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In this Year of the Bus 2014, the RT family is 75 years old.  Having celebrated by operating on route 22 between Piccadilly Circus and Homerton on 12 April and by running RT1 over its first route exactly 75 years later on 9 August, it is now the turn of route 11 to round off a year of celebration. 

 

RT1 was the first of a class that would become London's standard bus of the fifties and sixties.  Numbering nearly 7,000, they formed the largest standardised fleet of buses in the world.  In addition to the majority AEC RTs, the family included Leyland versions, the RTL and the eight-foot wide RTW.  Most routes featured only one or sometimes two of these types, but route 11, on Saturdays in the mid-1950s, fielded all three.  Those days will be recreated on Sunday 2 November, when four RTWs, four RTLs, ten RTs (all over 60 years old) plus RT1 operate in service over London's most famous route, the 11.

 

Organised by London Bus Museum, the free operation (other than RT1, which will charge a fare of £5) will start at 1000 and run all day.  Until about 1700, buses will run every 10 minutes between Aldwych and Chelsea World's End, via Trafalgar Square, Westminster Abbey , Victoria and Chelsea's King's Road.  Every half hour, buses will continue beyond Aldwych via St Paul's and Bank to Liverpool Street Station.  Every hour, buses will continue beyond Chelsea to Hammersmith.  Later, a small number of buses will continue in service between Victoria and Liverpool Street, until 2130.

 

The full timetable, identifying which bus is planned to operate each journey, is here.   RT1 will run as GM11, duplicated by RTL139 as R5.   The journeys are shown in the timetable under running number 5.  The buses scheduled for each running number are as follows: