The return of peace brought no ease to the railways, or indeed any transport operator, war battered, short of skilled maintenance staff and the necessary spares or replacements. The railways suffered badly enough, but so too did the bus operators. While the military required far fewer locomotives and other rolling stock than they had during the First World War, bus operators had seen vehicles requisitioned if they were in a ‘safe’ area, sometimes for military use but more often to support operators whose normal traffic had been expanded by military bases or shadow factories on war work in their area.
London Transport had ‘borrowed’ buses from other operators, and its own once smart fleet was showing its age. Early in the war, buses built for export customers had been frozen and then manufacturers had been allowed to complete them for allocation to home operators. London Transport’s most interesting vehicles were trolleybuses originally destined for South Africa: they never got there. These were easily distinguishable by having the upper halves of their windows in tinted glass, which was never changed. Others had a lower-deck forward exit door, which was never used and eventually had a double-seat placed across it.
Much of the pre-war fleet was in a poor condition, with some buses even sagging in the middle. New bus bodies seemed to arrive more quickly than new chassis and engines, so some new bodies started their service with London Transport on old chassis until new chassis arrived. London Transport also had to accept very non-standard utility vehicles, mainly of Guy manufacture, which it got rid off as quickly as possible. The shortage of vehicles, and of fuel, especially once the balance of payments crisis hit hard after the Americans ended ‘Lend-Lease’ in autumn 1945, was aggravated by the determination of many London bus conductors not to allow standing passengers outside the peak periods.