GM gets order for hybrid buses

Ann Arbor got new hybrid buses from GM few months ago. They are really nice and quiet. Apparently blind people complain to the drivers that they cannot hear the bus coming. Which is true, they are considerably quieter than the non-hybrid busses we have (inside and outside).

The Ride - Ann Arbor Transportation Authority

 

Gotta admit how puzzling it is, that various municipalities would not choose Toyota to do their hybrid busses. It only makes sense: Go with the company that first put forth a hybrid that so many love ... versus GM, where Lutz would criticize the technology as just a lot of hooey.

The only rational one can put forth is the "Bay Area Rapid Transit" (B.A.R.T) mentality ... where San Francisco hired a company to build rapid transit. For quite some time BART was a horrible money pit, that had to be reworked and reworked before it was finally made right. Is that how it works? ... municipalities naturally pick the worst to build something? (shaking head)

 

Does Toyota even sell a hybrid bus? I don't think so. Which pretty much debunks the rest of your argument.

 

GM was producing hybrid locomotives before Toyota was building cars.

 

Right ... I forgot, everyone knows there can't be any other manufacturers of busses .... either now;
Green Car Congress: Toyota to Use its Fuel Cell Hybrid Bus at 2005 World Expo

or in days gone by;
Blue Bird /Toyota Bus -

(sigh)
Yes, believe it or not, other companies can & do make chassis for big vehicles. Believe it or not, (for example) if you want a motorhome, you can put a power plant in it from ONE manufacturer, or ANOTHER manufacturer, and the chassis comes from a different manufacturer ... believe it or not. So, I guess I really failed at making the point ... taking it for granted that folks can imagine that other countries make stuff. But tangenting back, and even if Toyota and other manufacturers didn't know how to make busses, municipalities could certainly SUPPLY the BEST and PROVEN hybrid system ever made, to the chassis manufacturer, rather than have some company make it that already pooh pooh'ed hybrids. That's all the point was.

 

Well I have to say, in spite of the general animosity around here for GM, that sounds like a good thing to me. If I were running a local government, I'd sure buy American-made buses if I had the choice.

Heck, I'd love to buy a GM hybrid or EV myself if they can match or better Toyota in reliability, emissions and MPGs.

 

I guess I must have been presumptious. Knowing how GM lays off U.S. workers, shuts down U.S. manufacturing plants, outsources auto manufacturing to Mexico, Canada, China, (and Toyota, in the mean time, is BUILDING plants here) I wrongly thought GM would do the same outsourcing with the busses. Wasn't I the silly one ...

 

No, I was being optimistic. If I were in the position to spend millions on a public transit system, I'd include the following in my research:

* Reliability
* Fuel Economy
* Emissions
* Where the money I spend would end up

I wouldn't buy any GM vehicle for my own personal use for the reasons you state, among others.

For public transit I wouldn't rule them out just on principle though, I'd do my research. In cursory search I didn't find out where GM's buses are built, so enlighten me.

 

Yeah, because a Fuel Cell hybrid is just like a Diesel hybrids...

OMG, really?

Apparently...

If GM already "pooh pooh'ed" hybrids, they would not be selling any. I think you are being presumptuous by claiming that Toyota's HSD is better than GM-Allisons hybrid system.

 

Not "if" GM Pooh pooh's them ... Lutz DOES pooh pooh them:

Lutz: GM building hybrids for good press

I didn't know there was any doubt about that. So you see, GM CAN try to build a hybrid fleet (it aint much to look at right now ... but hopefully it will be some day ... with better quality than the shiny new '72 Vega I bought 35 years ago) of hybrids ... all the while not believing in them.

Being the King of outsourcing, maybe the busse won't be junk, like so much of their product has been for decades. Hopefully they'll outsource the buss systems to Toyota.

 

I don't even know if GM builds them any more. Last I heard, GM sold off it manufacturing line, years ago ... unless they started it back up again.

COMPANY NEWS; GREYHOUND TO BUY G.M. UNIT - New York Times

But somehow, the way they do things, it'd be surprising if GM was manufacturing them in the U.S. Allison is simply the company that makes the tranny. I believe GM is the parent company of Allison.

 

I'm confused... now the buses that were ordered by the various municipalities listed above will be delivered by Greyhound?

I guess GM did all they needed with the hybrid buses: They sent out a press release talking about them. That lines up more with Lutz's approach than actually following through would have....

 

i posted a pic of a GM diesel-electric hybrid bus on this forum 3 years ago. i guess it took long enough for the rest of the country to catch on. i am just happy that my area realized that other issues besides gas prices were involved since our first hybrid bus showed up when gas was about a buck fifty

*edit*

oops!! make that almost 4 years ago...here is pic taken in Lacey, WA May 2004...busses had been around a few months by this time

 

I don't know which buses cost over a million dollars... a quick search turned up this link although I'm not sure if that's entirely relevant, given the well-documented "hybrid premium" But if your estimate was possibly as much as 400% too high, I wonder about your other information. Can you source those regulations?

It's not that I doubt, but I don't commit trivia like that to memory unless I'm pretty sure not to make a fool of myself quoting it back someday to someone who knows better.

 

a million??

i am pretty sure that the buses that the transit authority bought here (financed about 60% by various government funding sources) were more like a few hundred thousand... with the hybrids being around 300k... might be more but not much more i dont think... but this was 4 years ago... probably much more now

 

I'm passing on what I was told while interviewing with an OEM manufacturer of transit buses. I thought is sounded high, but an VP from a bus OEM should know.

The OEM I interviewed with also sells a service package at the time of sale that just about doubles the price of the bus but covers all the powertrain components. From the cities position this is great because the federal government is essentially paying for your maintenance.

From your link the average price for a 60 foot articulated bus is ~$500,000. The average bus is conventional diesel. LPG, LNG, Hybrid buses are more than that. Granted, a 30 or 40' bus is half the price of a 60'.

Even if the cost is 1/2 a million dollars, no city is going to foot the bill alone to buy a foreign made bus when the feds will pay the majority of the cost if to buy American buses.

 

Tulsa has had one for about a year and a half.