On the buses

It's 25 years since I was given this customised Matchbox Superkings 'London Bus'. I was a journalist on the Sheffield Star and de facto (albeit unofficial) Transport Correspondent. I made it my business to dig out the bus stories. No, don't laugh, the buses in Sheffield provided a rich seam of shenanigans for a young reporter. When the Socialist dream of 5 pence fares to anywhere in South Yorkshire ended (oh they were good days) it was replaced by absurd bus congestion as every man and his dog set up a bus company. There were crazy tales of drivers racing to beat their competitors to the next bus stop, with fisticuffs ensuing, ridiculous 'bus jams' in the city centre (no, competition is not always good) and more. But my piece de resistance was an investigation into secret takeovers by SYT, the biggest operator, who had inherited the name from the socialist republic days of South Yorkshire Transport. They were buying up rivals, using other companies as a front, to avoid detection by the Monopolies & Mergers Commission. Except I blew the lid off it when they covertly bought out their main competitor. My investigation never quite made the impact I'd hoped though, because they then did the sensible thing and came clean, somewhat devaluing my story just as we were planning on splashing it.

I got on well with their PR guy, a chap called Steve Arnold. I keep meaning to look him up on Linkedin, but he might even have retired by now. It was Steve who gave me this bus, in SYT livery, commemorating an open day at SYT's East Bank depot in 1986. I recently found it and momentarily considered sticking it on Ebay. It must be a bit of a collector's item, complete with original box. But it's part of my history, so I think I'll hang on to it a while longer.