I had no idea it was on the cards for the E500s to be withdrawn. I wonder what will replace them at Aberdeen.
It certainly would help but I don’t imagine that will be anytime soon…
I imagine if E400MMCs come North it’ll be 68/19 plates
It was said that the remaining ones would be used on school services, but with the changes next week a lot of the school buses come from normal service and do not go back and forth to the depot, so there will be little savings there.
Is there any evidence of this? It is specifically Enviro400MMCs Aberdeen were expecting not Enviro400s.
Internal, as well as a post on the First Bus facebook group. The comments on that seem to be indicating the whole batch going.
Could you post the link to the post, please?
There are definitely e400s going to Aberdeen. I saw the one mentioned in the depot today.
They're 11/61 plates that have been upgraded to Euro 6 and they're perfectly fine for the work in Aberdeen with slightly more capacity than the MMCs. Much better on fuel than the E500s with their shocking MPG
Those 2011 plate enviro 400 models don’t have much up on the enviro 500s besides there fuel economy and lack of rear tire scrub.
It isn't the full batch, they will replace most but not all of the Enviro500s, 38213 and 38223 are already earmarked as staying. The reason E400s are being transferred instead of Enviro400MMCs as originally proposed is because they're intending to bid for funding for new Electric Deckers next year. Quite an odd move really, they're doing fleet movements on the basis that they will be successful in the bid... Surely it would've made more sense to keep the E500s for one more year rather than spending a fortune repainting and retrimming the E400s just for them to potentially go in a year too.
I’m wondering if Aberdeen will bid for Wright Electroliners instead of E400EVs to keep the fleet more standard.
Technically they don’t need to retrim as they are probably ok inside or no worse off than the E500s.
I would not be counting on another round of Scottish Government funding being available for large companies to purchase electric buses after the current one this year, as the low emission zones will be established with the current funding round and due to the Scottish Government budget pressures.
How can you convert an EV when they produce no emissions anyway…
Apologies, I meant the Enviro 400 diesels.
Source, please.
One of the company directors...
They're going to start running into more capacity issues now and again with university peak loads.
Don’t the E400s have the same number of seats if not similar compared to the MMCs and E500s?
Five less seats, which on a high frequency route like the 1/2 adds up to 40 less seats per hour (basically a single decker bus). Standing capacity on the E500s is also higher due to their longer length and higher permitted weight due to them being triaxle.