By Andrea
According to the Guardian this could be ‘the end of the road’ for the famous London black cab.

The taxi we all know and love is the FX4. Its friendly rounded curves and satisfying clunky doors are somehow reassuring; we know we’re safe.

The new TX4 just doesn’t have the same feel. It seems to be a bit of a pastiche of the black cab, put together by someone who really wants a top of the range BMW.

Still, there are enough FX4s out there that for the foreseeable future you’ll be able to take a ‘black cab’.

However Ken Livingstone pulled the Routemaster bus out of service. That’s the famous red doubledecker bus that has been an icon for generations of Londoners.

To be fair to Ken, there are some good reasons why Routemasters just don’t cut the mustard. Disabled access is a very weak point compared to modern low-floor buses, and the older buses aren’t fuel efficient either. None the less, taking the Routemasters out of service deprived us of one of our most striking symbols.

The Routemasters do still operate on two routes  though - from Royal Albert Hall to Aldwych on route 9, and from Trafalgar Square to Tower Hill on route 15. So if you want to take a proper red London bus, make your way to one of these routes and hop on.

Or head to Brick Lane, where an old Routemaster is now in use as a restaurant - ‘Rootmasters‘. The pun may not be great but the veggie food apparently is.(Rootmasters, Ely’s Yard, part of the Old Truman Brewery complex.

http://www.thelondontraveler.com/black-cabs-and-routemasters/