On 19 Dec, 13:20, "Recliner" wrote:
Surprised no-one's posted this story:http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/l...2.stm(complete with
pics)

Aston Martin designs Routemaster

The Aston Martin-Foster design has solar panels

Sports car manufacturer Aston Martin is joint winner of a competition to
design a new Routemaster bus for London.

The Warwickshire-based firm's winning entry was a team effort with
leading architects Foster and Partners.

They share the £25,000 first prize with bus, coach and truck design firm
Capoco Design, based in Wiltshire.

A Transport for London spokesman said the first of the greener and more
accessible, hop-on hop-off, double-deckers could be in service by 2011.

The original Routemasters were phased out from regular service by the
end of 2005 as they were inaccessible to wheelchairs or pushchairs.

Tendering process

The competition, in which children were also invited to take part,
attracted about 700 entries.

The winning designs will now be passed on to bus manufacturers,
following a competitive tendering process, to develop into a final
proposed design.

The Aston Martin-Foster bus design envisages a highly-manoeuvrable,
zero-emissions vehicle, with solar panels built into a glass roof, full
accessibility, warm lighting and wooden floors.

The Capoco design combines what the company describes as "the best of
the old with the best of the new".

The Capoco Design retains the Routemaster-style front engine

It has a low flat floor to allow easy access and will be low emission,
but will also retain the Routemaster-style front engine and open rear
platform.

The youngest winners were nine-year-olds Thomas Staricoff, from
Brighton, and Olivia Carrier, from north-west London, who received £200
worth of bicycle vouchers for their drawings of what a new bus should
look like.

London Mayor Boris Johnson said: "We have had a phenomenal response,
with ideas submitted from around the globe, and we now have, in our
joint winners, two stunning designs that allow us to go forward and
produce a truly iconic bus fit for 21st Century London."

But Labour's transport spokesperson on the London Assembly, Val
Shawcross, said: "The design competition may have been fun and the
winning designs are extremely impressive, but this is not a serious way
to make policy and not a worthwhile use of public money.

"I have yet to hear one convincing argument for why London needs a new
double-decker bus and until Boris comes up with some, Londoners will see
this as little more than a vanity project."

I couldn't find detail on the engineering:

- Will the bus be air conditioned? (Why aren't they now?)
- What will the drive train be? Hybrid or Plug-in hybrid seem logical.
- What steps are taken to improve safety? (always the biggest
perceived problem with routemasters).

On 20 Dec, 12:55, disgoftunwells wrote:

On 19 Dec, 13:20, "Recliner" wrote:

Surprised no-one's posted this story:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/7790082.stm
(complete with pics)

Aston Martin designs Routemaster

The Aston Martin-Foster design has solar panels

Sports car manufacturer Aston Martin is joint winner of a competition to
design a new Routemaster bus for London.

The Warwickshire-based firm's winning entry was a team effort with
leading architects Foster and Partners.

They share the £25,000 first prize with bus, coach and truck design firm
Capoco Design, based in Wiltshire.

(snip)

I couldn't find detail on the engineering:

- Will the bus be air conditioned? (Why aren't they now?)
- What will the drive train be? Hybrid or Plug-in hybrid seem logical.
- What steps are taken to improve safety? (always the biggest
perceived problem with routemasters).


I think the truth is that there isn't any detail on the engineering,
or at least not very much - these are concept designs (and bear in
mind that not one design has been chosen as the 'winner', but two).

Re air-conditioning - the conventional wisdom seems to be that it's
just too impractical to fit A/C to London buses for a variety of
reasons, including the fact that the doors are open so often. Some of
the newer buses do have quite decent forced-air cooling/circulation
systems (or whatever they are called). Also, A/C isn't exactly going
to be compatible with an open, door-less platform.

And yes, the issue of whether there actually would be an open platform
is very a good question.

