London Buses route 87

87
Overview
Operator	London General
Garage	Stockwell (SW)
Vehicle	Alexander Dennis Enviro400 10.1m Volvo B7TL 10.1m / Wright Eclipse Gemini
Peak vehicle requirement	21
Night-time	Night Bus N87
Route
Start	Aldwych
Via	Charing Cross Westminster Vauxhall Wandsworth Road Clapham Junction
End	Wandsworth
Length	6 miles (9.7 km)
Service
Level	Daily
Frequency	6-12 minutes
Journey time	28-56 minutes
Operates	05:00 until 00:00

London Buses route 87 is a Transport for London contracted bus route in London, England. Running between Aldwych and Wandsworth, it is operated by London General.

History

Route 87 was previously numbered 77A. It was renumbered on 3 June 2006 as part of Transport for London's policy of removing letter-suffixed routes.

The original route has a longer history, once being part of route 77 running from Kings Cross to Raynes Park. In October 1956, Monday to Friday morning journeys were extended to Worcester Park, until October 1978. Meanwhile, from 1959 the Sunday service, and from 1965 the Saturday service, was renumbered 77C, running via Westminster Bridge instead of Lambeth Bridge.

Until their replacement by Routemasters (RMs) in 1973, a varied mixture of types including RTs, RTLs and STLs had operated the service through allocations involving Merton (AL), Stockwell (SW), Victoria (GM), Walworth (WL), Camberwell (Q) and Chalk Farm (CF) garages. By the time of conversion to Routemaster, the route had settled down to operation shared between just Merton and Stockwell garages.

From 28 October 1978, the southerly extension to Worcester Park was cut back to Raynes Park. In April 1981, Saturday and Sunday services were re-introduced, albeit only running to Wandsworth on Sundays. At the same time a Monday to Friday bifurcation was introduced to Putney Heath, replacing the withdrawn section of Route 28, with the rest of the route running to Raynes Park. In April 1983, the Wimbledon to Raynes Park section was withdrawn.

From 27 October 1984, the remaining Merton (AL) Garage allocation was withdrawn, leaving Stockwell (SW) Garage as sole operator. This coincided with the withdrawal of Route 77A between Wandsworth and Wimbledon, with Merton Garage now running the replacement Route 156 over this section.

In the same year, Route 77A was used to trial the third of three evaluation Volvo Ailsas which featured a Routemaster-style rear entrance, albeit with doors. (London Transport were evaluating several new types at the time, all operating from Stockwell Garage, mainly on Route 170).

The Volvo Ailsa trial ended on 3 August 1985 when the route was converted to One Person Operation (OPO) under the third of four major OPO conversion programmes that year. The conversion of Route 77A was one of several deemed controversial at the time for bringing OPO to large-allocation Central London routes. (The Peak Vehicle Requirement of 33 was at the time was the highest in London for an OPO service).

On 25 May 1991, the northern section between Kings Cross and Aldwych was withdrawn, replaced by Route 30. The Putney to Wandsworth section was renumbered 77C (now 670). By this time, the route was in the process of gradual conversion from Daimler Fleetline (D/DMS class) to Metrobus (M class) as Stockwell Garage started receiving second-hand Metrobuses from elsewhere.

In 2001, the Metrobuses were formally replaced by brand-new Plaxton President (PVL class) vehicles.

On 3 June 2006, Route 77A was renumbered 87. It was the last route in London with a suffixed number due to the unavailability of a suitable replacement number. However, the number 87, as used by a long-standing Barking and Romford area service, became available from 25 March 2006 when that route was withdrawn and replaced by an extension of Route 5). The now-available number 87 was then quickly utilized for the renumbering of Route 77A.

Upon being re-tendered, the route was retained by London General with a new contract commencing on 1 June 2013 with existing Alexander Dennis Enviro400s and Wright Eclipse Gemini bodied Volvo B7TLs.^[1][2]

Current route

• Aldwych
• Charing Cross station
• Trafalgar Square
• Whitehall
• Westminster station
• Tate Britain
• Vauxhall Bridge
• Vauxhall bus station
• Wandsworth Road station
• Clapham Junction station
• Wandsworth Wandsworth Plain

References

External links

• Media related to London Buses route 87 at Wikimedia Commons
• Timetable