September 2005

Les Hogg & Gary Wilkinson
Members Evening
Report - Frank Long

After our August break, we met as usual for our September social evening to be greeted by the information that the cost of Television Hire would now be £25.00! Anyway, as the evening had already been planned, onwards we went. Les Hogg from Manchester brought along a video tape he had made in 2003 but, before this was to be screened, Les introduced us to a game of Noughts & Crosses!.First he divided the audience into two teams (A and B) and then the game began.He produced a drawing of Eastern Europe and then asked which country lay to the North-West of Hungary.A team provided the first correct answer of the evening and were invited to place their cross on the board. The questions continued until the board was filled with noughts and crosses and the game resulted in a draw whichwas a thoroughly enjoyable way to to explain the geography of the different areas of the Czech Republic.Les went on to introduce his video-showing on a line map, all the places we would see-and one of the first places we visited was pillzen in the south west. We saw many Trolleybuses with there own livery of mainly green and white. with motorbuses in red and white and trams in yellow. The imiges were superb- really sharp - and the colour lovely. Les provided a very informative commentary explaning the two types of all electric trolleybuses in service ( rigid and articulated ) plus the duo-mode vehicles, again rigid and articulated.We were surprised at the seemingly lack of traffic apart from public transport vehicles but Les explained that they had special days for Trolley's only,ect! You could buy tickets prior to commencing your journey which worked out much cheaper than buying them on board the bus - indeed some driversdid not have ticket machines, so you could not travel without a pre-purchased ticket. On one occation Les and his friends had an argument with a particular driver because the latter thought he was being filmed by the KGB! We were also shown some other locations around the area in what proved to be one of the most interesting evenings of the year.From Pillzen we traveled to the mountain bus rally to celibrate 100 years of public transport in the Czech Republic. There were a surprising number of British buses that had made the trip: ex Halton Leyland National, the London Routemaster and the ex - Warrington double - decker proved to be popular with the locals as many of them had never traveled on a double deck bus. Our thanks to Les and his mate John from Bolton.
The evening's entertainment continued with a 3/4hr silent video compiled by Gary Wilkinson from cine cuttings of Bradford and Huddersfield Trolleybuses. The imiges were again nice and sharp and the colour was good. There were quite a few shots of the Saltaire via Thackley route (which I used to drive on) and one inparticular which I concider rare if not unique film sequence of a short working from Saltaire to Thackley- with the trolley turning at Thackley Corner ready to travel back to Saltaire.We all remembered Saltaire,Duckworth Lane and Thornbury Depots and there were many other Bradford memories with shots of Thornton Road, St Enoch's Road, Pasture Lane Clayton ect.
We concluded with the bright red Huddersfield trolleys and the visual reminder that Bradford was not alone with it's hilly topography.
All in all it was a night to remember and we extend our thanks to Les and Gary.