VIA Metropolitan Transit has debuted eight 40-foot GILLIG electric buses to provide more sustainable public transport options in San Antonio, Texas.
These new electric vehicles join VIA’s fleet of nearly 500 compressed natural gas (CNG) vehicles, which are powered at the largest CNG fuelling station in North America, run by the transit agency.
As part of VIA’s electrification project, a charging area for the eight electric buses has been constructed in San Antonio. This consists of a covered 12-bay docking area with four charging stations that can each charge two buses.
The new vehicles are expected to fully charge in four hours or less and have a range of 150 miles.
VIA President/CEO Jeffrey C. Arndt said:The addition of new all-electric buses keeps VIA moving in the right direction with green technologies that are advancing to a point that makes them practical as well as sustainable. VIA’s CNG fleet conversion delivered up to a 97% reduction of harmful emissions from the vehicles they replaced and put us on the road to a cleaner, greener future.
VIA plans to place two of the new buses into service this summer for testing and data collection, before deploying the full electric fleet in the second half of 2023.
Each vehicle has capacity for up to 38 passengers and provides dimmable LED lighting and USB charging ports at every seat.
