Charging Forward (bus electrification plan)

[artthouwill]

1 hour ago, Sam92 said:

 

 

 

Hilariously my retarded self seen the topic should've moved here and STILL put my reply in the wrong thread but anyway here's the link I was referring to as far as CTA having to face the decision of meeting the all electric deadline or providing reliable service with conventional buses:

https://chi.streetsblog.org/2023/09/14/the-cta-cant-afford-to-let-electric-buses-hold-up-reliable-service

I think that happened when someone, maybe  @YoungBusLoversaid the reason C got the latest 8350s was possibly due to the amount of Proterras C had OOS.  While I noted there were a lot of Proterras OOS, the missing buses weren't detrimental to the service,  thus not related.  But what would be related is an expectation of Proterras running in determining fleet allocation when these Proterras aren't consistent in service.   I also felt that C receiving more Novas could be a way to ship their New Flyers off to NP.

[Busjack]

1 hour ago, Sam92 said:

 

 

 

Hilariously my retarded self seen the topic should've moved here and STILL put my reply in the wrong thread but anyway here's the link I was referring to as far as CTA having to face the decision of meeting the all electric deadline or providing reliable service with conventional buses:

https://chi.streetsblog.org/2023/09/14/the-cta-cant-afford-to-let-electric-buses-hold-up-reliable-service

Basically a fair analysis, and it noted the escape clause in the (what I classified as meaningless) state law. However, in a sense, this is similar to, in about 1946, writing "buses will never provide the level of service required, so lets get 1,000 streetcars." Pretty much that's what CTA got CSL to do, they bought 600 streetcars that were recycled into L cars within 10 years, and about 1800 propane buses ended up being purchased.

Fallacies I saw were:

• The reason why ridership has not recovered was not really studied. They implied it was unreliable service, but it may be that people are not commuting downtown. (That's also something PART does not deal with when trying to restructure Metra,)
• Trolley buses may be zero-emission, but the writer seems to slough off why Chicago got rid of them in 1972, and many other major cities (Toronto, Boston) recently got rid of them.
• Proterra did cite lack of standardization, but the TAs standardized their specs around 2000. The 6400s were one of the first procurement's under those guidelines. Then the TAs got away from that, to the extent that Gillig wouldn't bid on Pace specs, and any response to CTA usually has 100s of pages of vendors' comments. Maybe stuff like Pace having to take off Georgia's contract means that Pace has to accept Georgia's specs., maybe not.

 

[andrethebusman99]

Things might have gotten a little more standardized, but a CTA bus is not a NYCTA bus, and never will be. But this is not a new situation. Bus "final vehicle records" (like new car window sticker) showed all options. Some cities had many, some only a couple. GM in 1940s probably came closer to a "standard bus" than a anybody before or since.

[artthouwill]

1 hour ago, andrethebusman99 said:

Things might have gotten a little more standardized, but a CTA bus is not a NYCTA bus, and never will be. But this is not a new situation. Bus "final vehicle records" (like new car window sticker) showed all options. Some cities had many, some only a couple. GM in 1940s probably came closer to a "standard bus" than a anybody before or since.

My memory as a small child, there was only GM and Flxble.  Macks were a thing of the past.   GM had fishbowl and Flxble transitioned from the Old Looks to the New Looks.  Then Grumman teamed up with Flxble and created a nice looking bus.  GM matched it with the RTS.   CTA introduced the M.A.N. artics.   Then Flyer came into the market and GM decided to pull out of the U.S. market. 

[Busjack]

2 hours ago, andrethebusman99 said:

Things might have gotten a little more standardized, but a CTA bus is not a NYCTA bus, and never will be. But this is not a new situation. Bus "final vehicle records" (like new car window sticker) showed all options. Some cities had many, some only a couple. GM in 1940s probably came closer to a "standard bus" than a anybody before or since.

 

1 hour ago, artthouwill said:

My memory as a small child, there was only GM and Flxble.  Macks were a thing of the past.   GM had fishbowl and Flxble transitioned from the Old Looks to the New Looks.  Then Grumman teamed up with Flxble and created a nice looking bus.  GM matched it with the RTS.   CTA introduced the M.A.N. artics.   Then Flyer came into the market and GM decided to pull out of the U.S. market. 

ANOTHER QUESTION: What does either of these have to do with Bus Electrification Plan? This isn't the "Who Framed Roger Rabbit" thread.

