Electric, Hydrogen & Hybrid Electric Buses in Ireland

devnull

Does it really surprise you though?

As stated the Norway comparison was completely illogical because it's a totally different city which has 5 metro lines (with another on the way), 6 tram lines etc which make for a far more developed non bus public transport network overall where people generally travel shorter distances on buses. so single decks would suffice. That is completely different to Dublin where the average bus passenger journey is much longer and Bus is the main mode of transport in the city where double decks are required and double deck electrical vehicles with appropriate range are far less established compared to single decks.

I have to say that the quote from the NBRU suggesting that exempting bus garages for planning legislation to deal with this problem is the kind of fanciful pie in the sky solution I'd come to expect from the NBRU. It's hard to take them seriously when they come out with statements like that. It's nowhere near as simple as they are suggesting and is populist nonsense. Now don't get me wrong, I do think that there is room for planning law reform in this country, but the idea that we can just start bypassing the whole planning system when we feel like it isn't something I could ever support.

The media in this country have a very poor understanding of public transport, infrastructure and the parts that make it up in general and it's sadly there generally are always more articles that suffer from poor research and ill-informed analysis than the ones which actually are able to do that properly. It's not just on TV though. I often squirm when I hear people from the industry be interviewed on the radio as it's normally quite apparent that the person interviewing them has no idea about the industry, the key optics or how it works.

This is a shame for us as a country as it also means that the powers that be, whether that is the Department for Transport, The NTA, the operators themselves or anyone else involved in the industry, do not get the level of scrutiny that they should do as the media are not properly able to hold them to account as they lack the understanding, don't care, or both.

mikeybhoy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121343471#Comment_121343471

Not really for capacity reasons. The continental 12m single deckers are usually designed differently than Irish/UK single deckers. I was on a single decker in Italy with 3 doors which I noticed was plated to carry 90 pax which is very similar to a normal double decker in the UK/Ireland because there were few seats and plenty of room for standing pax and bendies generally carry about 150.

bk

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121344437#Comment_121344437

Yep, they have the same capacity, but much less seats, those sort of single deckers have about 30 seats, while a typical Dublin Decker would have over double the number of seats, high 60's to 70's seats depending on model (SG 67 seats for example).

Interestingly over time we have been slowly moving to less seats, the AV/AX had 76 seats while I think the EW class has 65. Of course mostly to make space for wheelchairs, buggies, etc. but when not in use leaves more standing space.

Now I'm curios how the O route single deckers will be configured, the single deckers in Cork were definitely configured for many seats and have poor capacity versus the double deckers.

The point still stands though, having so few seats on a single decker is acceptable when you are only travelling relatively short distances, mostly between Metro stations, etc. It wouldn't work for our current setup of very long bus routes, though I'd love to see us move that direction in time.

LXFlyer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121345613#Comment_121345613

The buses to be used on the O Route are the same as the fleet used by Bus Éireann in Athlone.

donkey balls

Was talking to a truck driver who was delivering into our place his company has got some electric trucks? I asked him about charging and he said the rapid chargers take the truck about 45mins to charge and the slow charge a few hours.

He did mention that they spend most times on a low loader after technical issues.

Peregrine

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121340000#Comment_121340000

Sunday 19 November for Summerhill launch

p_haugh

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121360445#Comment_121360445

https://twitter.com/dublinbusnews/status/1726276324111856018

EWs were meant to be out from today but according to AV415 on Tapatalk (they're a Summerhill driver), the buses were kept off duty for the photo op.

dublinman1990

As per the NTA press release today; Summerhill's charging infrastructure has the ability to charge 56 buses in the depot. Although releasing 20 buses into Summerhill over a few weeks seems a bit small. I thought there would be more than that stored in Ardee. Although some of the EW's are for Bus Eireann in Limerick.

Once the chargers are up & running in Phibsboro from December. It will charge 80 buses in the depot.

https://www.nationaltransport.ie/news/transport-minister-nta-and-dublin-bus-unveil-electric-bus-charging-infrastructure/

Trouwe Ier

Hitachi charging stations, as is the case at Roxboro Depot, where rumour has it that the first of the EWDs may arrive towards the end of the coming week. I think that there are/will be chargers for 48 buses at Roxboro although there is plenty of room for more as it has a far bigger "footprint" than Summerhill.

p_haugh

Bit of an insight to the charging setup at Summerhill

https://twitter.com/CEO_DublinBus/status/1727618028811010156

p_haugh

At least 11 EWs have entered service now according to Bustimes (However EW2 hasnt tracked in over a month)

They've still mostly been restricted to the 122/123, but some of them have done some workings on the 15B, C1/2 and even the L59.

AX636

EW2 is back in Wrightbus

mikeybhoy

What garage will getting chargers next after Broadstone and Summerhill?

AX636

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121473426#Comment_121473426

Ringsend and Harristown I think

bk

Interestingly it seems the new EW's are out in force on the 123 route now. I was out walking today and noticed 4 EW's on the 123 in a few minutes. Looking on bustimes.org it seems of the 10 buses out at the time on the route, 9 were EW's and one SG.

Nice to see them appearing in large numbers like this now.

ELM327

Interesting. 75kW (not kV - sic- as dozo mentioned) DC charging for 48 buses. Probably some load sharing so let's say 2*24 75kW chargers. That's some setup. I assume it's cheaper than Derv.

AX636

Today they are all spread out on Summerhill routes, mainly SG' on the 123 today

bk

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121525321#Comment_121525321

Boooo… lol, most be reading boards and messing with us 👋😁

It was cool to see so many back to back, they look and sound great.

john boye

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121525321#Comment_121525321

Is that to keep the failures spread wide rather than having a load of them concentrated on one route and shredding reliability?

AX636

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121525789#Comment_121525789

No idea, but at the end of the day they will be on every route in the garage anyway

thomasj

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121525321#Comment_121525321

Yeah just seen one heading inbound on the 33 at swords village followed behind by one on the 41c

mikeybhoy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121527713#Comment_121527713

The 33 would be a good test

john boye

I'd have thought the 33 wouldn't be ideal at night if they're having visibility issues with the camera mirrors.

AX636

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121528779#Comment_121528779

It'd only on certain EW buses, I tried to get one for the 33 and the depot manager gave me a big fat no

mikeybhoy

Read this online. Good grief that's ugly seemingly Wrights have updated the design of their latest Electroliners to look like the picture below. Wonder will future EW deliveries follow suit hopefully they'll continue the old design like they did for the SGs.

VG31

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121552748#Comment_121552748

If I saw that bus from a distance, particularly from the front, I'd think it was 15-20 years old. It reminds of the AVs/AXs which isn't a compliment.

devnull

The huge windscreen makes me think of one of these.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/gbbuspics/4924471830

Tarabuses

Is that a low height version of the Electroliner?

zell12

London - Optare Metrodecker run by Go-Ahead

L1011

First electric DB double decker trip for me today

More comfortable than any other deckers, but not by much. The noises made at low speeds are a tad annoying. Acceleration and braking are less aggressive than on the PAs

The route displays were all just empty with a time seven minutes ahead of reality, and no stop announcements, making tracking where you are in the dark with damp windows just like it was before the old stop announcements/signs came in