EURO BUS EXPO, 2022
This is a collection of my rambling thoughts on the buses
on display at Euro Bus Expo, held in the Birmingham NEC over 1-3 November
2022. For the mainstream vehicle
manufacturers it seemed to be a show of consolidation, continuing to develop
the vehicles that have been their
mainstay product for some years. I didn’t
pay much attention to the coaches but it seemed similar. As ever there were
some quirky vehicles there that may or may not ever be mainstream, and notably missing
were Wrightbus, Mercedes and any of the Turkish bus manufacturers, who have variously
tried to break in to the UK market in the last decade or two. Turkish coaches
were very much present.
Alexander Dennis (ADL) presented an electric Enviro 200 with its usual BYD chassis, which looks set for Ireland. These are now quite common buses in the UK so I didn’t pay it much attention. They also presented a hydrogen powered Enviro 400 in the new colours for publicly controlled buses in Liverpool. This vehicle was finished to a quite high specification, with although the tags on the seats seemed a bit unnecessary. I was very tempted to rip one off, because in front line service, that’s what will happen.
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| Coming to St Helens, apparently! |
It looks like we have to wait to see the new
front end on ADL’s line up.
Next was Switch Mobility, formerly known in the
UK as Optare. Most interesting vehicle
was an electric single deck bus, which lacked any name or branding so assume it’s
a concept for the time being. Update,
it’s called an e1. The usual rear
end roof line immediately caught the eye, and whilst my first thought is they
should dig out the Optare Delta roof pod design and install that, apparently
the tapered rear end has drag/fuel efficiency benefits. Inside the vehicle was very light and airy,
with some quite basic bus seats, but that did help the feeling of
spaciousness. Oh, and it was left hand
drive for promotion to the continental European market, but apparently is a modular
design that would [relatively] easily be buildable as a right hand drive.
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| The roof line catches your eye across the hall floor |
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| No interior pics, despite me liking it, as Switch were busy trying to sell them. |
Switch also had a short wheel base electric Metrocity in a London livery. I think these look a bit fussy on the outside but had a pleasant interior. Best of all it had a cab door that stayed open rather than automatically swinging shut and attempting to decapitate the driver every time they get in or out. ADL could learn from this. Three stalks though!
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| Cab door that stays open. I like, a lot! |
Moving on to the only bus on display from Scania. The Fencer F1 single deck bus is relatively recent to market and this was the first one I had seen. I expected good things from Scania: it certainly packs a good number of seats. However the Fencer F1 left me with four particularly negative thoughts:
1) The
compromise made on interior styling, the photo shows the window line by one
seat that leaves no shoulder/arm space;
2) At
least one coving panel and one grab rail rattled, which is not the build quality
I expected;
3) The
rear row of seats still has the Scania ‘mountain’ to climb to get to them. Anyone (well, my peers from university at
least) from Birmingham in the late 1990s will recognise this phenomena from Travel
West Midlands’ 1398 and 1399; and
4) The
drivers seat was some uber-techno effort that was in no way intuitive to
comfortably set. Probably from a coach or truck cab, whatever its MO it would no
doubt be quickly broken in front line service as most such designs are.
Disappointed.
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| Rubbish shoulder space: sit children here! |
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| It's a mountain at the back. |
Passing reference to the prototype conversion of a Borismaster in to a full electric bus. This is LT11 which it seems Metroline will have the pleasure of trialling in service.
Next was another bus imminently hitting the streets of
London, is ieTram
from Irizar. These electric buses
are going to be operated by Go-Ahead on the 358 in sarf London. I had a good play to try and get over my assertion
that “it’s just a bus with a sexy front end”.
First of all, the TfL branding inside promises me more than that! This vehicle has an extremely narrow single
leaf front door, which probably reflects the fact it is more commonly used in
longer/articulated form in continental Europe where multi-door boarding is the
norm. Despite a proliferation of windows
(including at locations where normally a modesty strip would be applied) it
seemed quite dark inside – a mix of location within the NEC and the dark colourscheme
chosen for the seats? There are USB
charging points, but rather than being built in to the frame of the seat or side
panels (as is more normal) they pertrude in to the knee space of some
seats. I didn’t like that, but what I
did find quite quirky is the rear row featuring only three seats in a 1+2
arrangement. This sure is a rare place
to find a ‘Rowley’ seat (sorry, another reference to Aston University transport
management students there): I wonder if TfL have specified the removal of the
centre seat at the rear?
Is it better than an Enviro 200? Not convinced. Will it
turn heads? Definitely!
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| Popular! |
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| With all the tech and funky looks the big mirror looks very out of place |
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| Narrow door |
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| Covered wheels - how do I fill in a defect card if I can't see the wheel nuts? |
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| Do we need windows here? |
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| New TfL poster |
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| Bizarre back row. |
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| Overview of what seems quite a dark interior |
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| USB chargers protruding to exactly where your legs go. The flimsy covers won't last long. |
Some years ago, I think at the Kortrijk show, Pelican
Bus & Coach assured me that Yutong would one day be quite big in
the UK. Well, Pelican, I am very sorry
for doubting you, you were correct. Two
buses were on display, one branded for Newport Bus and the other for the Traws Cambria
network. Both backed up my previous
experience with Yutong’s electric buses in the UK: they are very well
built. I couldn’t make any bit of it
rattle or shake. In the past I have commented on messy cab layouts in Chinese
buses – no more, this one I really liked, not just for the change of scene from
my usual ADL Enviro drives, but it seemed genuinely well thought out. I now really really want to drive one. “Get a
job with Newport Buses” I hear you say!
The Chinese manufacturer Higer were represented by agents Harris Bus & Coach. Their quirky looking ‘Steed’ certainly catches the eye and judging by the branding appear to have a customer in Transport for Ireland (TFI). As a ‘wheel forward’ design interaction between driver and passenger is difficult – the boarding door is well behind the driver, but there’s ticket machine mounts in the display vehicles so it seems they will be a local service bus. I quite liked the interior: it’s quite a high body and the overhead luggage racks remind us of times gone by – when there was actually space on buses to place belongings. Harris also brought a 12m bus called an Azure, which seemed perfectly competent, although a full row of tip up seats in the middle of vehicle, by and opposite the emergency exit, is certainly an unusual feature. Both the Higer products shared a lot of their cab design with the Yutong buses.
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| One of three Steeds at the show |
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| Looks like quite an old school interior, but I liked it |
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| Driver is a long way forward of passengers. |
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| Azure. Not bad. |
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| Azure has tip up seats by the mid-body emergency exit, which is unusual. |
Historically a builder of minibuses for community
transport needs, Mellor presented their new Sigma range of electric
buses. Either their stand was extremely busy or their buses (7 and 8 metre long
versions) were extremely small, meaning it was difficult to really get to inspect
these. However they’ve gone for the
quirky round headlight look. I’d be
interested to see if these vehicles take off in the UK market.
I had never heard of Eversum before, but they presented
their eShuttle vehicle. Eversum are
an Austrian/Slovenian company, which has surprised me because I associate
bonkersly small buses with French manufacturers. Other than an interior looking more like an
upmarket night club than a bus, I have no idea what to make of this, I wish
them well.
Finally, the Volvo BZL, the latest in a very long line
of ‘full size’ 12m Volvo city buses. Volvo
have been making decent buses for as long as I’ve had any interest, and the BZL
is just the latest in a line of buses that are well built and look good. There’s a BZL been on trial with some UK
operators but I’m sure if anyone has committed to buying one yet?
Finally finally a shout out to the great people at RGI who'll do a nice refurbishment of your mid-life bus for you!
