Tender bidders Arriva reportedly shipping 60 bendy buses to Malta
Transport group Arriva is planning to ship 60 of its 160 London bendy buses to Malta if it wins a contract to provide bus services on the island, according to a number of British newspapers including the Daily Mail.
But government officials made it clear that bendy buses are not ideal for all Maltese roads and that the best option for Malta is a mixed bus fleet composed of vehicles of different sizes.
Along with other operators, Arriva is presently withdrawing its bendy buses (also known as articulated buses) on orders of London mayor Boris Johnson, who wants them replaced with a new generation of open-platform Routemasters.
But a spokesperson for the Transport Ministry made it clear that “articulated buses are not suitable for all routes required in the public transport tender.”
But the only type of buses which are being excluded are rigid buses longer than 12.5 metres, which are deemed unsuitable for Malta’s road network.
Tenders proposing longer rigid buses will be disqualified because longer articulated Buses and double-decker Buses can be used to cater for these bus routes, a spokesperson for the ministry confirmed.
The tender document required bidders to analyse “the bus routes and the maximum waiting times” applicable to each Bus Stop in Malta and Gozo with a view of establishing an appropriate mix of bus types to provide the service.
“Such an analysis should take into consideration the physical dimensions of the streets and roads covered by such bus routes as well as overhanging infrastructure,” the ministry spokesperson said.
Studies conducted in the past years have shown that even the present 10 metre rigid bus fleet is not suitable for Malta.
In fact it will only be thanks to the introduction of smaller buses that the new company will be able to service a number of new routes.
“The uniform bus size we have today never allowed for certain communities to be served by public transport,” the ministry spokesperson said.
The government is following the recommendations made by international consultants Halcrow, who instead of the present single size fleet serving the entire network, proposed the use of vehicles of different sizes according to the needs and possibilities of each route: “some smaller than today’s typical size of a bus, and some larger.” Halcrow specifically recommended the use of articulated buses to connect the Gozo ferries with Rabat, Gozo.
Bendy Buses: The pros and cons Articulated buses are used in most European cities but were only introduced in London by Mayor of London Ken Livingstone in 2002.
Bendy buses have the advantage of carrying more passengers than rigid single-decker buses, while still being able to turn and cope with the limitations of the roads it is used on.
While an articulated bus can carry over 140 people per vehicle, a Routemaster is only able to carry a maximum of 77.
Articulated buses with multiple doors and simultaneous boarding arrangements like the once used in London, are capable of loading and off-loading many more passengers in less time than conventional double decker buses and Routemasters. This also resulted in greater fare-evasion as passengers are able to enter through any door.
Critics of articulated buses lament that these take more road space (18 metres long compared to nine metres for a Routemaster and 10 metres for a double decker), which makes them more likely to block junctions and cause difficulties for other road users.
Bendy buses were also more accident-prone, although this could be the result of their use in the busiest parts of the city.
In the run up to the London election, Tory candidate Boris Johnson described articulated buses as ‘cyclist killing machines’. Incumbent Ken Livingstone replied by pointing out that no London cyclist had ever been killed by an articulated bus.
In August 2008, following his election as Mayor of London, Johnson announced that the bendy buses would be withdrawn as their five-year operating contracts came to an end, starting from May 2009, and completed by 2015.
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