken by people better known in
rail circles (such as the late Roger
Perry), others by well-known Durban
collector Kevan Mardon, one-time SABC
radio personality John Silver and
slightly less familiar names like Noel
Reed and Pam Eaton. A feature unique to
early Johannesburg buses - route number
display on the offside - is
mentioned though not illustrated.
One of the vehicles pictured was part of
an order for Johannesburg diverted in
the early days of World War II to London
Transport, who numbered it 1745.
Another, LT 1749, was supposed to have
gone to Durban. Two absorbing pages deal
with experimental vehicles tried in
Johannesburg during the eighties, in the
course of a test project largely funded
by the national Department of Transport.
A minor criticism might be the absence
of maps. It would have been instructive
to trace routes so comprehensively
described. Back in 1975, author Brian
Patton (who took many of the pictures
himself) put the finishing touches to
the definitive publication Johannesburg
Tramways - which did include maps. Tony
Spit, who wrote the original text, died
aged only 31 in 1968. Patton (by
profession a history teacher) added
chapters including two on trolleybuses
and saw the 137-page work through the
press. As in the case of the present
volume, he worked from a distance -
Scotland
in fact, where he has lived all his
life.
One or two miniscule errors of detail
may be forgiven - Patton is not the only
one confused by the niceties of Cape
Town's tramway company names and
details. The City Tramways Company
Limited, for instance (a "group of
private companies") was actually a
public company in its own right, dating
from 1878. And the old tram depot in
Woodstock (which "made way for a block
of flats") was in fact replaced by the
new six-floor headquarters known as
Tollgate House. You can bet on it - this
reviewer had an office in the building.
Reviewer:
R. D. - as
published in the June
2005 edition of Truck &
Bus SA |
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Author:
Fraser, Gill & associates |
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Publisher: Cape
Electric Tramways, 1961 |
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Trams - real trams on rails - are
the main subject matter in both
Track and Trackless and Johannesburg
Tramways, though they do deal with
trolleybuses as well. Neither
unfortunately covers the field of
motor buses.
Cape Trams, which
includes a number of historic
photos, was an official company
centenary publication. Although the
first horse-drawn trams only started
operating in 1863, the formation of
the original Cape Town Tramway
company preceded that date. By 1898,
both the Port Elizabeth and Cape
Town tram systems were subsidiaries
of the same parent. The book
accordingly covers the history of
both trams and buses in both cities,
and also the Western Cape "country"
cousins at Mamre, Paarl,
Stellenbosch and Strand. (Saldanha
and Worcester are not mentioned;
both joined the fold only in later
years).
Reviewer:
R. D. - as
published in article in the
monthly Truck & Bus SA
during 2003. |
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Author:
Spit,
A H M
with
additional material
by
Brian Patton |
| Publisher : Light
Railway Transport
League, 1976. |
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The story of Johannesburg
Tramways is a tragic one. Author
Tony Spit did not live to see it
completed and published. After
his death in 1968 at the age of
only 31, the manuscript lay
untouched until a British
publisher arranged for Brian
Patton to finish the project in
1975. Including material that
had not been available
previously, Patton in his 137
pages credits several well-known
names for their assistance.
Reviewer: R. D.
- as
published in article
in the monthly Truck
& Bus SA during
2003. |
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Publisher :
Transport Publishing Co,
1984
: The Promotional
Reprint Company, 1992* |
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| Track
and trackless.
Cape Town |
| Publisher :
Struik, 1976 |
| ISBN:
0869770632 |
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Running to
240 pages, Track and Trackless
is a beautiful book in large
format, profusely illustrated
with 164 photos and many line
drawings, and bulging with
interesting and useful facts. A
real labour of love, it was the
result of painstaking research
by Peter Coates of the South
African Library, who coupled all
his professional expertise with
deep personal devotion to the
subject matter.
[In 2005,
Coates put together a follow-up
edition listing all the
references used in Track &
Trackless as well as those for
"abandoned research on railways
of the south-western Cape".
Running to almost 300 pages
between hard covers, it was
produced as a very limited
edition of 3 copies. It
runs to nearly 300 pages and is
marked "not for sale". ]
Reviewer: R. D.
- as
published in article in
the monthly Truck & Bus
SA during 2003. |
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Tramway systems of Southern
Africa. Johannesburg |
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(unpublished monograph) 1971 |
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More people, it seems, were drawn to
trams than buses, and more has been
written about them. A useful 69-page
record, detailing all the trams used
in South African cities and the
routes they served, was compiled in
1971 by W
Des Howarth. Entitled Tramway
systems of Southern Africa,
regrettably it did not get beyond a
duplicated version, and few copies
have survived. Trolley lines at
Lourenço Marques - today's Maputo -
are also included, as are those
at Victoria Falls, Umtali and
elsewhere.Reviewer: R.
D. -
as
published in article in
the monthly Truck & Bus
SA during 2003. |
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Our
world on wheels.
Randburg |
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Publisher: United
Transport, 1987. |
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ASIN:B0006ER2RE |
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Covering both road trucking
and buses, Tom Maund's Our
world on wheels (1987)
chronicled 25 years of the
United Transport group, from
its initial investment in
South Africa in 1962. Not
long afterwards, United
pulled out of buses, to
concentrate on its extensive
freight interests under the
Unitrans label.
Reviewer: R. D. -
as
published in
article in the
monthly Truck &
Bus SA during
2003. |
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Port
Elizabeth
Tramways.
Port
Elizabeth |
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This profusely
illustrated record of trams and
buses at Port Elizabeth was
published to coincide with the
centenary of the PE Tramway company
in 1979.
All the highlights of 100 years are
covered, such as tramway
electrification in 1897, the
crippling competition by "pirate"
buses in the twenties, the great
floods of 1908 and 1968 (watch out
for 2028!) and the gradual takeover
of surviving independents -
including bus services originally
provided by the S A Railways.
Reviewer:
R.
D.
The first part of the
64 page booklet is devoted to
history of the tramcars beginning
with horse-drawn trams in 1881 and
then the introduction of electric
trams in 1897. The remainder of the
publication covers the bus services
and is richly illustrated with
photographs of various models of
single and double-decker buses in
use up to 1979. It lacks a route map
of the electric tramway and bus
services.
Reviewer:
B. M. |
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| Publisher: Röhr
Verlag, 1989 |
ISBN:
3884901524 |
| Publisher: Seven Hills
Books, 1991 |
ISBN: 388490132X |
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Has a section with detailed coverage
of all tram and trolley bus systems
in South Africa, and listings of
tram and trolleybus fleets. I
obtained a brand-new copy of this
book in 2004 from Germany through
www. abebooks.de
(text in German and English).
Reviewer: B.
M. |
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| Kimberley
Tramways - a history of
Kimberley's Tramways 1887-1985 |
| Author :
Sabatini, Richard |
| Publisher : Kimberley
Litho Printers, 1985 |
| ASIN: B0007BE37S |
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Concise and richly illustrated
32-page A4 format publication of the
complex history of Kimberley’s
Tramway Companies and includes the
return of the present tram service
in 1985. It has four excellent maps
showing the extents of the services.
Reviewer: B.
M. |
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| A
Historical Survey of
Kimberley Trams |
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Facts about Durban 2nd
Edition |
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Famous Motor Coaches and
Coachways of the World |
| Published :
Frederick Miller,
London, 1957 |
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Includes some text on
South Africa and three photos - a
Leyland Comet, a Guy with underfloor
Gardner engine and a single-decker
allegedly rebuilt from a London
Transport Guy Arab Mk III.
R.D |
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