Bus-tin' loose with the homes
March 18, 2005 3:47 AM   Subscribe

What do Norman Cook (AKA Fat Boy Slim), Lord (Richard) Attenborough, Aubrey Beardsley, Lord (Laurence) Olivier, Sir Winston Churchill, Magnus Volk, Dame Anna Neagle, Rudyard Kipling, Sir Rowland Hill and Annie Nightingale, have in common?

They've all had a bus named after them [full list here] in the city of Brighton & Hove on the south coast of England. In Jamaica the buses are named a little more irreverently but this whole naming tradition doesn't seem to be as popular as naming trains with the late Joe Strummer one of the latest in a long line. Pix of the Stummer train here. [Scroll down a bit.]

Anyone live in a place where they name their buses? Or other inanimate objects?
posted by i_cola (24 comments total)
 
Your feelings toward tech affect the tech. My uncle said his truck ran better when it was clean. I've named several of the vehicles that I was emotionally invested in. Henry the Motor Cycle for example. War planes get a name and a pix.
posted by JohnR at 4:37 AM on March 18, 2005


here in the usa, we have an inanimate carbon rod we call dubya.
posted by quonsar at 5:09 AM on March 18, 2005


Boston has named one of its trolleys the "Bacardi Party Train" in recognition of the contribution Bacardi has made to the quality of life in this college city.

As for the Joe Strummer train, there's something odd about that because "Joe Strummer" was a stage name. It just seems odd to bestow an honor (especially posthumously) upon an alias. Not awful or bad mind you, but strange. I'm a HUGE Clash fan, but I think I would have named the train "John Mellor".
posted by Mayor Curley at 5:10 AM on March 18, 2005


We know what is what, but we don't know what is what. We just strut. What the fuck?
posted by hypersloth at 5:12 AM on March 18, 2005


C'mon! Chris Eubank is much more worthy of mention than that Slimboy Fat no mark.

Let let let let let let let let - le-le-le-le-le-le-le-le-le-le-le-le-le-le-le-le - l-l-l-l-l-l-l-l-l-l-l-l-l-l-l-l-l-l-l-l-l-l-l-l - let me vomit on the back of your bus. Drums!

Twat.
posted by nthdegx at 5:15 AM on March 18, 2005


I was going for global recognition nthdegx. And my ex- works for Normy & the gang so gotta be nice ;-)
posted by i_cola at 5:39 AM on March 18, 2005


That's okay. Chris Eubank is as much of a twat, but at least there was some art to his craft (in my humble opinion). Ex, eh? Yeah -- working for him, I'd have dumped her too.
posted by nthdegx at 6:00 AM on March 18, 2005


But what do you really think of Fatboy Slim, nthdegx?
posted by shmegegge at 6:32 AM on March 18, 2005


In my office, we've named all our workstations after characters from What's Happening NOW? It practically came to blows, but I got the one named Rerun.
posted by shmegegge at 6:35 AM on March 18, 2005


Ogunquit, Maine has a number of trolleys named Molly, Holly, Dolly, and so on.
posted by schoolgirl report at 6:49 AM on March 18, 2005


In the US, we name buildings, bridges, roads and just about every other concrete construct.
posted by mischief at 6:54 AM on March 18, 2005


In Nottingham our trams have names
posted by derbs at 6:57 AM on March 18, 2005


In Connecticut and New York, some very old train cars (1950s-60s) still in use on the Metro-North lines have names on the sides. Some are names of people, some are names of places. There's a Governor Ella T. Grasso and a James Fenimore Cooper, for instance, and, if memory serves, a Sing Sing. Oh, and there's a George Clinton, which presumably is named after the colonial politician rather than George "Dr. Funkenstein" Clinton.
posted by scratch at 7:07 AM on March 18, 2005


I think if you saw a person's name on a bus in the US today you could assume that the person paid to have it put there, or someone paid to have it done in that person's memory.

Typically we name stadiums after corporations -- despite the fact that they nearly always involve public money -- and concert halls after benefactors. Offhand I can't think of a case in which something was named after a person and money didn't change hands. I'm sure it happens once in a while but it's the exception to the rule.
posted by George_Spiggott at 7:17 AM on March 18, 2005


Apocryphal: as they built the channel tunnel, there were two teams boring from each side - a French team and an English team. Each crew had two huge expensive monster boring machines. The British called their two machines T.B.M. 1 and T.B.M 2. The French called their machines Francoise and Josephine.
posted by Meatbomb at 7:19 AM on March 18, 2005


I stole a sign off the train from Dortmund to Stuttgart, that identifies it as the Oskar Schlemmer.
posted by StickyCarpet at 8:09 AM on March 18, 2005


How come on each bio page they make mention that the buses were sold in April 2004? Did the city upgrade their fleet ?
posted by jeffmik at 8:19 AM on March 18, 2005


There's talk of corporate sponsors for our subway lines--the TacoBell 4 train? the CaptainMorgan A train? But people have said that it's advertising poison to have "A man was pushed to his death in front of the TacoBell 4 train yesterday" in the news.
posted by amberglow at 9:03 AM on March 18, 2005


I guess that's one good thing that can be said to come out of random subway assaults.
posted by scratch at 9:04 AM on March 18, 2005


At U.Va. we don't name our buses, but we do have a bus numbered 1337.
posted by thecaddy at 9:56 AM on March 18, 2005


On a related note, the North Carolina DOT, while not changing the names, has "affiliated" each ferry in the transportation service with a state university, repainting each one to match each university. Undoubtedly, Carolina's is the prettiest but with the shallowest draft.
posted by Pdubby at 12:29 PM on March 18, 2005


i can't believe no one has mentioned naming computers yet. There's even RFC 1178 to give guidance.
posted by dkg at 2:38 PM on March 18, 2005


Victoria BC named the busses after other countries in the commonwealth for the commonwealth games in 96 or when ever they were there.

The spirit of New Zeland etc.
posted by joelf at 5:46 PM on March 18, 2005


Ogunquit, Maine has a number of trolleys named Molly, Holly, Dolly, and so on.

So does Chicago. Including one named Kukla, Fran, & Ollie.
posted by SisterHavana at 7:35 PM on March 18, 2005


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