1) Whereabouts in Chandler’s Ford can you find these flags in? Which renowned business is it in Chandler’s Ford? Have you visited this venue before?
2) Whereabouts is this Genius Escapes business in Chandler’s Ford? (Do you know the answer without having to search online?)
3) We love buses! Do you have some stories to share about these buses?
Image credit: Bluestar
Put your answers and thoughts in the comment below. Thank you.
Morning
Charles Baynanams butchers on the parade. The family are from South Africa.
The vape shop at the Arcade.
And the 47 Bus. . .now the no1 on the Southampton to Winchester route. The 47a went around Hiltingbury. I used to go to school in Southampton . . .spent many a time in lost property in both bus stations.
Hi Karen,
Thanks for your answers. Well done!
The second photo – The Genius Escapes – is not a vape shop. I came across Genius Escapes last weekend – at the Central Precinct, just next to the former HSBC (currently Steel Tank) location.
I walk or drive past the area very often but somehow have just noticed this shop last weekend! I was told that it was open around November last year.
This seems like a great concept – “You are in a room with family, friends or co-workers, surrounded by codes, puzzles, locks and brain teasers….You have 60 minutes to solve as many as possible and ESCAPE.”
One of the B&W pics shows a “Lowdekka” Bristol which was the standard type in the 1960’s. Behind it looks to be an Aldershot & District double decker. One view of an older Bristol bus is taken in the old Winchester bus station, & the red single deckers possible there too.
The red colour was, I think, used after the old green Hants & Dorset was superceded, but before de-nationalisation in the 1980’s.
There were various versions of Bristol double deckers in the 50’s & 60’s. The Low Bridge type, which had a sunken gangway on the offside of the upper deck, & four-seat ‘pew’ seats upstairs.
You had the famous “Please Lower Your Head” sticker on both decks, often ‘vandalised’ to read…Fleas love your head !!!
There was also the Highbridge version, without these features, but they could not pass beneath low bridges.
The “Lowdekka” was designed to supercede the older types with a standard design, but it itself was altered as time went on.
Those were the days when there was a conductor (clippie) aboard too !
M.Napier.
Thanks Martin.
Regarding the 2nd bus photo (Black and White), Bluestar wrote:
“The Hants & Dorset 47 route ran between Southampton and Winchester via Chandler’s Ford and Otterbourne; it was the antecedent of the present Bluestar 1 route.
On a summer day in the late 1950s, highbridge bodied Bristol KSW6G LRU 64 awaits departure time to return from Winchester bus station to Southampton.
New in October 1952, LRU 54 was in service with Hants & Dorset until 1972”
On the first photo of the bus, Bluestar wrote:
“Antecedent to the present Bluestar 1, the Hants & Dorset 47 route ran from Southampton to Winchester via Chandler’s Ford. Operating the route in the mid 1960s and photographed in Winchester was Bristol LD6G UEL 720, which had been new to Hants & Dorset in March 1958.
The Hants & Dorset timetable book used to show connections at Winchester with Aldershot & District route 14 onwards to Alresford, Alton and Aldershot, and following UEL 720 in this photograph we see an Aldershot & District Dennis Loline, also dating from 1958, on that company’s 14 route.”
On the Red bus, Bluestar wrote:
“Pictured at the Blenheim Road depot and bus station in Eastleigh in the mid 70s is DKE 265C, a Leyland PSUR1/1R single deck bus with a Willowbrook body; it had been new in 1965 and transferred to Hants & Dorset in February 1972. A similar single deck bus that dated from 1967, but likewise transferred to Hants & Dorset in 1972, can be seen on the left.
To the right is a more familiar type of Hants & Dorset vehicle of that era – Bristol FLF6G GLJ 750D had been new to the Company in June 1966 and carried a 70 seat forward entrance body by Eastern Coach Works.”
Re Bus Fares – To and from Winchester to school was ‘free’ (taxpayer funded, of course) with students season tickets issued each term … the full adult fare from Eastleigh Turning (Top of Leigh Road) was 1/- return to Southampton (20 minute journey) and 1s/3d return to Winchester (30 minute journey) … the buses on the 47 and 47a routes in those days were older than those shown and mainly Leyland … one of the factors determining the make/model of buses used, on various routes, was of course ‘low bridges’, such as the one at Compton Village under the Winchester by-pass at that time, and some even lower in some areas.
We drove past Central Precinct yesterday and, as I was not driving, I was able to look around. “There’s the shop that’s in the quiz” I exclaimed when I saw Genius Escapes. Like you, I’d not noticed it before; although I don’t often go past Central Precinct either!
I bow to “Bluestar’s” greater knowledge than mine on both ‘bus descriptions & also the location I erroniously gave as Winchester, when it is actually the old Eastleigh Bus Stn.
Can you remember before that bus station was set-up, & buses stopped along Southampton Road?
Where the Job Centre is now, there was a model shop, where the bus stopped outside, en route back to Chandler’s Ford. (Spent much time gazing at the models & kits in that shop, & bought a model boat kit out of plywood there, plus electric motor etc., there once) !
In the same area (near the Eastleigh bus station) was Bryce Slade – a tiny shop full of magical electrical components. Or might that have been the same shop you are talking about? I spent a relative fortune there, amassing a wonderful and time-consuming collection of bits and pieces. And as a small boy I was able to ride all the way there on my bicycle from the top of Leigh Road without having to worry about traffic.