At last, finally a two door one staircase design of the New
Routemaster has arrived!
It was first unveiled at Covent Garden on 16th March and the initials ‘SRM’ are believed to stand for 'Son of Routemaster'. The newly designed
bus is manufactured by Wrightbus whilst the chassis is made by Volvo. The
company who designed the original New Routemaster bus was Heatherwick Studios.
Transport Engineer
has produced a report on the new bus:
Wrightbus and Volvo launch SRM hybrid bus
A new version of the Wrightbus double decker – inspired
by the New Routemaster – was unveiled yesterday (16 March
2016), based on the Volvo B5LH Euro 6
hybrid chassis.
Dubbed SRM, the new bus body retains
the look of the New Routemaster – more than 720 of
which are currently in service around London – but has an overall length of 10.6m – 0.7m shorter – and has two doors and a single staircase, rather than three doors and twin staircases.
Ian Downie, managing director, sales
and custom care at Wrightbus, explains that the vehicle is the result of TfL’s (Transport For London) requirements.
“TfL presented us with a challenge to
develop the iconic look of the
Routemaster with a shorter overall
length, single staircase and twin
doors, which could be built on an
alternative driveline combination,” states Downie.
“The look of the side structure, roof and floor are the same as the
original New Routemaster, along with
a number of other important design
features – to preserve the style of its iconic predecessor,” he continues.
“From a body perspective, we also sought
to achieve a high level of commonality
of spare parts, so that the aftermarket
support can be optimised.”
Downie says that, aside from the
chassis, the main difference between the Routemaster
and the SRM is the moulded
fibreglass dome.
“This is an additional structure to the
rest of the vehicle, whereas on the New Routemaster it is part of the
structural integrity of the bodywork,” he explains.
“We are happy that our partnership
continues to be developed in this way,” states Phil Owen, commercial sales director for Volvo Bus
UK & Ireland.
“This new Volvo Bus/Wrightbus combination gives operators a wider choice of body options from Wrightbus
with the class leading B5LH Euro 6
Hybrid chassis.”
Meanwhile, Downie says that Wrightbus has completed three vehicles to
date.
“We are delighted and honoured that RATP Dev London have placed the order for the first vehicle.”
“The continued partnership between
Wrightbus and Volvo Bus has delivered yet another great product and Wrightbus
has worked hard to deliver against the challenges laid out to them by TfL,” confirms Richard Hall, managing
director for RATP Dev London.
“This latest addition to the
Wrightbus/Volvo Bus partnership will form an important part of our drive to
provide the best in passenger transport around our city,” adds Leon Daniels, managing director
for surface transport for TfL.
“Wrightbus has certainly risen to the
challenge we set them, which has resulted in the state-of-the-art bus we have here today.”
The first order for RATP Dev London is
for 56 double deck buses, with six being the new SRM and the remaining 50 with the Gemini 3 body style.
Also, six of these SRM’s
are bought and paid for by RATP Dev
London for route 13, so if you thought these ‘New’
2 door 1 staircase Routemasters were paid for by TFL you would be wrong as
operators buy them.
Why are they bought by operators? Bus and Coach explains:
Leon Daniels notes that the new SRM will be bought and owned by
operators rather than TfL, pointing out that the New Routemaster had been acquired by the public body only because
of the fact that a three-door,
two-staircase model would not be applicable outside the capital and
therefore a less attractive proposition
for fleets which have the need to cascade vehicles in their second life.
Ian Downie points out that the second life of the vehicle has also
been taken into consideration with
the inclusion of a conversion kit to
take the bus from two doors to one door
if required. A provincial version with a
single-door is also in development.
Official Visions have also written a short report on
the successor to the New Routemaster on Twitter.
Today, @WrightsGroup launched their @VolvoBusUK B5LH chassied SRM in London. pic.twitter.com/oKl92k2keM— Visions Official (@OfficialVisions) March 16, 2016
The registration of the bus is believed to be LJ16EXD. The
fleet number of this vehicle is unknown.
I wrote in my previous article about the Mayoral candidates not buying any more 3 door 2 staircase New Routemaster buses. The New Routemaster has evolved, we
have the Enviro400H City
which is manufactured by Alexander Dennis as well as the Volvo Wright SRM and
at least those new state-of-the-art buses will be bought and paid for by the
private operating companies for their contract requirements. Fear no more, the
evolution of the London Bus has happened! and the next route to have Enviro400H
City's will be route 26, and those buses are bought and paid for by CT Plus.
There are five battery
electric double deck buses which are the BYD K8SR and they will be trialing
on route 98. Wrightbus should work with BYD to have a SRM version of the
battery electric bus, just like Alexander Dennis are doing with the single deck
Enviro200 MMC. Routes 507 and 521 will be fully served with battery electric
BYD K9E Enviro200 MMC's which are expected to be in service on 27th August 2016.
So what else can I say? Well, the mayor has passed a new
budget which includes the final 195 three door, two staircase New Routemaster
buses, bringing the total fleet number to 1,000. I like having a mixture of
different bus types operating in London; take a quick look at the routes that
go through Whitehall
which are 3, 11, 12, 24, 53, 87, 88, 159 and 453. Routes 3, 11, 12, 24, 88, 159
and 453 are served by New Routemasters, this can make observations quite boring
for enthusiasts seeing the same bus on different routes.
The future looks bright for London Buses as we witness the
designs evolving year on year. The New Routemaster rollout comes to an end in
2017 with 1,000 of these 3 door 2 staircase buses. Hopefully we will see more
of the new style buses in the outer London areas.
In other news, Reading
Buses have announced a £1.3 million order with Wrightbus for six of their
Streetdeck models which contain the glazed staircase based on the New
Routemaster design. Reading Buses is a municipal bus company which is owned by Reading Borough Council.
Please share this article as this news
hasn't been reported by the mainstream media yet. The Enviro400H City and SRM
deserve to have more publicity as they are competitive, state of the art buses.
As always, you can follow me on Twitter, Tumblr, Pinterest and Google Plus at:
@CLondoner92
Previous articles on New Routemaster project: