Furious East London man demands action as TFL buses keep smashing into his parked car

CCTV footage shows a London bus scraping Reece's car
-Credit: (Image: Garry Middleton/SWNS)


An East London man has compared parking outside his home to "spinning the roulette wheel" after his car was repeatedly damaged by TfL-managed buses. Reece Manning, from Harold Hill in Havering, first experienced issues in February 2021 when a Stagecoach bus scraped his car while passing it on the road, resulting in costly repairs that Stagecoach eventually covered.

However, since then, Reece's car has been hit again by buses, and his mum's car was so badly damaged in June 2023 that it had to be written off. The most recent incident was caught on camera, showing the bus hitting the car, slowing down briefly, and then driving off.

Reece said: "The bus driver hit the car and then just drove off. You can see from my neighbour's camera footage, it's quite an impact. The car shakes a lot. It's not a minor scrape, so the driver would know that he's hit something." He added that each incident involved buses travelling in the same direction, on either bus route 256 or 294.

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Reece is currently seeking compensation from Stagecoach and TfL for the latest damage. While he has received compensation for the two previous incidents, he described the "stress" of waiting for the pay-outs as tough, reports the Mirror.

He remarked: "A repair is always just a repair at the end of the day. Even then, you've still got two weeks of waiting for them to get back to you. It's the stress of knowing you can't really park on the road. You spin the roulette wheel every time you park outside your house that a bus could just hit your car."

He continued: "You can see from the video how clear the road is, it's not like the driver has to navigate between two parked cars it's just one parked car on the side." Following the incidents, Reece has called on Stagecoach and TfL to carry out an investigation to prevent any more damage on the street.

When approached for a response, Stagecoach directed queries to TfL. Rosie Trew, TfL's head of bus service delivery, stated: "We're very sorry for the distress caused to Mr Manning and the damage to his vehicle. We are investigating with Stagecoach, the bus operator, to establish what happened."

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