New bus for London

Ok this isn't strictly Plymouth news but I thought many of you would be interesting if you haven't seen this already. The final design was announced yesterday and I must be honest, I think its quite a shocking design!


There were some pretty decent concepts that were dreamt up about this 'New Routemaster' still capturing at least the essence of the old. But this? Well personally this simply looks like a slightly rounder Enviro 400 with less lights? I really do doubt that this will be the "Icon of London" that Boris was hoping for! They talk at length about the efficiency of the new Routemaster and how it will be ideal for London, but really the whole backbone of this project was to bring back the favourite along with the icon looks, and this it simply does not achieve. Will we be seeing these in some 50 years time on the front of postcards? I have my doubts.