US cities pay too much for buses

(www.bloomberg.com)

355 points pavel_lishin | 2 comments | 26 Sep 25 13:57 UTC | HN request time: 0.415s | source

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PaulHoule ◴[26 Sep 25 14:41 UTC] No.45387051[source]▶

Tompkins County bought Proterra buses, they had some serious problems. When they jacked one up to work on it the axle came off and they immediately took all our electric buses out of the fleet -- and Proterra was bankrupt and not able to make it right.

TCAT is still scrambling to find diesel buses to replace those and older diesel buses that are aging out. Lately they've added some ugly-looking buses which are the wrong color which I guess they didn't customize but it means they can run the routes.

replies(2): >>45387278 #>>45394088 #

1. rsynnott ◴[27 Sep 25 08:30 UTC] No.45394088[source]▶

>>45387051 #

Something that strikes me as a bit odd is that most US electric buses seem to come from companies who just make electric buses. The electric buses here are made by conventional bus companies who've been making buses for, in one case, 80 years an in another over a century. Do none of the traditional US bus companies make electric ones?

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2. coryrc ◴[27 Sep 25 21:03 UTC] No.45399288[source]▶

>>45394088 (TP) #

That was just Proterra; all of Seattle's buses are from the usual suspects.

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