Routemaster coach RMA48

English: Routemaster coach RMA48 (ex-BEA31) (reg. NMY 631E) was one of the batch of front entrance Routemasters built as express coaches for use by British European Airways (BEA). Also equipped with luggage trailers, they transported passengers from their Cromwell Road Air Terminal in Kensington to Heathrow Airport. Initially numbered BEA31, it was delivered to BEA in January 1967, wearing blue & white BEA livery, followed by a more striking orange one. Following the creation of British Airways, absorbing BEA, it received a darker blue & white BA livery. In June 1979 it was one of the last batch of these air buses bought by the owner of most other Routemasters built, London Transport, and renumbered RMA48. Still wearing BA blue & white and initially stored, in November 1981 it eventually entered service for LT as a staff bus, transporting workers to and from Aldenham Works, LT's main overhaul facility. When Aldenham was privatised in October 1985 as Bus Engineering Ltd (BEL) it passed to them, being repainted into their mainly grey livery. By August 1987 it was finally redundant, and passed to dealers PVS and then Wigley. A month later it was sold to the London operator Blue Triangle. In July 1992 it had a destination blind box fitted. In June 2007 Blue Triangle's bus operations were sold to Go-Ahead, and RMA48 and all the other vintage buses passed to the new London Bus Company. Having at some point been painted in LT livery, from June 2007 it has been on long term contract to BBC London 94.9 for use as a mobile radio station.

BBC London 94.9

9 June 2007

Pictured at BBC London's Springwatch Garden Party held on 9 June 2007 in the Memorial Recreation Ground in the London Borough of Newham, where it was used to broadcast a special live edition of the Springwatch show. [1]

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22 November 2007

Pictured outside the London Transport Museum in covent Garden, on the occasion of the museum's re-opening after a two-year, £22 million refurbishment.

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3 May 2010

Pictured on a bank holiday Monday in Covent Garden as the 'Battle for London bus', [2], a month long programme of outside reporting around London from 7 April to 7 May 2010, relating to the 2010 London local elections (held on 6 May).

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17 June 2011

Pictured at Watney Market in Shadwell, Tower Hamlets, East London, on a 3 day mission to canvass local resident's views live on air about the forthcoming 2012 Summer Olympics to be held largely in nearby Stratford, under the banner 'London 2012:What's In It For You?'.

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22 April 2012

Pictured in Canary Wharf during the 2012 London Marathon, parked next to the Upper Bank Street part of the course.

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