Missing from our donated D40LF were any fleet name or other branding. BC Transit had removed these before we picked it up. The horizontal stripes along the bodywork remained, but there was space where the company logo had been on the nearside and front. Chris Cassidy stickhandled putting the TMS logo on the front dash. But the shape of the nearside space below the ‘belt line’ precluded doing the same there.
Our logo, designed by Mike Cui, included our name. Jason Sharpe had the idea of just using that text to fill the vacant space. He also that that we could use a reversed version of the logo on the rear panels, in the same fashion as West Vancouver Municipal Transit used a sailboat motif.
With help from myself and President Bryan Larrabee, we produced high quality drawings suitable for use as decals. In a strange twist we found that the hexadecimal ‘colour code’ of our blue TMS logo matched the blue of the existing stripe almost perfectly. According to the BC Transit graphic standards, it should have much darker. (Maybe the BC Transit colours were formalised after the stripe was applied, or the decal had darkened through exposure to the climate.)
When applying the rear decal, Jason noticed that it would be more attractive if the surplus black background was trimmed off – this he did with consummate care, and the results look fantastic.
You’d be correct if you noticed the snow on the ground in these pictures. I took them on Tuesday, 2nd February at Cullen Diesel Power Ltd. on 192nd Street in Surrey. Bryan Larrabee drove #9753 there so they could perform a CVIP inspection and certification. While the bus was there, Cullen also examined the underside of the coach as part of our Preventive Maintenance program. We’re pleased to say we received good news on both!