[artthouwill]

12 hours ago, Busjack said:

 

ANOTHER QUESTION: What does either of these have to do with Bus Electrification Plan? This isn't the "Who Framed Roger Rabbit" thread.

Short answer is options or possibly a lack thereof .  For now there's still a couple of diesel,  CNG, and Electric  but it seems like the government is trying to force the nation towards Electric vehicles .   A different manifestation but seems like a cycle of standardization .

[Busjack]

3 minutes ago, artthouwill said:

Short answer is options or possibly a lack thereof .  For now there's still a couple of diesel,  CNG, and Electric  but it seems like the government is trying to force the nation towards Electric vehicles .   A different manifestation but seems like a cycle of standardization .

A point there, but Proterra is complaining that each customer has its own specs. The real problem is that Congress passed the Low/No Emissions plan, but, unlike the Canadian government, doesn't seem to fund it adequately. CTA orders only when it gets a grant.

[andrethebusman99]

Looks like New Flyer, Nova, even Gillig are building electrics. Maybe Proterra's problems stemmed from the fact they are ONLY building electric, so if they are having issues with their electrics, they have nothing to fall back on like the other builders do.

[Busjack]

3 hours ago, andrethebusman99 said:

Looks like New Flyer, Nova, even Gillig are building electrics. Maybe Proterra's problems stemmed from the fact they are ONLY building electric, so if they are having issues with their electrics, they have nothing to fall back on like the other builders do.

But, at least effective in early 2025, Nova will be building electrics only for Canada.

However, the problem NF, Gillig and (you left out) ENC, is that if the U.S. Government and state governments push electric, and there is a problem with that, they'll have nothing to fall back on. Proterra's problems may be temporary, and a company like Lion Electric may be able to step up. There seem to be more companies making electric 30 foot buses (Lion, ARBOC division of NFI), Green Power,and  BYD (may be questionable, but not a state-owned enterprise, as Warren Buffet owns a chunk of it), and maybe somewhere like Niles goes electric sooner than you think.

[andrethebusman99]

Another issue to think about - where are all these chargers going to get power from? Recently read there is a plan to build a 1.5 MILLION acre solar farm somewhere. Have also read that if you wanted to have all solar vehicles, you would need a solar farm the size of the state of Utah just to power them, never mind any other electricity users. This will at some point become rather extravagant.

[Busjack]

2 hours ago, andrethebusman99 said:

Another issue to think about - where are all these chargers going to get power from? Recently read there is a plan to build a 1.5 MILLION acre solar farm somewhere. Have also read that if you wanted to have all solar vehicles, you would need a solar farm the size of the state of Utah just to power them, never mind any other electricity users. This will at some point become rather extravagant.

That does seem to be a question, but that's not the only source. There are alternative places to put solar, such as rooftops, and bus garages provide huge surfaces for this purpose. There are already huge wind farms along I-55 and I-65 (nothing but windmills between Remington and West Lafayette, IN). The two biggest places to commit to electric buses (Toronto and Quebec) have ample hydroelectric power, and Hoover Dam generates hydro for Vegas (unless global warming dries it up). @OneofthewillsNW believes in hydrogen fuel cell buses. Some in Illinois think nuclear is clean (I don't agree).

Anyway, that's why te Federal Government requires a transition plan, instead of you worrying that a solar cell roof will cover the Mormons.

[Busjack]

On 10/20/2022 at 3:53 PM, artthouwill said:

What is the equivalent of 208 artucs?  Is it 208 electric artics or 312 40 ft electric buses?  

Maybe the 2024 Budget clarifies it a bit:

Title: Purchase up to 208 Electric Buses (4000-Series)
Budget: $185.4M
Core Requirement: Meet regulatory requirements.
Description: Funding will provide for a new procurement intended to
replace 208 Articulated 4000-Series buses with the equivalent
number of electric buses. CTA has operated two electric buses since
2014 and added twenty-three more buses to the fleet in 2022. CTA
currently operates 25 electric buses. CTA has exercised an option
order to procure an additional twenty-two electric buses in 2023.

So, it sounds like 208 electric artics, although with only C and 103rd on the short list to go electric, I don't know how CTA can support that many. Maybe some chargers at NP and K.

