News Archives - Page: 5

As Ctrabs reported in the forums, NABI #5312 has been reported on the route 92. After many many years of the NABIS being operated on the route 104, Victory is slowly losing NABIS and are now reassigning them to Frontier and other depots. 5311-5313, 5315, along with 5317 has joined their fleet of 13 NABIs, making for a total of 18 NABIs being assigned to Frontier.  Callowhill received 5302 from Red Arrow. 5273 with 5276 have been reassigned to Midvale. It appears that the remaining of the Victory 52xx may also be assigned to Midvale as well.

According to Chuck Green, Victory only has 17 NABIS left.  Among those left are 5277, 5300-5301, 5304, 5306, 5309, 5320, and 5324.

On June 3rd 2010, two trolleys collided while operating on the route 36. The crash occurred at island and Woodland.  #9017 rear-ended #9072. 9072 has suffered some damage in the rear of the unit. One poster on our forums said, "It's easily 2' shorter now.” It is uncertain if anyone was hurt. While this accident occurred, shuttle buses were dispatch to operate on the route 36.

Photos are taken by Trolley Bill of the Friends of Philadelphia Trolleys (FPT) group:

According to several posters in the forums, trolley Route 10 will be Bus Shutting throughout the summer months. This is due to the new tracks being replaced on 63rd street. Service between 63rd, Malvern, and 33rd street station will be bus-substituted with buses.

http://philadelphiatransitforums.cjb.net/topic/7207854/3/#new

The winner of June's Photo of the month is Transit Freak photo of three SEPTA Kawasaki cars with the new Luminator LED signs. Congratulations

With the arrival of the 2010 restyles, Victory has lost of their 51xx, which are their 1996 NABI 416.08TA. It has been reported that 5134, 5136, 5139, 5142, and 5148-5149 has been listed for resale.

Frontier has received several NABIS from Victory as well. Their numbers are 5317, 5313, and 5311. Making Frontier having a grant total of 16 nabis in their fleet of 107 buses.

On the hybrid front, the highest hybrid spotted in service is 8358. Making Victory having 18 new hybrids. Mainly of the hybrids assigned to Victory are expected to dominate the route 101, 102, 123, and 125 throughout the summer of 2010. Some hybrids has been reported on other Victory routes as well.

The AC Jitney is getting 190 new CNG powered cutaways, starting July 1st.  They will be green instead of blue.  Apparently they are test driving one now.

Check out this article for more information: http://www.pressofatlanticcity.com/news/breaking/article_1e6a89ee-63c9-11df-887c-001cc4c002e0.html

Late last night (Saturday, May 15th) shortly before midnight, 8310 on the 27 struck a utility pole and brought down power lines at Ridge and Butler Pikes in Plymouth Township, Montgomery County.  Power was knocked out in the area and was restored around 1:00 this morning.  The two people on the bus were not injured.

Story: http://abclocal.go.com/wpvi/story?section=news/local&id=7444380

Note: The last 27 on Saturday nights from Plymouth Meeting leaves the mall at 11:20 PM, thus placing this accident around that time.

Both 8341 and 8342 has arrived at Victory and are now being placed into service to operate on the route 101.

Over the summer months, the route 101 and soon to be 102 shuttle will exclusively use these buses. The NABIS assigned at Victory will remain in service until the construction on the 101 and 102 is completed.

On a side note, 8344-46 are now at Germantown awaiting for inspection. Once they have completed inspection and the arrival of new fares boxes, they will then get assigned to Victory.

Photo-right: Photographer buswizard

Amtrak is holding its 3rd Annual National Train Day event this Saturday from 11 AM to 4 PM.  There will be equipment displays, an exhibit about the history of baseball and the railroad, model train set, and more!  Check out this website for more information: http://www.nationaltrainday.com/events/philadelphia/

According to Front5151 on our forums, 8341 has just arrived at Germantown depot. It finally looks like that the order DE40LFR has finally begun. This will be be the first order of DE40LF-restyles to be placed in service. According to several posts on the board, roughly 20 of these units will go to Victory.

On Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday (April 12th, 13th, and 14th) the married pair of Silverliner Vs will be on display at Suburban Station.  You will be able to access 801 and 802 on Track 0 between the hours of 11AM to 6PM.

Capital Area Transit (CAT) of Harrisburg, PA has recently purchased several American Ikarus buses from SEPTA.  They were purchased about four months ago and were put into service his past week.  So far five buses are confirmed to be at or heading to Harrisburg.  They are being numbered in the 9600 series representing the year of the bus.  They are 5035 (9602), 5042 (9603), 5061 (9604), and 5073 (9605), with 5194 due to arrive in mid May.  It is not known at this time whether legendary SEPTA employee Tom Collins who works at CAT was involved in this purchase or not. 

For more information, see the thread in our forums, http://philadelphiatransitforums.cjb.net/topic/7199852/1/ .

TMA Bucks has just rolled out its new twitter page for updates on the rushbus service.   Check it out: www.twitter.com/rushbus.

First it was TrainView, which was an huge success, now it's BusViewer. SEPTA has finally rolled out this cool new online tool called BusViewer. It basically gives their customers an up-to-the-minute status on where the buses are at on the route. It only supports two routes (33 and 109) for the time being. Admittedly, not all buses on the route are showing up! This system has a lot of potential. Hopefully would serve as an excellent customer service tool in the future.

 http://septa.org/service/bus/busview.html

 http://philadelphiatransitforums.cjb.net/topic/7196317/1/#new

Earlier this week, Elizabeth Mintz, the communications director of SEPTA, reported to the Citizens Advisory Committee that the Regional Rail "R" designators will be ELIMINATED starting July 25th, 2010.  Instead, the lines will be named by their terminus, similar to the way that the general line destinations are posted today.  The only exception will be the R6 Norristown line, which SEPTA will rename the Manayunk/Norristown line, since Manayunk is a primary destination on the line.

Along with the elimination of the "Rs", the line colors will disappear as well.  Instead, all lines will be represented in the typical Regional Rail gray that you find on the maps and signs downtown today.

This is part of SEPTA's customer service initiative, an effort to make the system easier to understand for occasional and first time riders.  For more details on this particular change, view the following article at PlanPhilly.com: http://planphilly.com/regional-rail-numbers-will-go-away-july-25