My interest in Ribble Motor Services began as a child in Liverpool where I was brought up. My parents never had a car, so all my travel was by public transport either with Liverpool Corporation, Ribble or Crosville. I was born in Birkenhead and still had a Grandmother that lived there, so I also used the Mersey Ferries and Birkenhead and Wallasey buses. Local Passenger Transport was in my “blood” from birth and I used it until I was 18yrs old when I got my first car.
In late 1966, I found myself with a year off Teachers Training College and waited in the corridor in Crosville’s Edge Lane Depot in Liverpool. I waited and waited and in the end walked out …into the ‘arms of Ribble’ at Aintree where I became a Conductor on the “Joint Services” and also the rural routes into Lancashire. I simply loved the bus life and was hooked. I made lifelong friends there and life was just ‘fun’ on the buses.
Soon I wanted to drive rather than conduct, and I made the move to Liverpool Corporation at Green Lane close to my home in Lydford Road. I trained as a PSV Driver and was soon in charge of Atlanteans, Titans, and enjoying every minute I could get behind the wheel.
I returned to my Teacher Training in Sheffield and was soon working part-time on Sheffield United Tours and that turned into full seasonal work over some 5years, working throughout the UK and Europe. I worked for Ribble or Liverpool, the MPTE by then, in the winters. I was Ribble’s first Part-Time Driver in March 1971, working from Aintree. Most of 1972 was spent working on the MPTE from 'Penny Lane' Garage - officially
Prince Alfred Road - where I drove AEC Regents, Leyland Atlanteans, Panthers and
Titans. The Panthers were my favourite using them on routes 46 and 99. I came to NZ in late 1972, taught and continued my part-time driving and bus interests.
In mid 2003, an accident at work again gave me time off and I turned to developing my NZ Bus interests more. I decided to buy a bus….
I had lived in Christchurch for about a year in 1984/85, and I loved the Bristol RE buses that were the mainstay of that fleet. ”English buses” some with ECW bodies in an “ English City” and they were even in almost Ribble livery.
However it was the Swiss sourced “Hess” design on the Bristol RE that attracted me back n the 1980s’ |
With my renewed interest in NZ’s buses, I went photographing the fleets and someone suggested “You should buy a bus” I went looking at what was available, interesting to me and “historical”. I didn’t want a dual door City-bus and it was the Hess bodied buses that attracted my attention. 
