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Electric buses seem to be fairly common in UK city centres. I first saw one in London about 4 years ago - it was surreal when walking past a typical red double
by spongeb00b 8y ago
Electric buses seem to be fairly common in UK city centres. I first saw one in London about 4 years ago - it was surreal when walking past a typical red double decker at a bus stop and it just glided away with the faintest whirr.
I’m all for buses and taxis turning electric to reduce the diesel fumes in cities.
- tialaramex 8y agoGliding away silently is often a hybrid. London does own electric buses, but mostly it has hybrids (and lots of conventional diesel buses). If you were on the bus its engine probably started a minute later, it's still an improvement, and I assume that environmentally not spewing fumes at bus stops helps a little with local air quality, but it's not usually an electric bus.
- Blackbeard_ 8y agoYeah, right on. To put some numbers behind that it seems only ~1% of London's buses are electric whereas about a third are hybrid. http://content.tfl.gov.uk/bus-fleet-audit-31-march-2018.pdf http://content.tfl.gov.uk/bus-fleet-audit-31-march-2018.pdf
- magduf 8y agoConsidering that most of a city bus's use is at low speed, constantly braking and accelerating from stops, the hybrid should be a huge improvement environmentally; it's the perfect use-case for a hybrid powertrain (where the ICE just runs at constant speed and charges the batteries, known as a serial hybrid vehicle).
- mcv 8y agoAmsterdam also has a number of electric buses, though I'm not sure how many. I'm also glad to see lots of Teslas and Priuses as taxis. Clearly this is the low-hanging fruit for cutting back on fossil fuels: short range city traffic that's in constant use. It also improves the air quality in city centers.
- heavenlyblue 8y agoHow Ansterdam taxi drivers afford Teslas, btw?
- mcv 8y agoSame way they used to afford the Mercedeses they had before, I suppose.
- dractori 8y agoGiven gas prices, cost of oil changes, and the number of miles being driven per year it probably makes economic sense.
- magduf 8y agoIt's too bad Toyota doesn't make battery-electric cars; they'd be the perfect car for a taxi. Teslas are expensive and not that reliable, but if Toyota decided they wanted to capture that market they should be able to dominate it with their reliability ratings.