It's been another super Superloop Saturday and the channel's been out on the decks! Woop to the SL11, the big red express rocking the hood from North Greenwich to Abbey Wood.
Head to TikTok for all the reels of buses driving past and the full-length route videos, also more shots of buses driving past and route videos in the opposite direction. We got you covered!
Bit sad the Mayor didn't rock up but seems he only does weekdays. Not even Bus Aunty made an appearance. But BusTokker09 was there, also Jings, Markie, Rizzo, Dr Kilt, Denzel, the Carshalton Crew, Axeman Joe and some excitable 8 year-olds with their dads. Check out all their channels too, goes without saying.
I can't lie, the worst thing was they didn't even send the right vehicles.
What we expect on Day One is a pristine fleet in red and white, fully branded. What we got was old red Wrightbus Eclipse Geminis drafted in to cover for the lack of NB4Ls. These vehicles had plates like BG59FXD and BV10WVG which makes them 2010 vintage, so hardly the gleaming start Sadiq promised. Like Rizzo said, "Man these vehicles are older than I am!" Our first bus was so ancient that the driver had to hop out of his cab to try and nudge the front door open.
Thing is, the SL11 is due to run with electric double decks. But they're not arriving until later in the contract so the plan was to stopgap with New Routemasters instead, recently turfed off the SL3. But even they're not ready so instead we got doddery diesels making up at least 80% of the fleet. I don't think I saw more than three Boris Buses in SL11 livery all day. "Who even was Boris?" asked Rizzo, "the Mayor has only ever been Khan in my day."
Obvs we waited long enough to catch a proper SL11 with the white top and red bottom. When it came it had the proper blobby diagram on the side, also maps inside for the SL11 and N472 which is the nightbus version. But we were only on board for two minutes going nowhere before the driver chucked everyone off. I didn't hear why because like everyone I had my chunky headphones on. So we all piled off and had to get a scuzzy old bus instead, and someone from a rival crew got the front seat and that was my westbound reel wrecked.
Best thing about the SL11 is how often it is. The old 472 was only every ten minutes but this is every six, and ten an hour is massive! It means you're never far away from catching one, unless you're at a stop where it doesn't stop in which case you could be proper far away. It also meant there was none of the usual Day One riots as all us hormonal spotters piled onto the same top deck, because there was so many top decks to go round. Great vibes!
Bus statz by Jings
The SL11 is the most frequent Superloop route! every 6 minutes: SL11 every 8 minutes: SL4 every 10 minutes: SL8 every 12 minutes: SL1, SL2, SL3, SL5, SL9, SL10 every 15 minutes: SL6, SL7
The SL11 is the most 5th most frequent TfL bus route! every 5 minutes: 18, 38, W7 every 5-6 minutes: EL1 every 6 minutes: 29, 41, 86, 158, 207, SL11, W3 every 6-7 minutes: 5, 73, 137, 141, 279
I can't lie, a lot of the SL11s were mostly empty. Every six minutes does seem well generous, even for shoppers piling from Thamesmead to Woolwich. But it was proper great to sail past all the stops in Thamesmead North where the 472 used to stop and the SL11 doesn't. Ha we watched them put their arms out, and ha we whizzed straight past. It's their own fault for living near a bus stop they should have realised might be skipped one day.
Also the roadworks between Charlton and Woolwich are pretty rad. There's like a mile and a half of orange barriers and narrow carriageways, also lorries and diggers, also long wide trenches where unhelpful street furniture used to be. It's all so cyclists can have a safer ride, also Markie on his e-scooter. But it means 18 months of nasty disruption, no cap, and that totally slowed the bus down.
But it was still pretty fast. Jings says the 472 used to take an hour off-peak and the SL11 is now timetabled for more like three-quarters. We actually did North Greenwich to Abbey Wood in 37 minutes flat, although that's before everyone in southeast London climbed in their cars and drove to the shops so we imagine it was slower later.
Disappointingly no freebies. In the old days the jobbers in pink tabards appeared on day 1 and handed out maps and advice, even pin badges. Rizzo has all the pin badges on his rucksack. This time nothing, not even a smiling nod towards the bus because I guess TfL is skint now.
Anyway you don't want words you want vids, better still vidsto anurbanbeatwithoccasionalwordssuperimposedon top. All our favourite streams are on our ownchannels, including the full ride and the one Tokker sped-up after filming buses turning into the stand. Sorry for the five minutes of glare when LTZ1851 was driving into the sun, but we had to include it for completeness. If you're proper old, like over 30, you might also want to look at the photos the greyhairs with big lenses spent all day taking.
We don't yet know when the gang will next be together IRL, no info for the SL12's yet been spilled. But see you probably in the summer for a ride to the godforsaken estuary edge in Rainham, all faithfully recorded in portrait mode and watched by almost ten of you. Bring on the Havering Loop!
