I worked in it for a short while spanning the changeover to GLC stewardship in January 1970, and it was truly horrible. Anyone who advocated large, open-plan offices should try working out bus schedules surrounded by about 120 other people doing exactly the same thing. I was glad when my traffic management traineeship took me elsewhere!
I worked in many parts of 55 Broadway and like you say some parts were not very nice although the last part I worked was fine. I would not say that the NOC was bunker like just a restricted area and only those that had business could get in other than those that worked there. There were other areas which were very restricted and entry was very tight.
Worked in it for many years and I liked the Officer's mess but you had to be invited if you were not the correct grade.
I definitely wasn't on the guest list!
You were not in the right circle I take it.
Never have been! LT was a hotbed of Freemasonry too, I've since learned, and I've never been that way inclined. I've always been too irreverent for my own good.
It was rife when I worked there and I suspect it's just the same or worse. I recall someone who was on a DB and when it was over the chairman and others asked the person who had been DB where they would go for a drink and the result of the DB all charges dropped. There was a relief station manager who was so high up in the movement that he would not take promotion and was even allowed to ride a white horse in the Shell ticket hall entrance at Waterloo, first name Vic.
I only know about this from a conversation I had in my bookshop in Cornwall with a very nice chap, aged probably mid 70s, who bought a book from me on 'London Transport and the Trade Unions' and asked me why I'd be stocking such a book! Having explained my interest and brief, long-ago work connections, he told me his father was xx who'd been high up in bus operations in the 1960s, and indeed I'd heard of him but he'd retired just before I joined. He said his father was expecting to join the Board but he was barred, no reason given, but was convinced it was because he wasn't a member of a lodge. The chap telling me this also said that the order were particularly active on the Underground side, quoting a couple of names I'd certainly heard of, very high up.
The registered office address changed because Windsor House closed and the TfL legal team, whose location dictates the registered office, was relocated to 55 Broadway.
[My highlight] That's an interesting reason - if you don't mind my asking, what religion are you?