Bi-articulated bus - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

A bi-articulated bus or double articulated bus is an extension of an articulated bus

Articulated bus

An articulated bus is an articulated vehicle used in public transportation. It is usually a single-deck design, and comprises two rigid sections linked by a pivoting joint...

in that it has three passenger compartment sections instead of two. This also involves the addition of an extra axle

Axle

An axle is a central shaft for a rotating wheel or gear. On wheeled vehicles, the axle may be fixed to the wheels, rotating with them, or fixed to its surroundings, with the wheels rotating around the axle. In the former case, bearings or bushings are provided at the mounting points where the axle...

. Due to the extended length, bi-articulated buses tend to be used on high frequency core routes or bus rapid transit

Bus rapid transit

Bus rapid transit is a term applied to a variety of public transportation systems using buses to provide faster, more efficient service than an ordinary bus line. Often this is achieved by making improvements to existing infrastructure, vehicles and scheduling...

schemes rather than conventional bus routes.

One of their main advantages is that they reduce the number of drivers needed to run a service for a specific number of people - i.e. it is usually much more cost-efficient to run a bi-articulated bus with one driver, than, for example, to run two smaller non-articulated buses providing the same total number of seats.

Disadvantages include some difficulties in traffic, the need to have bus stops catering to the extended length, and the fact that two buses with the same capacity can be used more flexibly, such as having one bus arrive every five minutes, instead of one of the larger articulated buses every ten minutes (as an example providing the same service capacity, but different frequencies).

Early versions

The French

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

manufacturers Renault

Renault

Renault S.A. is a French automaker producing cars, vans, and in the past, autorail vehicles, trucks, tractors, vans and also buses/coaches. Its alliance with Nissan makes it the world's third largest automaker...

and Heuliez

Heuliez

Heuliez is a French company that works as a production and design unit for various automakers. It specializes in producing short series for niche markets, such as convertibles or station-wagons....

developed the "Mégabus" (officially the Heuliez GX237), a bi-articulated high-floor bus, in the late 1980s

1980s

File:1980s decade montage.png|thumb|400px|From left, clockwise: The first Space Shuttle, Columbia, lifted off in 1981; American President Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev eased tensions between the two superpowers, leading to the end of the Cold War; The Fall of the Berlin Wall in...

. The demonstrator Mégabus visited transit agencies throughout France, but the only city to order them was Bordeaux

Bordeaux

Bordeaux is a port city on the Garonne River in the Gironde department in southwestern France.The Bordeaux-Arcachon-Libourne metropolitan area, has a population of 1,010,000 and constitutes the sixth-largest urban area in France. It is the capital of the Aquitaine region, as well as the prefecture...

(for an order of 10 buses, built in 1989). These buses, now retired, operated Bordeaux's bus route 7 (most heavily-used route in Europe) until the city's Tramway de Bordeaux

Tramway de Bordeaux

The Bordeaux tramway network consists of three lines serving the city of Bordeaux in southwestern France. The first line was opened on 21 December 2003; further extensions have increased the route length to . The system is notable for using a ground-level power supply of the Alimentation par Sol...

was built in 2004.

Hungarian bus manufacturer Ikarus

Ikarus Bus

Ikarus is a bus manufacturer based in Budapest, Hungary. It was established in 1895 as Uhri Imre Kovács- és Kocsigyártó Üzeme .-History:...

also developed a bi-articulated bus prototype, the Ikarus 293, in the early 1990s.

Currently in use models

The oldest bi-articulated bus system still in use is in Curitiba

Curitiba

Curitiba is the capital of the Brazilian state of Paraná. It is the largest city with the biggest economy of both Paraná and southern Brazil. The population of Curitiba numbers approximately 1.75 million people and the latest GDP figures for the city surpass US$61 billion according to...

, Brazil

Brazil

Brazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is the largest country in South America. It is the world's fifth largest country, both by geographical area and by population with over 192 million people...

. The system began in 1992 with buses manufactured by Volvo

Volvo

AB Volvo is a Swedish builder of commercial vehicles, including trucks, buses and construction equipment. Volvo also supplies marine and industrial drive systems, aerospace components and financial services...

chassis and Marcopolo

Marcopolo S.A.

Marcopolo S.A. is a bus manufacturer founded on August 6, 1949, in the southern Brazilian city of Caxias do Sul, state of Rio Grande do Sul. The company manufactures the bodies for a whole range of coaches, e.g. microbus, intercity and touring coach...

/Ciferal body that can carry 270 passengers. Each bi-articulated bus is constructed with five doors where passengers can quickly load and unload. These buses (along with other bus routes in Curitiba

Curitiba

) were the first to stop on tube stations. These stations allow passengers to pre-pay the fare and enter the vehicle at level, allowing Curitiba's bus system to be a much more affordable solution compared to subway. Curitiba

Curitiba

has over 170 bi-articulated buses circulating the city along five major structural axis of dedicated bus lanes. These buses run on an average frequency of fifty seconds during peak hours.

The Brazilian bus body manufacturer Marcopolo

Marcopolo S.A.

and CAIO have made many bi-articulated buses on top of Volvo chassis. They are currently used in São Paulo

São Paulo

São Paulo is the largest city in Brazil, the largest city in the southern hemisphere and South America, and the world's seventh largest city by population. The metropolis is anchor to the São Paulo metropolitan area, ranked as the second-most populous metropolitan area in the Americas and among...

