Routemasters of the Universe

The last Routemaster to ply a proper London bus route retired to the garage back in 2005. But over 15 years later, this indestructible bus still pops up everywhere! Nowadays, merely in London, Routemasters are wedding buses, Ghost Buses, afternoon tea buses, mobile yoghurt stalls on the South Bank… And elsewhere, all over the world, they have found new homes and been put to the most unlikely but serendipitous uses. Harry Rosehill catalogues 50 of the most ingenious and endearing uses of a Routemaster bus, from a tea room in Essex to a posh B&B in County Durham, a promotional vehicle for a circus in Moscow to a McDonald’s in Germany, not to mention making history during the Gulf War as a Human Shield in Baghdad. Along the way he explains how Routemasters were built to last so long, why they’ve become so cherished, and where you get a spare big end for a 70-year-old commercial vehicle. This book gives an alternative history of a true London icon, and a celebration of ingenuity, determination and the sheer variety of human life.