Arriva order 50 new Wrightbus StreetLite and StreetLite Max buses

Arriva will take delivery of 50 new Wrightbus StreetLite and StreetLite Max buses in late spring 2015.

The new buses will feature Cummins Euro 5 engine as well as Wrightbus’ exclusive and innovative ‘Micro Hybrid’ Technology. The new buses will be distributed across Arriva’s regions across the UK and will comprise of 34 StreetLite Max 11.5m and 16 StreetLite (four of which will be 8.8m and the rest 10.8m).

Following an open tender process 34 of the buses are the StreetLite Max product. A total of 28 of the StreetLite Max vehicles will be manufactured to Arriva Sapphire premium specification which is widely recognised as one of the highest specification services available today – designed to improve the quality of bus travel and encourage more people to use public transport. The bus features high-backed luxury seating and audio-visual announcement systems, as well as free Wi-Fi and charging points.

The hybrid technology captures energy generated from a bus’s braking system, and redistributes this energy to power pneumatics, hydraulic and electrical systems which would otherwise require power from the engine. The result is a reduction in fuel consumption of up to 10%, leading to substantial savings over a bus’s typical 15-year operational service life.

Arriva have 103 StreetLite vehicles in service, an extra 50 will now join the fleet. The mechanical platform for the buses will be built at the company’s dedicated chassis facility in Antrim, with the bodywork completed at the Wrightbus headquarters at Ballymena.

Ian Downie, Managing Director, Sales and Customcare for Wrightbus, commented on today’s announcement: “With Arriva being a long established customer of Wrightbus, we’re pleased they have come to us again for this significant order.

“Our StreetLite range is a tried and trusted offering that is not only used by Arriva, but also by many other operators around the UK on a daily basis, we are pleased that due to the proven excellent fuel consumption performance and reliability these buses have again been selected by Arriva.”

Mark Yexley Operations and Commercial Director for Arriva UK said: “We have a long standing partnership with Wrightbus which continues to provide us with exceptional vehicles offering the levels of fuel efficiency that we seek”