Friday Variety

Yesterday, the fbbs travelled from Ardgartan (depart - 0730) to Searon (arrive 2000) at which point enthusiasm for blog writing had dissipated! A pre-posted "variety" is the best the old bloke can manage. A Scotish snippet or two may have been added.

Hydrogen Bombs Again

The above fine and splendid personages are just launching some new buses in Mulheim, Germany. The operator is a consortium called Ruhrbahn which seems to have a very well kept fleet in fetching yellow ...

... including some rather nifty minibuses.

But the new buses are  Unterwegs mit Wasserstoff , as displayed modestly above the personalities above.

Readers may be able to deal with "Unterwegs" as "Underway" but "Wasserstoff" was initially perplexing; however, it does literally mean "Water Stuff". And our astute reastiers will have guessed that Wasserstoff is Hydrogen.

But all is not well with Mulheim's Water Stuff.

The article explains ...

The latest hydrogen bus setback in Germany is no surprise. Essen and Mülheim are now stuck with 19 hydrogen buses that need to travel up to 89 km round trip just to refuel after the state of North Rhine–Westphalia withdrew its subsidy for further fleet conversion. The financial burden has left the cities scrambling for alternatives, but the real question is: why did anyone expect this to work in the first place?

This is just the latest in a string of failures for hydrogen buses. Wiesbaden scrapped its hydrogen bus program and pivoted to battery-electric buses instead. London’s hydrogen double-deckers proved too expensive to run, with Transport for London (TfL) acknowledging that the cost per mile was nearly double that of diesel buses, even with subsidies. 

A 2023 report from TfL revealed that the total operating cost of hydrogen buses was around £1.50 per mile, compared to £0.80 for diesel and £0.65 for battery-electric buses. The high costs, combined with refueling challenges and supply chain issues, led TfL to shift its focus toward battery-electric alternatives.

We're Short Of Money - says Chancellor

Really? £700 milion?

£200 million for the North East's mega mayor?

£200 million for new Cambridge South Station.

 

£140 million for a station "refresh"...

which makes £13,000 seem small change.

Truiy, in the broad scheme of things, it is small change, but not the best PR to leak out at the time of a fares increase. Note also that the lads and lasses of the fourth estate could not be bothered to find a picture of the correctly "wrapped" bus.

fbb will oblige.

It still looks brown and not red to fbb!

AI : Creates Atrocious Illustrations

It does admit to a "created" picture which appears to show a large vessel powered by so many batteries that there is no room for cargo.

Prophetic, Eh?

AI : Atrocious Illustration in Chesterfield

The building looks like Chesterfield's Stagecoach depot, once Chesterfield Corporation bus shed. Indeed the east side has a large parking area facing the main road, the old A61.

Now, are you really telling us, an Awful Implication, that Stagecoach have lined up twelve identical single deckers, nose to tail, to illustrate the wonders of electric buses and their charge points?

Presumably they are all going off depot in that precise order. But the left hand four are not next to chargers anyway.

Another Day, Another Livery

Once it was the 747 and 757 ...

Then it became just the 500.

They used to look like this:-

Smart single deckers rode the road between Glasgow city centre and it's airport.

Then in 2018 there was an upgrade, a re-launch and a new livery - all at once.

Distinctive stand-out paint job with ab obvious plane-a-zoomng.

But what did your eagle eyed octogenarian spot as awaited his Lochs and Glens Volvo in North Hanover Street?

You guessed it! A brand new brand for the 500.

Not bright, not distinctive and with a barely visible plane. Well done brand consultants.

The 500 picks up at various city centre stops ..

... Notably Buchanan bus Station and on -street stops for Queen Street and Central railway stations. Daytime frequency Mon to Sat is every 10 mins ...

... every 12 on Sunday.

fbb spotted several 500s at North Hanover Street (stop for Queen Street station). An occasional couple boarded or alighted leaving single figure loads in and out.

Maybe it was not a good time for flights, but First certainly did not cover it's costs on the trips fbb observed.

Maybe the crowds boarded at Central?

Hmmm?

Never mind, eh? The new 500 livery will soon be abandoned and replaced with First's richly memorable new look.

Hmmm?

Hydrogen A P.S. ...

... to an earlier blog.

So it was contaminated hydrogen? Contaminated with what?

Borscht?

 Next Variety blog : Sat 22 Mar