News Archives - Page: 4

A contract to rebuild PATCO's aging fleet of railcars has finally been award. Alstom of France recently won the $194.2 Million contract to strip there cars down to there bare stainless steel bodies. New interiors, brake and propulsion systems, lighting and messaging systems, and  heating and cooling systems will be installed. The cars will reportedly keep there original wheel assemblies and traction motors. The cars were built in 1968 and 1980 by Budd and Vickers respectively and the project will extend the cars life 25 years. All 120 cars will be rebuilt at Alstom's Hornell NY facility over a 5 year period!

Article by Daryl Jackson (Philly Transport)

This afternoon at around 1:30, 4571 collided with a Lexus that was heading in the opposite direction.  The accident occured in Norristown by the old Logan Square Shopping Center as 4571 was heading to Norristown TC on route 90.  The Lexus driver was flown to University of Pennsylvania Hospital as 8 passengers on the bus were taken to local hospitals.

Link to the ABC news report: http://abclocal.go.com/wpvi/story?section=news/local&id=7814925

On Friday morning, October 29th, SEPTA is holding a press conference/ceremony to announce the start of passenger service for the Silverliner Vs.  This will be held at track 0 in Suburban Station, starting at 9:30 AM.  The train is due to run from Norristown to Center City before the ceremony, but we do not know what train it will run as.  It's quite likely that this will be an "extra wildcat" train.

Last Saturday, SEPTA held it's bus roadeo at Cornwall Heights parking lot. During this event, SEPTA introduced two milestone buses.  The first unit, Frankford's 8411 was the 1000th bus ever produced by New Flyer for SEPTA. The second bus is Southern's 8450, this is a greater milestone as this is the 30,000th bus which New Flyer ever built.

Photographer: Michael EEEEE Pearson

PTV forum member Reeko_8197 spotted Silverliner IV #280 with a LED sign. The sign resembles the exact same units that are mounted on the rear of the New Flyer hybrid buses. Over the year 280 was chosen to test out the new wireless recievers for the new Silverliner Vs which is expected to be delievered over the next 2 years. 280 also had an interesting device mounted on the on the top left corner of the car.

Reeko_8197 spotted 280 today at Suburban station 

http://philadelphiatransitforums.cjb.net/topic/7223088/3/#new

Later last night, 8425 has been delivered to Southern, this completes the list of which depots will receive the New Flyer DE40LFRs. It's been reported that Southern WILL indeed get the remaining 35 of these restyles. According to the "Southern's Number 1 Informants", the lucky driver of the day to receive this bus was on 7357 on the route 37. They also reported that all of the 5000 with the 5100s assigned at Southern will be scrapped within the next few weeks.  Be sure to check out the forums (http://philadelphiatransitforums.cjb.net/index/) for more infomation.

According our newest member on the forums, Phillydriver, Frankford still has three to four restyles that still needs to be delivered. During the past several weeks, the delivery of these restyles offset the recently overhauled Zfers (5775-5799) off to Comly. By doing this, this enabled SEPTA to scrap some of their remaining nabis at comly.

The offical break down for the 2010 order of New flyers restyles are: 8340-8379 (40), Victory; 8380-8404 (25), Frontier; 8405-8424(20), Frankford; and Southern, which currently will receive the remaining 35 units  8425-8459 (35).

As of today, July 25th, the R designators for the Regional Rail lines are no more.  Gray decals now cover any reference to the R identifiers in the Center City Stations, replaced by the new line names.  The new schedules, which were put out last week, are the same blue-gray color, with the Trenton/Chestnut Hill East and the Fox Chase/Chestnut Hill West schedules separated.

However, sources say that we may be seeing the colored placards used on the railcars for some time - the new placards aren't ready yet!

5312 is still around, the infomation claiming that this is the bus that caught on fire a few weeks back in chester is false.

Last night around 9:15 PM while on the 117 at 15th and Edgmont in the City of Chester, NABI 5312 suffered an engine fire.  The fire was bad enough that smoke from it set off a fire alarm at a nearby business.  Engine 82 (Chester City Fire Department) put the fire out but it is unknown whether or not the bus will be salvaged.  Given the age of the bus, it probably will not be.  Rust in peaces 5312, a good NABI that spent most of its life at Red Arrow.  

PTV member frankl3217 found 2321 parked at Woodland with an LED sign stating it was not in service!  Will more PCC IIs be retrofitted with LED signs like the Kawasakis?  Stay tuned to find out more!

As mentioned in this post, Now that much of the delivery of the hybrids at Victory are now completed, Frontier has started to receive their allotment of hybrids as well. 8384 was spotted on the 124 earlier today.  It been reported that Frontier is expected to receive 25 hybrids.

On another note, 8370 has been spotted in the northeast at Franklin Mills mall by Joechopchop. It was reported that this bus was running a training run on Comly's behalf. We shall see whether or not Comly will receive any buses from this order.

Overhauls of the first generation Hybrids operating out of Southern (5601H-5612H and 5831H-5850H) has been completed!  The last two buses, 5611H and 5849H, were both spotted overhauled by SouthernSeptaRida215 this afternoon.  With this complete, Berridge can focus its resources on the overhauls of the 2004 New Flyer D40LFs.

8380 has been delivered to Frontier depot.  This is the first of what is believed to be 20-25 DE40LFRs to be assigned to Frontier.  Red Arrow has received their batch (except for 8340) of the new hybrids.  Southern is next in line for the new buses.

According to Darryl Bulls on the boards, more NABIS assigned to Comly, and Callowhill has been scrapped. Their numbers are: #5090, 5092, 5095, 5099, 5102, 5110, 5120, 5141, 5146-5147, 5157 and 5159.

After many months of waiting, #8341 arrived at Germantown. Along with 8342 a week later. The hybrids were arriving at 4 buses per month, now a month later, roughly six/seven buses are arriving on SEPTA's property on an weekly basis. As it stands now, 8371 is the highest SEPTA bus on property. 8371 is currently at Germantown awaiting for plates and acceptance. Earlier today, Rick S, spotted a 836x being delivered to Victory.  As it stands now, the highest hybrid spotted in revenue service is 8364.

According to many reports, Victory is set to receive 40 hybrids (8340-8379). It's unknown at this point who the next depot will be to receive the hybrids. It's been reported that Southern will receive their units in July. It's also been speculated that Frontier and Comly may also receive them as well.