by TIM BOND
Last night Metro held an open house detailing the initial findings of the Trolley Evaluation Study. The purpose of this study was to determine if the purchase, operating and maintenance costs of electric trolleybuses exceeds that of diesel-electric series hybrids. The initial findings, released two weeks ago, summarized the preliminary findings, indicate that electric trolley buses outperform diesel hybrid buses in comparisons based on cost, energy, and environmental effects. This study is not about whether or not the trolley system should be expanded or what the new buses should look like (e.g. three door boarding).
The presentation provided a few more concrete numbers. It is important to note that the study was based on present-day facts and figures and not projections or speculations. For example, one citizen at the meeting suggested that ridership would improve with the purchase of trolleys over hybrids. Metro reps suggested that was speculation, and that the study would assume ridership was not affected by bus type.
The FTA standard for the vehicle’s useful life is 15 years for a trolley and 12 for a diesel hybrid. The cost difference for 60 foot buses is $1.285m for a trolley vs. $785,000 for a hybrid. Because there are many manufacturers offering hybrid buses, the figure for hybrids was easy to obtain. Since fewer manufacturers produce trolleys, these numbers were based on those paid by other North American agencies and quotes from manufactures such as New Flyer and Vossloh Kiepe. This annualized cost for this report was calculated over one life-cycle for each vehicle type. Also included was fixed-guideway grant money—something the feds give out to operators of trolley networks. This money would mostly be used to cover the difference in capital cost of the trolleys. Not included in the 2009 audit but evaluated here were the costs to decommission the trolley infrastructure ($37 million) and the costs to expand fuel capacity at the base ($5 million). More after the jump.
