De veerboot over de Schotse rivier de Clyde stopt er mee. Vandaar dat Schotten in de toekomst in een Nederlandse bus vervoerd zullen worden. Herhaal: bus!
Het betreft hier de amfibiebus van Splashtours (Rederij Tonissen) die vanaf de weg zo het water induikt. Niet voor niets kreeg Splashtours in 2007 de Ketelbinkieprijs voor meest innovatieve Rotterdamse ondernemer. Probleem is wel dat sinds 2007 nog nooit een bus lang genoeg heeft gedreven om in gebruik genomen te worden. En de eerlijkheid gebiedt te zeggen dat ook de amfibiebus in Schotland zich na een paar testritten al weer in de garage bevindt, of op de werf, één van beide.

bus ahoy

UK’s first ‘floating bus’ from Holland gears up to ferry commuters

It was not a sinking feeling exactly. But Stagecoach’s hopes that its trials of a new amphibious bus would go off without a hitch were dampened on Monday when the vehicle had to be dry-docked for repairs.
Stagecoach is testing the Dutch-built £700,000 amfibus as a possible replacement for passengers who face the loss of the existing ferry service between Renfrew and Yoker from the end of March.
The “amfibus”, seen here testing the water between Renfrew and Yoker on the River Clyde, developed a minor technical glitch after its second crossing – forcing the trial to be suspended while the vehicle was repaired. read on>>

“The driver noticed an issue with the suspension,” said a Stagecoach spokesman. “An air-bag became disengaged.” He stressed that the air-bag was “not a buoyancy aid”.  

While such buses are already in use for tourist “splash” tours, Stagecoach chief executive Brian Souter said the proposed service would be a “Scottish and UK first” – the first amfibus commuter service.

“It is a great example of the potential for new transport links using the country’s rivers and estuaries,” he said.

The bus, which can carry 50 passengers, is based on a Volvo bus chassis that incorporates a hull, so allowing the vehicle to float. It can travel at 8 knots in the water and has a maximum road speed of 60mph.

Over the past two weeks, the firm has been testing the 55-seat vehicle in Rotterdam harbour, where it surfed safely over the backwash from tugs and cargo ships. The bus has been borrowed from its owners, the Dutch waterborne tour operator Splashtours, which is planning to run a service on Rotterdam’s Maas river. Steve Stewart, head of communications for Stagecoach, is confident that passengers will have no need of seasickness tablets on the amfibus’s 200-metre trip over the Clyde. “I was on the journey this morning. It was a very, very smooth journey. You hardly felt any different from the sensation you would get on a normal stretch of road. You don’t get buffeted about,” he said.

The spokesman said trials of the bus would resume on Tuesday.

This entry was posted on dinsdag, februari 9th, 2010 at 2:59 am and is filed under Eureka, JdeW, English, Techniek, Geld, Reizen, World on the Dutch, Going Dutch. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.