8 reasons to love (and not to love) the Boris bus

The Mayor’s New Bus for London is now a familiar sight in the capital. Boris wants two thousand of them on the streets by 2020. But a quick look at the good and the bad of the Boris bus reveals some troubling truths about the Mayor’s vainglorious vehicle.

It's unique and eye catching

Its uniqueness means each bus costs £52k more to produce than a standard hybrid. Londoners also stumped up £11.1m in research and development costs even though the Mayor had hoped these would be borne by the manufacturer.

It incorporates “the most innovative and cutting edge hybrid technology” – Boris Johnson, 2011

The New Bus for London bus has had to be re-engineered this year to meet the new European emissions standards. All those built before 2014 will need a trip to the repair shop for retrofitting.

It’s the “greenest bus of its type” – Boris Johnson, 2013

A year on, and we are still waiting for the evidence to support the Mayor’s claim. The Mayor can’t guarantee that his bus will meet the criteria to enter the Ultra-Low Emission Zone (ULEZ) which comes into force in 2020. He hopes to get around this by letting the dirty buses enter it under an exemption.

The “air cooling” system has been fixed

'Cauldron on wheels' and 'Roastmaster' were two of the nicknames given to the Mayor's bus last summer by passengers were left sweltering in a 32.5C mobile sauna due to technical faults and a lack of opening windows. Despite promising all had been fixed, TfL logged 160 passenger complaints about the 'boiling' bus this summer and several have taken to twitter to make their feelings known.

It’s a masterpiece of British design

That nobody wants to buy. Two prototypes of the New Bus for London were loaned to the UK government to take part in a year-long global trade mission covering 16 countries in four continents. To date there have been no sales outside London.

You can hop on and hop off

Well, sometimes you can. To avoid paying £64k per year for a health and safety officer to guard the open rear door on each bus, the back platform is kept shut during evenings and weekends on all but one route. On route 148 the platform is permanently closed. Passengers have been left hopping mad after being blocked by this extra staff member when trying to alight from the back platform.

It’s the first bus owned by Londoners for decades

Only because no-one else wanted to buy them. The Mayor hoped bus operators would buy the vehicles (as is standard practice) but after TfL found no takers it was forced to purchase the whole fleet itself and miss out on the £28m government subsidy for green buses. The New Buses will spend their entire operational lives in the capital, keeping outmoded technology on London’s streets for 14 years.

It could have been THIS

London’s bus fleet needs innovation. We need zero-emission vehicles on our streets and we need them now. Out of a fleet of 8765 buses just six are pure electric vehicles. Likewise the number of hydrogen fuel cell hybrids on London’s streets has increased from a mere 3 to a still-lowly 8 in the past nine years. London can do better than this!