A serial-hybrid bendy with hub-mounted motors, expected to enter service in late 2009. B-b-b-but we keep being told that only Boris can save the planet with his new Routemaster. and now the Germans are ahead of us? Schweinhund!
The support of politicians and the public sector in the form of subsidies is required to make the one-third higher costs for this technology in large-scale production worthwhile for both customers and manufacturers
Well, how about it, then? With rumours of further big cuts at TfL, will the hybrid programme survive?
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So they cost a third more, but save up to a third of the fuel consumption, so its a long term saving for a quieter journey and quieter less polluted city, hmmmm
Yes, that’s about it. Spend now to save later. Not a Boris trait, one suspects.
The price will come down with volume production, which makes the real comparison Boris’s brand new and expensive bus in 2012 against whatever Daimler are knocking these out for by then, which will be rather less. Either way, the new RM is looking bad value for money, particularly with the reported scrapping of GWT today (I’m still not sure whether that’s now the whole scheme gone or the extension that I didn’t expect to go ahead anyway).
If I’m ever in the position to make the decision, I’m getting London these – http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4f/Gothenburg-bus-16-by-BIL.jpg
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-23675692-details/Woman+dies+after+bendy+bus+collision/article.do