Electric buses arrive in Dublin, driver training begins
Transport for Ireland has announced that driver training, vehicle testing and route piloting have commenced with the first battery-electric buses arriving in Dublin.
Wrightbus delivered the first nine electric buses out of the 120 ordered by the National Transport Authority (NTA) in June 2022. Testing, commissioning, and driver familiarisation will continue through August and September using the new buses.
Dublin Bus is currently undertaking an extensive training and piloting programme with drivers from the Phibsboro and Summerhill depots. Over the next few months, Dublin Bus will train 760 drivers. Transport for Ireland says the testing and training phase will take around three months.
The National Transport Authority (NTA) of Ireland has recently approved the ordering of an additional 210 buses from Wrightbus for delivery in 2024 under the framework agreement. This is in addition to the 120 ordered in June 2022 and the 91 ordered in Dec 2022. A total of 421 electric buses will enter service during the next 24 months. Within two years, about a third of the public transport provider’s urban bus fleet will have zero tailpipe emissions.
Attending the event to celebrate the arrival of the buses and the beginning of the testing and training phase was the CEO of the NTA, Anne Graham, Dublin Bus CEO Billy Hann and the Irish Minister for Transport Eamon Ryan (title photo). Minister Ryan remarked: “These buses (…) will also offer a much-improved customer experience, and as somebody who had an opportunity to travel on one last week, I was very impressed with how quiet and comfortable the journey was,” he exclaimed. “And, of course, electric buses mean that every community will get to benefit from cleaner air,” the Minister noted.
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