[Busjack]

While I tended to dismiss the column Hit the accelerator, CTA, on going electric by a former transit official now with The Climate Reality Project, I now think he has some valid points or points that can be debated here. While I take it with the caveats whether it's fair to compare CTA with Pace (the Pace fleet being about 36% of CTA's), and the problems with Proterra (reliability and bankruptcy reorganization), he appears to have his point that while Pace has taken steps to implement its electrification plan, he claims that CTA is falling behind on Charging Forward.

Some of the significant points:

• While I previously said that the legislation was a "fig leaf," he goes further in saying that CTA "put in language that would make the ban unenforceable if the CTA does not have the funding or facilities ready to charge electric buses."
• Comparing the Pace and CTA 2024 capital plans, CTA is planning to spend less than Pace on such things as garage upgrades, and deadlines for electrical infrastructure for 103rd have not been met and for 77th and 74th cannot be met based on the capital plan.

To get back to @artthouwill's call for more diesels and most recently @YoungBusLover's for hybrids (which are not zero-emission, but maybe 20% fewer emissions), it might be credible to say that cancelling the current order at 400 instead of 600 is infeasible, but here he's arguing that CTA is defaulting on its representations to the federal government, and I therefore conclude that your suggestions would make that more obvious, unless @YoungBusLoveris saying that someone is willing to sell hybrids at such a discount that they would still be eligible for retirement in 2040, notwithstanding that that doesn't answer his argument that "CTA will continue to emit dangerous greenhouse gases for almost the entire decade of the 2030s."

[Jstange059]

https://www.apta.com/news-publications/press-releases/releases/apta-joins-white-house-roundtable-on-clean-buses-releases-recommendations-to-strengthen-u-s-bus-manufacturing/

The White House is creating a roundtable regarding the manufacturing of electric buses in the United States. Hopefully we can manage to attract foreign companies to enter the US market, similar to how many European and Japanese train manufacturers have constructed facilities in the US. Because at the current state of having 2 major bus manufacturers in the United States, the companies simply are unable to keep up with the demand for new electric busses, not to mention the fact that there is hardly any competition to encourage them to improve their busses, especially considering the far higher quality of buses by European manufacturers like Mercedes and Scania

[Jstange059]

Reading a bit more, apparently APTA's task force is led by Dorval Carter ... That scares me a bit...

[Busjack]

17 hours ago, Jstange059 said:

the companies simply are unable to keep up with the demand for new electric busses

I have argued that the demand isn't actually there, if you compare the assemblers' announcements for 5 or 20 buses to Canadian orders for thousands. The feds better figure out how to finance the buses and infrastructure first.

 

 

[andrethebusman99]

When politics and reality collide, politics usually wins. He who controls the purse controls the result. If the government decides to push electric, it does not matter if the result is practical or even possible. "Thy will be done".

Here though is an interesting sidelight. RTC Las Vegas recently came into possession of four XE40's. Paragraph and all. But they are not restricted to any one route. Every time I have seen one has been on a different route. They're charged at garage and go out on full 8-10 hour runs, and do not seem to have any problems doing so. No terminal chargers. Only real difference between CTA and RTC is most RTC reliefs made at terminals, using relief cars, so sending out driver in a replacement bus instead of driver in car is no big deal. In fact, most PM reliefs are bus changes as a normal thing. One thing that also makes this easier is only one relief per run, lunch is "catch as catch can", on the bus.

[Busjack]

1 hour ago, andrethebusman99 said:

They're charged at garage and go out on full 8-10 hour runs, and do not seem to have any problems doing so. No terminal chargers.

Getting back to CTA (this topic), that seems to be an inconsistency between the consultants' reports, which seem to favor garage charging, and CTA's announcements of such things as a grant for 6 chargers at 95th. CTA also seems fixated on the 75-mile range of the original configuration of the 700s, while the NF Charge NG brochure states a range (depending on the size of the battery) of 178-258 miles.

[andrethebusman99]

Reason seems to be CTA insists bus stays out as long as possible with drivers changing off. Many cities change out bus when driver changes so range is not as crucial. 

[jajuan]

On 2/16/2024 at 4:32 PM, andrethebusman99 said:

Reason seems to be CTA insists bus stays out as long as possible with drivers changing off. Many cities change out bus when driver changes so range is not as crucial. 

