Yesterday, Los Angeles Metro released a solicitation to purchase up to 1,160 zero emission buses (solicitation link in comments). The base order includes 260 battery electric buses (BEBs), 20 fuel cell electric buses, and opportunity chargers for future bus rapid transit lines. The order is an important next step in achieving Metro's ambitious zero emission fleet goals. Metro's procurement meets many of the Federal Transit Administration's administrative priorities meant to strengthen the U.S. transit bus manufacturing industry -- there are only two Buy America compliant full size transit bus OEMs left!! We've reduced customization, introduced progress payments, and implemented a regional procurement approach that will allow other LA County transit operators to buy buses through the contract options. While it will be a few years before these buses hit the streets, Metro's existing BEB fleet has logged more than 5 million miles, to my knowledge, more than any other transit agency in the U.S. And we have 95 more BEBs coming this year that will serve the J Line and local service around the County. BEB technology still has a long way to go before it reaches cost and performance parity with Metro's renewable gas-powered CNG fleet, but we anticipate considerable improvements with each new generation of buses. We hope that by aligning our procurements with FTA's administrative priorities it will bring more certainty to a challenged industry, draw more competition into the transit bus space, and drive technology advancement. Well done Daniel Surmenian, Metro's Vendor / Contract management team, and the many other staff and consultant team members who got this procurement together. Your efforts not only help to push the industry forward but also put Metro's recent application to the FTA LoNo / Bus & Bus Facilities grant programs in a strong position to receive funding. Go Metro!
Great work team! We are well on our way to a ZEB fleet.
Congratulations!
Can't wait to see more EV buses on the streets of LA!
Congratulations to Los Angeles Metro on this massive step forward! 🎉
Yeah, buddy! Great to see this moving.
Congrats on getting this RFP on the street and continuing the early work VEA put in to making ZE operations a reality at LA Metro! Go get em Daniel!
Great work Shaun Miller
Shaun that’s amazing news! Congratulations to LA Metro for the milestone. Keep pushing!
Shawn, This is super cool news. Go Metro…Go Olympcs!!
Transportation Decarbonization | ZEB Program Planning at LA Metro
7moZEB Solicitation link: https://business.metro.net/webcenter/portal/VendorPortal/pages_home/solicitations/openSolicitations?Adf-Window-Id=f4j04ba6