Routemasters shut door to hopping on and off

THE desperate dash to jump onto the open back of a Routemaster bus has become a thing of the past, after its famous hop-on, hop-off service came to an end.

The change follows the axing of 300 conductors as part of a £10 million costcutting programme by Transport for London — and it will mean the end of an era that began in 1956.

Unions voiced fury at the job losses and said conductors were being treated as “scapegoats”.

New-generation Routemasters, which stops. Nineteen routes already run without assistants and yesterday they disappeared from the final six: numbers 9, 10, 11, 24, 38 and 390.

The Number 15 will remain hop-on, hop-off, but is a heritage route aimed at tourists.

Pete Kavanagh, London regional secretary for the Unite union, said: “London buses are a success story and the network looks ready to expand with an increasing population — there should be plenty of jobs available for conductors.

“There is no way that these conductors should be made the scapegoats because of the vanity project of Boris Johnson when he was mayor.”

The assistants are employed by bus operators Arriva, Go-Ahead, Metroline and RATP. TfL pledged to work with the firms to provide support and information on job opportunities for sacked conductors elsewhere.

Leon Daniels, TfL’s managing director of Surface Transport, said: “The conductors have done a great job, but the New Routemaster routes that don’t have conductors also operate very effectively and we can no longer justify the £10 million extra costs that could otherwise be invested in modernising the transport network. We are working with the bus companies to find conductors other opportunities within the transport industry.”

The new-generation Routemasters were a flagship policy of Mr Johnson. Costing about £350,000 per vehicle and designed with Thomas Heatherwi c k ’s He a t h e r wi c k S t u d i o s , the buses have hybrid engines and are fully accessible.

However, they suffered problems with air conditioning, and are being fitted with upstairs windows, at a cost of £2 million, after passengers complained of stifling heat.