New Eldorados?

[west towns]

Now if these are pulse buses Whats going to happen to them for the next few months or yr as construction hasnt even started

[Busjack]

7 hours ago, Busjack said:

....

I tried to get an official picture of 6323 to compare the air conditioner to the Pulse mockup, but the http://www.eldorado-ca.com/ site is down, with a database error.

Got it now. 6323 itself has a white air conditioner, so you can make what inference you want from the mockup.

Embedded from eldorado-ca.com

13 minutes ago, west towns said:

Now if these are pulse buses Whats going to happen to them for the next few months or yr as construction hasnt even started

Do the same thing as Pace is doing now with the new Suburbans--run them unwrapped. They aren't going to be much different than what is being run in NW now. That undoubtedly would allow NW to get rid of the last of the Orion VIs it has.

[BusHunter]

Just make sure to run the ones with cell phone chargers by me!!

[Pace831]

I brought my camera  to Chandler and took zoomed photos from across the street, over 200' away. You can clearly see that 6538 and 6541 are transits, not coaches, so presumably 6510 and up also are. These buses have white AC units, so it seems the blue one seen on 6518 was an anomaly.

[Busjack]

8 hours ago, Pace831 said:

These buses have white AC units, so it seems the blue one seen on 6518 was an anomaly.

As BH indicated, that could have been a Pulse bus. Depends on how much one can take out of the brochure.

The other question is if this indicates an effort to start replacing at SW. Theoretically, SW needs replacements before S does, although S wears out its buses, but the CNG project extends into Summer 2017.

[Busjack]

On 9/22/2016 at 9:01 AM, Busjack said:

The other question is if this indicates an effort to start replacing at SW.

This one was quickly answered. 6525 on 383

[Pace831]

1 hour ago, Busjack said:

This one was quickly answered. 6525 on 383

That's exciting. I'll be glad to ride something newer and cleaner than the Orion's. SW is like the Pace equivalent of Forest Glen with its worn out buses that need to be replaced.

[Busjack]

34 minutes ago, Pace831 said:

That's exciting. I'll be glad to ride something newer and cleaner than the Orion's. SW is like the Pace equivalent of Forest Glen with its worn out buses that need to be replaced.

The numbers also sort of work in that, as I mentioned, there are 47 buses left in the 2016 budget, not that the budget had ever meant anything, and I figure 10 Pulse buses, and then the rest to SW. If the rest of the CNGs come after that, S would then be updated in approximate order.Of course, one has to take into account that SW got 6156-6161 because they are year 2004 buses, and hence newer than the year 2003 NABIs.

I also figure that since prices in the solicitation were for Year One...Year Five, and the contract was awarded in Oct. 2011,any options would need to have been exercised by Nov. 2015, and if Pace wants any more diesel 40 foot buses, it will have to rebid.

[busfan2847]

According to Bus Tracker 6526 is on the 384 this afternoon.

[artthouwill]

7 hours ago, Pace831 said:

That's exciting. I'll be glad to ride something newer and cleaner than the Orion's. SW is like the Pace equivalent of Forest Glen with its worn out buses that need to be replaced.

Not quite,  in that old buses got sent to FG when other garages got new equipment.   West and NW still have Orions.   But at some point,  both of those garages have to start retiring their Orions.   I believe West' s replacements will be NABIS from South when South receives more CNG buses. NW Pulses could retire their remaining Orions. 

[Pace831]

2 minutes ago, artthouwill said:

Not quite,  in that old buses got sent to FG when other garages got new equipment.   West and NW still have Orions.   But at some point,  both of those garages have to start retiring their Orions.   I believe West' s replacements will be NABIS from South when South receives more CNG buses. NW Pulses could retire their remaining Orions. 

The SW/FG analogy was only in the sense that both garages had (for the most part) some of oldest buses that were worn out and uncomfortable.

The general belief on this forum used to be that South's NABIs would take the place of all the remaining Orions after they were displaced by CNGs. Obviously, that was before we knew about what happened with the bus deliveries since then. Your theory makes sense, but I think the bus assignments after the rest of the CNGs arrive will be more complex, involving some shuffling around the system.

[Busjack]

11 hours ago, artthouwill said:

Not quite,  in that old buses got sent to FG when other garages got new equipment.

In that sense, too, as a number of Orion VIs, including 6156-6161 were sent from NW to SW. Any Orion VI outside the approximate range of 6072-6110 has been somewhere else.

While I saw several Orion VIs at Golf Mill last night, again I'm sure that's only until the suburban and  Pulse buses are deployed.

10 hours ago, Pace831 said:

but I think the bus assignments after the rest of the CNGs arrive will be more complex, involving some shuffling around the system.

There is the issue that it isn't scheduled to be complete for another 9-10 months. It looks like (again assuming 6156-6161 are still around) it replaces some of the 2003 NABIs, but there were originally 183 of them. A few are gone, but if we are making the assumption (as Melissa Metzger apparently did when she said that the CNGs would arrive when needed on the bus replacement schedule), that the CNGs replace 2003 NABIs, that's only half of them. Probably the 2005s go back to West. However, at that point, Pace will need to issue a new solicitation, and the question is what it will do with N, i.e. will it buy any 35-foot buses? NS presented a similar issue, except its 35 footers are gone and it has 10 Axess buses.

[artthouwill]

21 hours ago, Pace831 said:

That's exciting. I'll be glad to ride something newer and cleaner than the Orion's. SW is like the Pace equivalent of Forest Glen with its worn out buses that need to be replaced.

