In compliance with the Executive Yuan’s plan to replace city buses with electric counterparts by 2030 and to improve the quality of living by adding low carbon emission vehicles with less noise, the city government began adding new electric buses to its fleet of public buses starting 2018.
Currently, a total of 58 electric buses serve major city bus routes including routes 66, Heping Line, 236 limited, 251 limited, and 307. After receiving positive feedbacks from commuters, the city government announced that it will allocate 20 more buses to the operation of route 620 on March 16. With the addition of the new vehicles, there are now 78 electric buses serving local riders!
The Public Transportation Office (PTO) pointed out that route 620 include stops at major attractions such as Taipei Children’s Amusement Park, National Taiwan Science Education Center, 9 MRT stations along the Tamsui-Xinyi and Wenhu lines, and various locations across Nangang and Neihu districts. It is also an important transportation option for students attending schools such as Yangming High School, Taibei Senior High School, Soochow University, and Neihu Senior High School. The route serves an average of 2 million commuters each year.
The new electric-powered vehicles allocated to route 620 will be based at the special terminal in Beitou-shilin Technology Corridor which comes equipped with smart charging facilities. The buses also come with installed ADAS system, offering functions such as vehicle collision warning, pedestrian collision warning, vehicle-to-vehicle distance monitoring, overspeed warning, and more.
According to PTO, the agency will do its best to realize the goal of expanding the local electric bus fleet to 400 vehicles by the end of 2022.