‘NOT IN SERVICE’
Bus manufacturer taking 15 ART buses back to Calif. plant
The 60-foot all-electric buses intended to transform Central Avenue into a rapid transit corridor as part of the Albuquerque Rapid Transit project are on their way back to a California manufacturing facility, city officials announced Wednesday.
Representatives from bus manufacturer BYD removed the model K11 electric buses from the City of Albuquerque Transit Department’s Daytona Facility early Wednesday after city officials demanded earlier this month that the company take back the 15 electric buses it had delivered.
Mayor Tim Keller cancelled the city’s contract with BYD earlier this month after officials from ABQ Ride said they discovered problems ranging from failing brakes to insufficient battery life. BYD was originally contracted to build 20 of the 60-foot fullyelectric buses for ART.
“This is a weight off of our shoulders,” Mayor Tim Keller said in a statement. “It was good to see these problematic buses leaving town. It’s unfortunate the company couldn’t deliver and it leaves our city’s ART project years behind.”
China-based BYD, also known as Build Your Dreams, has “vehemently” denied allegations its buses were unfit for service and said it would hire “independent transportation experts” to evaluate them and prove they are safe and ready for use. A BYD statement issued late Wednesday said the buses will undergo third party inspections later this week.
Keller said the city has placed an order for 10 new, nonelectric buses from a “well-established American company that makes buses all the time.”
An earlier BYD statement said “the city is not acting in good faith under the contract and further indicate a potential political agenda to discredit and throttle a public works project that the mayor has long criticized as part of his campaign platform.”
While those buses were in-route back to BYD’s home
plant, city officials on Wednesday released a video on YouTube purporting to illustrate a safety issue on one of the ART buses involving the bridge plate, which is designed to fold out to allow wheelchairs to access the bus.
According to the statement from ABQ Ride, the bridge plate should not fold out when there is weight on it to prevent a wheelchair or person being flipped onto the street.
The video shows a test in which a 118-pound brake drum is placed on the bus’s bridge plate. However, the bridge plate folds out and in, easily flipping the weight of the brake drum.
The video also purports to show a bridge plate catapulting a 190-pound person out of the bus. The bridge plate should not fold out if there is weight atop it, officials said, yet the video depicts it doing so with a person standing on it.
The bridge plate should also stop its descent when there is any object in the way, but the video shows the plate compressing a tennis shoe.
The BYD statement issued late Wednesday said the bridge plate issue was never reported to the company.
“Once again, blanket allegations are being made through press conferences or releases with no data or information to support same, as the city still has not released a copy of their inspection report,” the statement read. “BYD is a global leader in battery-electric technology and stands with its clients and its products.”
The findings of an inspection report are still being completed, according to ABQ Ride officials.