Issued by City of York Council 
City of York Council, First and Transdev York are celebrating today after successfully bidding for £824k funding for nine new electric buses for the city.
Made available through the government’s Green Bus Fund, the new buses will provide cleaner and greener bus journeys for thousands of passengers across the city.
Funding was available from Department for Transport as part of the Green Bus Fund initiative and the nine electric buses will help save over 4,500 tons of CO2 in York over their lifespan.
York successfully received funding for the following:
• One electric bus for use on the University of York’s ‘Unibus’ service (bid submitted by Transdev)
• Two electric buses serving the Derwenthorpe sustainable housing development (bid submitted by City of York Council with the support of Joseph Rowntree Foundation)
• Six electric buses to be deployed on the York Park & Ride network (bid submitted by First York)
Frequent bus services enter the city up to every ten-minutes and travel short distances, which makes these buses ideal candidates for running on electricity, as the onboard battery can store sufficient charge for the days work. Over 80 per cent of the bus traffic through York could be operated using electric vehicles.
Councillor Dave Merrett, Cabinet Member for Transport, Planning and Sustainability, said: “This is absolutely excellent news. We’ve been determined to improve air quality and the city’s carbon footprint, and have been working with bus operators through York’s Quality Bus Partnership to achieve this.
“These nine new electric buses will be a tremendous step forward, and are a first step to demonstrating how we can transform York’s bus fleet and environment for the future.”
Simon Pearson, Commercial Director for First in North England, said: “This announcement is great news for York and we will be working in partnership with City of York Council to introduce these vehicles onto Park and Ride services in early 2014.
”Electric buses are an exciting step forward in terms of innovation and attracting new customers to use our services and demonstrates our commitment to improving bus services for people in York.”
Nigel Eggleton, Marketing Director for Transdev commented “We’re delighted that our partnership with The University of York will be further enhanced with the arrival of an electric bus.
“The many students using the internal route within the University will benefit from this investment which brings the highest environmental standards, improved air quality and an excellent carbon footprint.”
The York electric buses will be assembled locally on the outskirts of York near Sherburn by manufacturer Optare, providing a further boost to the local economy.
The council adopted a “Low Emission Strategy” in 2012 to improve air quality in York which contains a variety of measures tackling emissions from different sources of which buses are an important group given their frequency through the city.
For more information about buses in York please visit www.itravelyork.info or follow @itravelyork on Twitter
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