Wednesday 7 March 2012

Not the Number 306 route

Well, now, here's a bit of a puzzle.  A modest web search indicates that there used to be a 306 running between Crystal Palace and Blackheath, until 1996;  but then again, there seems also to have been a 306 running between New Barnet and Leavesden.  Both these areas count as London nowadays;  suffice it to say, however, that there is no such route in the TfL world now but, as it our habit, we feel we should mark its non-existence.

And I thought I would take the opportunity to have a little moan about pub names.  You may have noticed it as a thread in some postings:  some pub names are strange and wonderful;  some are run-of -the-mill.  But it seems little enough to expect the pub website to explain the name.  And yet few of them do: too busy describing the food and the quiz nights.

Sometimes you can work out 'who' from the sign:  here's The Duke's Head, and it's clearly the Duke of Wellington;  never mind the uniform, just admire the nose, the reason he was called 'Old Hookey'.  And a lot of Queen's Heads can be identified from a sign.

Wetherspoons does the right thing by its pubs.  You can always find a couple of sentences offering reasons for the name.  I should like to appeal to other pub chains, and indeed publicans, to do the same.  How can you run a pub called 'the Change of Hart' or 'the Bald Faced Stag' and not be curious about it?

Just a suggestion...

2 comments:

  1. Perhaps a future project, once you've finished bussing, is to write the definitive guide to pub names in London?

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  2. A new 306 bus started on 7 December 2019.

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