Well if CTA is serious about its wanting to have the fleet fully electric or very close to it by 2040, then it may have to reconsider opting for the original 75 mile range of the 700s and instead go for the higher range given how slow it is so far in securing funds for further charging infrastructure. Not to mention, other TAs that operate in some form of urban setting are managing to operate their electric buses with only garage charging, and doing so better than CTA seems to be with the 600s through both garage and terminal charging. SamTrans, for example, runs some of its XE40s on its highway express routes between downtown San Francisco and the southern parts of San Mateo County. Trip times might be typically be an hour and a half to two hours one way. In fact, its EPX (El Palo Alto-San Bruno) express route, which replaced its 398 express last week, runs primarily with XE40s though a diesel or hybrid may still show up on this route. CTA meanwhile is still struggling to get consistent operations on two local routes.

[Busjack]

23 minutes ago, jajuan said:

Well if CTA is serious about its wanting to have the fleet fully electric or very close to it by 2040, then it may have to reconsider opting for the original 75 mile range of the 700s

The relevant consideration is a Proterra spec sheet (I'm surprised it's still available) that says a ZX5 has a range of 92-120 miles, while a ZX5MAX has a range of 221-329 miles (which is what we would expect today). But we don't know which model CTA has nor why their buses aren't regularly on the street (while the Pace bus has been the past couple of weeks).

[artthouwill]

21 minutes ago, jajuan said:

Well if CTA is serious about its wanting to have the fleet fully electric or very close to it by 2040, then it may have to reconsider opting for the original 75 mile range of the 700s and instead go for the higher range given how slow it is so far in securing funds for further charging infrastructure. Not to mention, other TAs that operate in some form of urban setting are managing to operate their electric buses with only garage charging, and doing so better than CTA seems to be with the 600s through both garage and terminal charging. SamTrans, for example, runs some of its XE40s on its highway express routes between downtown San Francisco and the southern parts of San Mateo County. Trip times might be typically be an hour and a half to two hours one way. In fact, its EPX (El Palo Alto-San Bruno) express route, which replaced its 398 express last week, runs primarily with XE40s though a diesel or hybrid may still show up on this route. CTA meanwhile is still struggling to get consistent operations on two local routes.

And one of those routes has a charger on both ends of the route and passes right by the garage also.  Rge other route has a charger at Midway.   

[jajuan]

5 minutes ago, Busjack said:

The relevant consideration is a Proterra spec sheet (I'm surprised it's still available) that says a ZX5 has a range of 92-120 miles, while a ZX5MAX has a range of 221-329 miles (which is what we would expect today). But we don't know which model CTA has nor why their buses aren't regularly on the street (while the Pace bus has been the past couple of weeks).

So it gets down to the question I posed in the 600s thread about what the stumbling blocks are that CTA is running into that's made service deployments so spotty and inconsistent compared to the other TAs that we know of that have electric buses on the roster and in service.

[NewFlyerMCI]

On 2/18/2024 at 10:53 PM, jajuan said:

So it gets down to the question I posed in the 600s thread about what the stumbling blocks are that CTA is running into that's made service deployments so spotty and inconsistent compared to the other TAs that we know of that have electric buses on the roster and in service.

I'd guess there's some overlap with the same issues most other transit agencies have had, btwn supply chain issues for repair/replacement & cold weather snaps affecting range & other operational issues. Here in Alexandria, we have 4 Proterra ZX5s, 4 XE40s and 4 XE60s.

• The XE60s were all out for a while (part of time was due to the recall), although usually one consistent one (usually 901 or 903, the odd numbers are more resilient) will pop back into service for a bit, and now we've progressed to about 2-3 at a time
• The XE40s perform a bit better than the XE60s, although I see them less b/c the XE60s usually get assigned to my route when they run (busiest in the system).
• ZX5s I see the least of all the electric buses

In all cases, it's been a minute since all 4 of each time were out at once, and this definitely started happening when it started getting colder. I take my bus usually 3-6 times a week, and for about the last month or so, I see one of the XEs about 1-2 twice a week. Haven't spotted one of the ZX5s in a minute (although they could very well be on other routes). I try to check the Pantograph app for their positioning as well. I understand this might not be what CTA's experiencing, but the issues at the top are common enough across non-west coast TAs from my understanding

[Tcmetro]

Minneapolis has 7 XE60s that they use on the C Line and have had a number of issues with them, including at the sole charger on the line. When the charger is down, none of the buses can go out.

They're purchasing more electric buses and recently opened a new garage which is supposedly future-proofed for electric buses.