THE
OMNIBUS
BULLETIN
From mid 1981 to late 1999 folk with an interest in the New Zealand bus and coach industry were able to subscribe to the Omnibus Bulletin. The OB was A5 format, and started off as a monthly, and ended up as an “occasional” publication. In each issue the Publisher tried to have at least one “historical” article, which was supported by both local and international news columns. Other regular topics were Supplyside, Trolleyscene and Small Lots. Sadly there seemed to be quite a few obituaries published over the years as well.
OB was started by Peter Rendall, who produced most of the issues, did almost all the typing, and was assisted for most of the magazine’s history by Colin Hoey in assembling and enveloping it. Allan Lang and Mike Secker allowed their names to appear as Editor (the publisher having a bit of a conflict of interest at times with his real job), and in later years Mike became more involved, contributing Editorials and other material.
The great hero, however, has to be Clive Otway. Clive has a prodigious knowledge of the early days of the passenger transport industry , massive files and extensive photographic material, all of which he freely made available. When accessing the index of articles be aware that Clive wrote a good 90% of them !!!!
Many folk have expressed regret that OB failed - it was never a financial success, and the administrative tasks finally got too much – and my wife said I had spent enough on it over the years ! I have always thought that the Internet might provide a means to resurrect the OB, and now we plan to continue publication electronically.
Welcome to E OB !
By following the links you can get to:
Please note that copies of some issues of the paper OB are still available. Follow this link to the SALES PAGE.