Society is demanding more accessible city buses, which provide a safe and comfortable environment for passengers. Typical current designs of urban bus have a mechanical layout arrived at over fifty years ago, when operating requirements were very different. This paper describes the LoBUS low floor bus concept which is designed for modern conditions. The major pre-requisite is that responsibility for fare collection is entirely removed from the driver, but this is now becoming commonplace in many cities. The new design consists of a power module, attached to a passenger module. The power module contains a front wheel drive power train, and the driver's accommodation. This enables the passenger module to have a very low floor, with small trailing wheels, and a simple structure. There is enormous flexibility in door and interior layout. Whilst the most common variant is likely to be a 12 metre long single deck bus, double deck and articulated versions can be built. The concept is feasible with available components, but manufacturers would face a series of challenges in order to create a practical vehicle with competitive life cycle costs. For the covering abstract see ITRD E128680.
Samenvatting