Happy New Year and welcome to 2020, the start of a new decade! Thought I jump in and create the Brisbane Transport observations thread for this year.

Regards

About eight new coaches parked at Volgren today so it looks like they are building coaches at present so there may be no new TfB B8s (i.e. past 2883) for a while.

E2881 parked at Eagle Farm Depot today with rego XQ 45 JU.


There are about 10 gas MANs parked in the rear lanes at Eagle Farm - very difficult to identify which ones as the fleet numbers have all been been diligently removed.

I have been able to identify 1200, 1208, 1238 and 1241 as being four of them.

Does anyone have a contact at Eagle Farm Depot who could get the other fleet numbers?


1209 has had decals removed and is currently parked in the front corner of Toowong Depot - looks to be the next withdrawal.

1204, 1205 and 1206 are listed on the Manheim site for auction on Friday 10 January 2020.

3 MAN ARTICS from garden city are now at eagle farm
depot for retirment. fleet numbers to follow shortly.

E2880 (rego XQ11JU) and E2881 (rego XQ45JU) in service today.

Fleet numbers for withdrawn MAN ARTICS are

1620
1625
1608
number plates still fixed to buses.

l94scania wrote:Fleet numbers for withdrawn MAN ARTICS are

1620
1625
1608
number plates still fixed to buses.

Highly unlikely given their young age of only 11-12 yrs, more likely transferred or getting maintenance done.

Not a transfer as Eagle Farm is a Diesel only depot. Interesting times if they are being scrapped so early.

Definitely interesting as I'd thought Brisbane were rather desperate for more articulated buses at the moment. Wouldn't have thought a small fleet of 30 artics would be causing any great concern for the average fleet age, either.

The Tarmac at Garden City Depot is going to be resurfaced next week. As it is School/Uni Holidays not as many artics are needed at the moment. Some more will be transferred to Eagle Farm this weekend for storage.

Just saw E2883 going along the Riverside Expressway towards Milton about 10 minutes ago.

Didn't see whether or not it was in service.

Earlier this week I saw 1030 with a bright white LED destination screen. Are there many vehicles retrofitted?

l94scania wrote:3 MAN ARTICS from garden city are now at eagle farm
depot for retirment. fleet numbers to follow shortly.

I can't believe those MAN ARTICS could be withdrawn at such a young age. That is too waste.

E2883 wrote:Earlier this week I saw 1030 with a bright white LED destination screen. Are there many vehicles retrofitted?

I think the only one is 2110.

From memory, 2123 was the trial bus for the desto and all buses from about 2162 have the white desto.

E2882 in service this morning on a 199 and T2884 in service on a 417.

Megumi wrote:

l94scania wrote:3 MAN ARTICS from garden city are now at eagle farm
depot for retirment. fleet numbers to follow shortly.

I can't believe those MAN ARTICS could be withdrawn at such a young age. That is too waste.

The MAN Artics are NOT being withdrawn as I said earlier some have been moved to Eagle Farm to create room for Tarmac resurfacing at Garden City.
Also as a side note be on the lookout for them operating route 66 from the 28th January.

Daza wrote:The MAN Artics are NOT being withdrawn as I said earlier some have been moved to Eagle Farm to create room for Tarmac resurfacing at Garden City.
Also as a side note be on the lookout for them operating route 66 from the 28th January.

I hope that this means that multiple depots will be doing the 66 again - it was somewhat risky IMHO to have only Sherwood operating the route = if something happened at Sherwood and buses were unable to be despatched, then the whole route would be stopped.

Same risk having the Blue Glider by T only, the Maroon Glider by C only, the GCL operated by S only, the 100 by W only, the 204 by C only, the 77 by G only to name a few.

T2887 parked at Volgren today so still some more B8's to come into service.

T2885 in service tonight on a 444.

S5096 is now W5096.

Spotted E1595 a couple of times lately servicing Route 198 at the PA Hospital, and along Creek Rd Cannon Hill. I guess servicing Route 210.

Spotted E1595 a couple of times lately servicing Route 198 at the PA Hospital, and along Creek Rd Cannon Hill. I guess servicing Route 210.

L433 wrote:Spotted E1595 a couple of times lately servicing Route 198 at the PA Hospital, and along Creek Rd Cannon Hill. I guess servicing Route 210.

It seems to be used more as a route bus than a City Loop at present. It was on my morning 310 service a couple of weeks back and was on a 352 this morning.

T2886 in service tonight on a 382.

What's the use of 3 B8s at Eagle Farm?

2873 is also now in AoA for Mt Cootha Free Shuttle.

Another problem currently with BT is that the western depots have a significantly higher average age of buses than the northern and eastern suburbs. And also, East and North depots (Virginia and Eagle Farm) have an all-Optimus fleet, while the buses that I catch (from Toowong and sometimes Willawong) were all MAN 18.310 before Toowong started getting Optimi as well. But the truth is that when the city is free of MANs than the average age of Western buses would be lower than that of Virginia and Eagle Farm's aging Optimi.