Not quite,  in that old buses got sent to FG when other garages got new equipment.   West and NW still have Orions.   But at some point,  both of those garages have to start retiring their Orions.   I believe West' s replacements will be NABIS from South when South receives more CNG buses. NW Pulses could retire their remaining Orions. 

[artthouwill]

3 hours ago, Busjack said:

In that sense, too, as a number of Orion VIs, including 6156-6161 were sent from NW to SW. Any Orion VI outside the approximate range of 6072-6110 has been somewhere else.

While I saw several Orion VIs at Golf Mill last night, again I'm sure that's only until the suburban and  Pulse buses are deployed.

There is the issue that it isn't scheduled to be complete for another 9-10 months. It looks like (again assuming 6156-6161 are still around) it replaces some of the 2003 NABIs, but there were originally 183 of them. A few are gone, but if we are making the assumption (as Melissa Metzger apparently did when she said that the CNGs would arrive when needed on the bus replacement schedule), that the CNGs replace 2003 NABIs, that's only half of them. Probably the 2005s go back to West. However, at that point, Pace will need to issue a new solicitation, and the question is what it will do with N, i.e. will it buy any 35-foot buses? NS presented a similar issue, except its 35 footers are gone and it has 10 Axess buses.

I actually wondered if Pace would possibly solicit bids for more 30 ft buses (EZ Riders) ?  

Remember that even though SW did get 6155 - 6161 from NW, it also shipped out some 61xxs to West,  unlike FG where Novas were being sent to die.

[Busjack]

1 hour ago, artthouwill said:

Not quite,  in that old buses got sent to FG when other garages got new equipment.   West and NW still have Orions.   But at some point,  both of those garages have to start retiring their Orions.

Sure there are distinctions, like both NW and SW got TIGER 30 footers, and West is way too large, compared to SW, to dump all of its Orion VIs there.

However, it isn't like when N was half Gilligs and half Orions. Pace showed its shift in philosophy in 2003. when it sent 6116-6144 from S to NW, instead of sending some new NABIs to NW.

The bottom line, now faced by both CTA and Pace as a result of decisions made since 2003, is that some garages now need fairly full fleet replacement at once. It didn't used to be that way (except for a garage like 69th).

1 hour ago, artthouwill said:

I actually wondered if Pace would possibly solicit bids for more 30 ft buses (EZ Riders) ?  

Other than the 7 trolley replicas, doesn't seem the need to do so until the 2600s hit their service life, but then one would be talking about 230 in a short period, and not being able to cover some of the collar county divisions if it couldn't.  Only mitigating circumstance is that those on feeder routes have little mileage compared to those used in the divisions. There might be a question whether Pace is going to establish more feeders (such as 604 and 608), but, in the case of the DuPage restructuring and Shuttle Bugs seems to be killing them at least at a rate commensurate with adding them. Similarly, on SW assuming 895, 6 NW 30 foot buses were transferred to SW, instead of acquiring 6 more 30 footers.

As I noted above,the more immediate question is what Pace is going to do about replacing 35' buses, and then mostly at N, as S (clearly) and W (probably) will only run 40 footers once the 6600s bite it.

[artthouwill]

Nice to see SW getting new buses.   Since they are the smallest,  perhaps this set of new deliveries will rid them of all their Orions and maybe even their EZ Riders. 

[Busjack]

2 hours ago, artthouwill said:

Nice to see SW getting new buses.   Since they are the smallest,  perhaps this set of new deliveries will rid them of all their Orions and maybe even their EZ Riders. 

The numbers I indicated above don't indicate that. Certainly, if the intent were to eliminate EZRiders, NW wouldn't have sent them 6 when SW took over 895.

[Busjack]

6530 on 386 then 385.

[Busjack]

At the moment, 6524 on 379.

[jajuan]

Good to see SW finally have another standard size bus model to use besides all those crappy Orions. 

[BusHunter]

20 hours ago, Busjack said:

At the moment, 6524 on 379.

So these are new eldorados? Damn that was sudden. I guess the orions really are history now. Ill have to check those out tomorrow.

[artthouwill]

1 hour ago, BusHunter said:

So these are new eldorados? Damn that was sudden. I guess the orions really are history now. Ill have to check those out tomorrow.

Assuming that 7 have been delivered to SW so far,  that wouldn't eradicate the Orions at SW,  W, and NW.

[Busjack]

12 minutes ago, artthouwill said:

Assuming that 7 have been delivered to SW so far,  that wouldn't eradicate the Orions at SW,  W, and NW.

From Webwatch, SW suddenly seems to be putting the mileage on 6156-6161. Also, whatever NW has seems to be on the road. For instance, 6008 was the first one I saw back around 2000, and it is still out there.

[BusHunter]

2 hours ago, artthouwill said:

Assuming that 7 have been delivered to SW so far,  that wouldn't eradicate the Orions at SW,  W, and NW.

Yeah but if the #6500's are coming in beyond the dundee bus order, if the fat lady  isn't singing  she's practicing. Sw dont need that many buses maybe 30 or 40 and 6510-25 are unaccounted for. S is purging nabis it dont need and the orions at nw will probably fall victim to the i-90 project . If anything  i think  nabis will start disappearing  now 

[BusHunter]

Got sort of a blurry shot yesterday of #6524 at Midway. Sure is funny seeing an Axess there!!