Shopping

With things a little more certain on the bus service side we have been able to invest in some new buses for that side of the operation. 

This will take two forms.  Optare Solo SRs for smaller vehicles and ADL Enviro 400 MMCs for larger vehicles. The larger vehicle investment means we'll have a replacement double deck fleet to filter through the operation, us having a number of school and college services. The dual purpose seating with these vehicles also means they can be used on railway replacement work on weekends, meaning they get full use throughout the working week. 

The Solos are a belated purchase. For a few years now, there's been no 'new diecast small bus' on the market. The Enviro 200 is no longer sold as a new vehicle and there has been no releases by NMC for a number of years. There is promised an MMC version of the Enviro 200, but that was announced in 2018 and it is now 2022. Suffice to say, were they available, we'd have a few of them as 'larger' vehicles. 

The Solos are going to be the last of their line. I've had a lot of them, mostly brand new in my time fleet operating, spanning 21 years. However the announcement by their manufacturer that they'll no longer produce diesel powered vehicles from this year means no more new ones will join our fleet. We're not quite ready for zero emission and the economics of our bus network don't support the increased capital expenditure which will come from operating those vehicles. 

The issue for us is battery replacement midway through the life of the bus. With a double decker, it is viable to do this as we write down over 15 years, but smaller buses are written down over a shorter time period. This, combined with the purchase premium over a diesel vehicle make them commercially unviable at present. So either we now invest in Euro 6 diesels, or we miss the bus completely. 

4 small buses for Bridgwater Town work and some of the rural routes.

As for the coach side the delayed delivery of some 'dealer white' Irizar i6s means we can put new vehicles onto Counttywide 400 and our own London express route.  Some work in Paint 3D gives the coach a 'livery'. We're calling this the squiggle livery. 

Toothpaste, in green form.

It's also very easy to maintain, as if a driver prangs a lower panel then no masking is needed. I have never understood why liveries have swoops applied to lower sections of a vehicle with vinyl. Once the vehicle sustains accident damage it falls to garage staff to refit vinyls and most of the time they never correctly line things up.  So most of my liveries observe the lines of the vehicle and colour changes occur where panels alter position. 

The NBfL/Borisbus is a pig to paint as it doesn't have many straight lines and I've tried many variations in my quest to find one that works. 

I can see more of these white coaches coming into the fleet for various different work we do. It does reflect reality, as most 'liveries' these days use white as a base colour and the colour is applied using vinyl.