delt1c
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In the late 50's many models were available as front or rear entrance models. Always wondered why the Lodeka LD was never available as a front entrance
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Front entrance Bristol Lodeka LD
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I don't know if there were any technical reasons which made the LD (and LDL) chassis unsuited to front (technically forward) entrance bodies, the FS range which succeeded it had lots of front entrance examples, indeed the 30ft FL saw very few built, the size really only existed as the front entrance FLF.
But government restrictions on the sale of Bristol/ECW products (which had been nationalised almost by default along with the Tilling group of bus companies) meant that in the 1950s they could only be sold to other state-owned organisations. This effectively meant the ex-Tilling bus companies and some Scottish companies. These tended to be very conservative in approach indeed compared to the BET group and some municipal operators.
But even big and progressive operators such as Midland Red who designed and built their own vehicles didn't go for front entrance deckers in the '50s despite having built large numbers in the 1930s. It was really with the arrival of the 30ft decker in quantity with companies like Ribble in the late 1950s that front entrances started becoming more popular, the logic being platform safety when the conductor might have a long way to get back to the platform at each stop to work the doors. The driver took over this duty on front entrance buses.
But government restrictions on the sale of Bristol/ECW products (which had been nationalised almost by default along with the Tilling group of bus companies) meant that in the 1950s they could only be sold to other state-owned organisations. This effectively meant the ex-Tilling bus companies and some Scottish companies. These tended to be very conservative in approach indeed compared to the BET group and some municipal operators.
But even big and progressive operators such as Midland Red who designed and built their own vehicles didn't go for front entrance deckers in the '50s despite having built large numbers in the 1930s. It was really with the arrival of the 30ft decker in quantity with companies like Ribble in the late 1950s that front entrances started becoming more popular, the logic being platform safety when the conductor might have a long way to get back to the platform at each stop to work the doors. The driver took over this duty on front entrance buses.
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