The Barry Festival of Transport saw quite early crowds at the annual Classic Car and Heritage Bus event on Sunday at Barry Island. The hot weather brought out the car enthusiast and the Vale of Glamorgan Council staff said it was the highest numbers of car entries they had seen. Visiting buses was also higher than for several years, with several new visitors helping out on the free trips being offered during the day.
Visitor numbers seemed to be on the par with last year, which we thought was particularly busy, after the Pandemic. What was noticeable was the early turnout with the Island and visitors to our vehicle restoration base at The Bus Depot making it very busy by 11 a.m. The late afternoon threat of thunder did not deter the public taking up the half hourly Open Top Bus journeys which stated at just after 10 and were duplicated after an hour or so remaining busy until the last bus of the day.
Mike Taylor, chairman of the Welsh heritage bus group that organised the Festival
There were many new visitors amongst the 300 plus classic and the performance cars. Enthusiast car groups including the South Wales Classic, Jaguar and the Mini clubs were well represented. Several real classics made the event from the humble Morris Minor or Ford Escort to a 1927 Rolls Royce and a 1929 Austin 12/4 Special.
Barry has seen two or three in the past but around ten American Police Cars turned up, like a movie set from CSI. The convoy stood out, not every day do you see such a range of Sheriff cars such as Gordon County, Bucks County, Pittsylvnia Township, Miami Beach Police and NYPD cars together! Visiting buses from the local industry gave support from Cardiff Bus, Newport Bus and Stagecoach South Wales. On the heritage bus side, they came from various places such as Blaenau Ffestiniog, Swansea, Devon, Birmingham, Bath, Swindon, West London, Weston Super Mare and Eastbourne. The oldest bus at 77 years also made it, a 1946 former London area bus. I am grateful for everyone who came along, to our volunteers and the Vale of Glamorgan Council for making the day possible.
Mike Taylor, chairman of the Welsh heritage bus group that organised the Festival
Anyone interested with spare time interested in helping our Charity restore our Welsh heritage bus fleet including our World War Two Utility Decker can contact us via info@ctpg.co.uk