, Campinas

Campinas

Campinas is a city and municipality located in the coastal interior of the state of São Paulo, Brazil. is the administrative center of the meso-region of the same name, with 3,783,597 inhabitants as of the 2010 Census, consisting of 49 cities....

, Goiânia

Goiânia

-Climate:The city has a tropical wet and dry climate with an average temperature of . There's a wet season, from October to April, and a dry one, from May to September. Annual rainfall is around 1,520 mm....

and Curitiba

Curitiba

.

Volvo

Volvo

has manufactured several bi-articulated buses now in use in Gothenburg

Gothenburg

Gothenburg is the second-largest city in Sweden and the fifth-largest in the Nordic countries. Situated on the west coast of Sweden, the city proper has a population of 519,399, with 549,839 in the urban area and total of 937,015 inhabitants in the metropolitan area...

. They are based on their pusher articulated low-floor bus model with the internal combustion engine

Internal combustion engine

The internal combustion engine is an engine in which the combustion of a fuel occurs with an oxidizer in a combustion chamber. In an internal combustion engine, the expansion of the high-temperature and high -pressure gases produced by combustion apply direct force to some component of the engine...

mounted on the floor on the side of the bus, and the cooling system on the roof.

The Belgian manufacturer Van Hool

Van Hool

Van Hool NV is a Belgian coachbuilder and manufacturer of buses, coaches, trolleybuses, and trailers.The company was founded in 1947 by Bernard van Hool in Koningshooikt, nearby Lier, Belgium. In the early years, the company introduced serial production and exported their products all over Europe...

offers a 25 metres (82 ft) bi-articulated bus with a capacity of about 180 passengers. In September 2002, fifteen were deployed on lines 11 and 12 in the Dutch

Netherlands

The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...

city of Utrecht

Utrecht (city)

Utrecht city and municipality is the capital and most populous city of the Dutch province of Utrecht. It is located in the eastern corner of the Randstad conurbation, and is the fourth largest city of the Netherlands with a population of 312,634 on 1 Jan 2011.Utrecht's ancient city centre features...

, connecting the downtown railway station to office, college and university buildings at the edge of the city. Twelve more have been added since. These buses are also used in the German

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

cities of Aachen

Aachen

Aachen has historically been a spa town in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. Aachen was a favoured residence of Charlemagne, and the place of coronation of the Kings of Germany. Geographically, Aachen is the westernmost town of Germany, located along its borders with Belgium and the Netherlands, ...

(lines 5 and 45) and Hamburg

Hamburg

-History:The first historic name for the city was, according to Claudius Ptolemy's reports, Treva.But the city takes its modern name, Hamburg, from the first permanent building on the site, a castle whose construction was ordered by the Emperor Charlemagne in AD 808...

(Metrobus 5 and Eilbus E86), where single articulated buses alone were not able to handle the huge number of passengers per day.

Swiss Manufacturer Carrosserie Hess

Carrosserie Hess

Carrosserie Hess AG is a bus, trolleybus and commercial vehicle manufacturer based in Bellach , Switzerland. Its products can be found operating across the globe, including the United States and Canada.-History:...

produces a bi-articulated Trolleybus

Trolleybus

A trolleybus is an electric bus that draws its electricity from overhead wires using spring-loaded trolley poles. Two wires and poles are required to complete the electrical circuit...

. called LighTram

Hess lighTram 3

The Hess lighTram3 is a 24.7m long double-articulated trolleybus with a capacity of around 192 passengers. It is manufactured by Carrosserie Hess, a bus, trolleybus and commercial vehicle manufacturer based in Bellach , Switzerland. It is in use in several cities in Switzerland including Zurich and...

that is in use in several Swiss cities, including Zürich

Zürich

Zurich is the largest city in Switzerland and the capital of the canton of Zurich. It is located in central Switzerland at the northwestern tip of Lake Zurich...

, Geneva

Geneva

Geneva In the national languages of Switzerland the city is known as Genf , Ginevra and Genevra is the second-most-populous city in Switzerland and is the most populous city of Romandie, the French-speaking part of Switzerland...

and Lucerne

Lucerne

Lucerne is a city in north-central Switzerland, in the German-speaking portion of that country. Lucerne is the capital of the Canton of Lucerne and the capital of the district of the same name. With a population of about 76,200 people, Lucerne is the most populous city in Central Switzerland, and...

. Also, a bus with an hybrid engine based on the LighTram is offered. This type is currently in use for the Luxembourgian bus operator Voyages Emile Weber.

In development projects

The Chinese manufacturer Zhejiang Youngman (Jinhua Neoplan) has developed the 25 metres (82 ft) JNP6250G bi-articulated bus, deemed the "world's largest", with assistance from NEOPLAN Bus GmbH

Neoplan

NEOPLAN Bus GmbH is a German automotive company that manufactures buses, trolleybuses and coaches. NEOPLAN is now a subsidiary of NEOMAN Bus GmbH, which itself is a part of MAN SE.-Foundations:...

. These buses are on trial service in Beijing

Beijing

Beijing , also known as Peking , is the capital of the People's Republic of China and one of the most populous cities in the world, with a population of 19,612,368 as of 2010. The city is the country's political, cultural, and educational center, and home to the headquarters for most of China's...

.

Bogotá's BRT system TransMilenio

TransMilenio

TransMilenio is a bus rapid transit system that serves Bogotá, the capital of Colombia. The system opened to the public in December 2000, covering Av. Caracas and Calle 80...

is currently operating bi-articulated for its most crowded corridors.

External links

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