How this all plays out still seems pretty unclear. The notion of a new
Routemaster is one that has crossed an enormous number of people's
minds over the years, even if just as an inconsequential little day
dream - is Boris therefore really planning to be the 'can do' man that
ignores people who say such things can't be done in this day and age
turns this into a reality, winning accolades from all quarters? I dare
say that is his fantasy - his future political career (and be in no
doubt, he is ambitious) being boosted by his reputation as being the
man that 'saved' London's buses in the public's eye.

I'm not sure how this quite fits with his oft professed drive for
'taxpayer value' though. Are these new buses really going to have
conductors on them, especially when one bears in mind one of the big
arguments for having them is that of speeding up fare collection and
hence reducing dwell times - something Oyster has been rather
successful in doing?

And more to the point how much of the bus network's budget will get
swallowed by this project? The bus service in London has got better by
leaps and bounds over the past ten years - far more reliable, frequent
and faster services providing a far greater capacity with attractively
low fares has led to a great increase in passenger numbers. If this
'new Routemaster' project means there'll be less money around for the
bread-and-butter of the bus network then all the gains made over the
past few years will be in vain. I really hope Boris understands that.

Mizter T wrote:


And more to the point how much of the bus network's budget will get
swallowed by this project? The bus service in London has got better by
leaps and bounds over the past ten years - far more reliable, frequent
and faster services providing a far greater capacity with attractively
low fares has led to a great increase in passenger numbers. If this
'new Routemaster' project means there'll be less money around for the
bread-and-butter of the bus network then all the gains made over the
past few years will be in vain. I really hope Boris understands that.

I doubt whether he understands it in the way we, as persons using public
transport regularly, see it. Remember he did classics, it is possible that
he sees himself as Caius Boris, saviour of the people of Londinium, possibly
soon to be elected emperor (or tyrant) of the entire universe by popular
demand.
Personally I think he is more likely to be equated with one Biggus Dickus of
mythical times past.


--
Martin

replies to newsgroup only please.

On 20 Dec, 16:41, Martin Smith wrote:

Mizter T wrote:

And more to the point how much of the bus network's budget will get
swallowed by this project? The bus service in London has got better by
leaps and bounds over the past ten years - far more reliable, frequent
and faster services providing a far greater capacity with attractively
low fares has led to a great increase in passenger numbers. If this
'new Routemaster' project means there'll be less money around for the
bread-and-butter of the bus network then all the gains made over the
past few years will be in vain. I really hope Boris understands that.

I doubt whether he understands it in the way we, as persons using public
transport regularly, see it. Remember he did classics, it is possible that
he sees himself as Caius Boris, saviour of the people of Londinium, possibly
soon to be elected emperor (or tyrant) of the entire universe by popular
demand.
Personally I think he is more likely to be equated with one Biggus Dickus of
mythical times past.


Ho ho!

I'm in no doubt that he's very ambitious and sees the Mayoralty as but
a stepping stone to bigger and better things - bear in mind that never
before has a UK politician been directly elected on such a large
popular vote as he was. I remember his sister, the columnist and
writer Rachel Johnson, being interviewed on the radio the night of his
win - she was of course singing his praises but also spoke very
unguardedly of her certainty that being Mayor was but a juncture in
the ongoing and inevitable ascent of Boris.

I think it should be borne in mind that Boris is playing to a national
audience, not just a London one - and thus one should look at what he
does on the Mayoral stage in this context. Obviously this isn't going
to apply to everything he does as Mayor, but it will to the high-
profile stuff that gets national coverage - indeed it's likely that
the aforementioned stuff will become high-profile and get national
coverage because Boris and his people desire this to be the case.

So I'm sure he thinks that if he can somehow resurrect the Routemaster
this will be another thing on which his reputation as a rare
politician 'who actually does what he says' can hang. The thing is
ditching the western extension of the congestion charge is one thing -
it's easy to cancel something - but actually making something like the
new Routemaster happen is a rather different story. I reckon sure he
thinks he can somehow do it, and thus create for himself the legend of
the politician who 'saved London's bus'. I just hope he realises that
he also has the power to ruin London's bus service as well - but
perhaps the ongoing day-to-day success of this is of less interest to
him than the far more tangible resurrection of an icon. At what cost,
Boris?