The MTA has been making big changes over the past year, with the most recent being the decision to finally phase out the diesel-running RTS buses.
In an effort to be more environmentally conscious, the MTA have decided that the first order of business is switching to low-emission vehicles. Considering that the last RTS was manufactured back in 1999, it makes sense that its finally reached the end of the road (no pun intended). As part of their contribution to ensuring a greener future, investment into electric buses has been made a top priority.
The MTA currently owns roughly 1,700 hybrid-electric buses, 745 natural gas models and 3,000 clean diesel buses. As for the all-electric buses, numbers are still quite low with about 10 in total, however this stat is expected to increase quite soon as newly purchased models will be delivered in around October of this year, with the end goal of having 45 all-electric buses on the fleet by 2020.
A transition of this magnitude obviously doesn’t just happen overnight, so the MTA have two big dates on their projected timeline. These are, adding 500 all-electric buses to its fleet by 2025 and having an entire electric fleet by 2040. Ambitious goals, but definitely for a worthy cause. Let’s see how the next few years unfold.
featured image: youtube