Driven by a quest to meet low emissions targets, Lothian Buses is accelerating its fleet upgrade with secondhand buses fully refurbished and retrofitted to Euro 6 standard.
MD Richard Hall told routeone: “We want to make Edinburgh the greenest city. These buses will replace Euro 3 models so that by 2020 the whole fleet will be Euro 5, Euro 6 or electric.”
Lothian’s ongoing investment has seen the regular intake of new buses in its 794-strong fleet, with strong Volvo content. Consequently, the purchase from Ensignbus of 50 former London Euro 5 Wright Gemini 2-bodied Volvo B9TLs helps further standardise on the Swedish manufacturer.
The seven-year-old Euro 5 buses became available after Metroline lost the contract for London’s route 18.
The interiors are being brought up to Lothian’s new bus standard by the comprehensive refurb, while the addition of an exhaust after-treatment package will upgrade them to Euro 6; the supplier of the retrofit system is yet to be determined.
After completion by Thornton’s, the first two of the ‘as new’ buses, have arrived at Lothian’s Central Garage. The remaining 48 will be refurbished by Wrightbus.
