Buffalo in the ’70s: New NFT buses arrive at the Aud

By Steve Cichon
steve@buffalostories.com
@stevebuffalo

This former NFT bus, a 1967 GMC Model TDH-5304, was the wave of the future when it and 33 others started rolling around Western New York.

Buffalo News archives

This undated photo, likely from the late ’30s or early ’40s, shows those “Old Look” buses lined up for service along the Porter-Best route.

Buffalo News archives

By the time the Blizzard of 1985 struck, the NFTA was replacing “New Look” GMC buses with an even newer look — these 1983 GMCs were the first to arrive on Western New York roadways with the orange and brown color scheme that the NFTA used through the ’80s and ’90s.

Buffalo News archives

These three buses were fighting through the snow on Seneca Street at Stevenson as life began returning to normal after the 1985 blizzard.

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Steve Cichon

Steve Cichon writes about Buffalo’s pop culture history. His stories of Buffalo's past have appeared more than 1600 times in The Buffalo News. He's a proud Buffalonian helping the world experience the city he loves. Since the earliest days of the internet, Cichon's been creating content celebrating the people, places, and ideas that make Buffalo unique and special. The 25-year veteran of Buffalo radio and television has written five books and curates The Buffalo Stories Archives-- hundreds of thousands of books, images, and audio/visual media which tell the stories of who we are in Western New York.