Belize City Council to Launch E-Transit Pilot Project with Electric Buses
Belize
The Belize City Council is in the process of procuring two electric buses as it prepares to launch its E-Transit Pilot Project in December. The council, through the project’s implementing agency, the UNDP, recently concluded a procurement exercise where competitive bids were submitted and reviewed. The Chinese company, Build Your Dreams (BYD), was then selected to supply the first two electric buses for the one-year EU-funded pilot project. The council’s e-transit coordinator, Niel Hall, explained that once the buses are in the country, testing will be done to ensure the launch of the project is smooth and beneficial.
Neil Hall, eTransit Coordinator: “When they arrive it’s going to be both a relief and a jolt because that’s when the work starts happening all over again. Upon arrival we have several training programs, one that’s technical, the other one that’s for drivers, which by the way we will be looking for drivers so if you know anybody who wants to be a driver of one of these electric buses please tell them to send their information to us. We’d love to hear from them, males and females, but also we’re excited because we are ushering in something new for Belize City. As you know our buses that we use are a little bit on the antiquated side. And these are going to be brand new 2023 buses with the features and amenities of 2023 buses. These are low floor buses, which we’ll be able to accommodate for older and handicapped passengers to have them to start using the public transportation system and give them greater independence. They’re also going to be, like you said, smarter buses where we’ll be giving you amenities like well, AC is not an amenity that’s smarter, but air conditioning inside the buses. You’ll have ports so that you can charge your phone while you’re in the buses. We’ll also have, we’re working with the telecommunication carriers so that how we can get internet on the buses and we’re just looking forward to bringing municipal transportation, public transportation to that next level. We’re looking forward to when we bring this out and I don’t know if you’ve noticed it, but buses in Belize City have actually started to look newer now. So we’re hoping that the introduction of these buses has inspired the other municipal bus operators to start bringing in newer buses for themselves as well.”
Neil Hall, eTransit Coordinator: “These buses cost over $300,000 US each. That’s a heck of a bet to make to find out if it works. So we’re very fortunate to have the EU to take that investment and to put it in the hands of Belize so that we can test and see if it works. I mean, yes, there are similar buses working in Barbados, which is also a small island state or even better, so it’s an actual small island surrounded by salt water has more or less the same climate as we do here in Belize. And we know that these buses are working all over the world. So just to ensure that it would work in Belize is something that our bus owners, bus operators don’t have to do themselves. After this project is done, that’s when they can step in and say, okay, let’s see how we can incorporate our knowledge, our help, our assistance, and how we can get our businesses to work together. In terms of you mentioned the excitement of having them here. We are truly, truly excited to be moving Belize City towards becoming a green city, to reducing the noise pollution because these buses are practically silent. We’re looking forward to when these buses move forward you don’t have that plume of smoke coming out of the end, causing both greenhouse gasses and carbon emissions that are unhealthy. Because I’m sure, as someone who loves Belize City, you’ve been beside a bus when it took off beside you and you had to, ahem, ahem, where we’re eliminating all of that. Plus, we’re also looking at the fact that these buses should be something that’s economically feasible once they’ve landed, once they start working because in a study done a few years ago, it was pointed out that on one gallon of gas a bus goes something like four miles per gallon. Using a bus like this, even if it goes one mile per kilowatt hour, a kilowatt hour is less than 50 cents so for less than $2, you’re going that same 4 miles that cost you $11 in a regular, we call it ICE, internal combustion engine bus.”
Image: Jamaica Gleaner