Archinect - News

California's first EV-charging roadway to be built at UCLA before 2028 Olympics

2024-12-03T10:56:00-05:00

Nearly $20 million will go to electrify the university’s BruinBus fleet and install underground charging for shuttles and buses along a route that stretches for less than a mile in Westwood. The grant will also fund a new transit hub between the UCLA bus depot and a planned UCLA/Westwood Metro station that would connect to the future D Line subway extension.

The project comes as part of a multimillion-dollar grant to UCLA ahead of its hosting of the 2028 Olympic Village. Under the plans, inductive charging coils will be installed underground along Charles E. Young Drive between the Westwood Plaza intersection and Murphy Hall, while stationary chargers will also be added at passenger drop-off and pickup locations.

Buses traveling along the roadways will pick up charge while driving or parked. The team behind the project hopes it will eliminate the need for drivers to hook vehicles up to charging ports, thus saving time.

"A wireless inductive option is a game changer," UCLA Fleet and Transit director Clinton Bench told the LA Times. "When a vehicle is driving over [a charger], the vehicle can collect charge while it’s moving. If you’re stationary at a stop and you had a five to seven-minute layover [...] that’s probably giving you a pretty good head start on your next route and reducing the amount of charge you need in the evening."

The w...

Cities are finding newer and more creative ways to incorporate electric vehicles into their transit schemes

2021-10-04T14:20:00-04:00

But where cities are succeeding, they’re finding that electrifying public transit can solve more than just climate problems. It can clean the air, reduce traffic jams and, ideally, make getting around town easier for ordinary people, which is why some politicians have staked their reputations on revamping transit. In many cases, city governments have been able to take climate action faster than their national governments.

The effort to reduce car traffic mirrors those taking shape in U.S. cities like New York and San Francisco. The cost of doing so has in a way become its own problem, as the infrastructure required to support expansive EV fleets in large metropolitan areas has proven to be a challenge for many of the places that have mandates for electrification coming due in the next two decades. The widespread adaptation of electric vehicles and trams could reduce emissions by 37 million metric tons a year in American cities alone.

London to try out an all-electric double-decker bus

2015-07-01T05:25:00-04:00

[London Mayor Boris] Johnson, who uses the city’s bike-share system to commute to work most days, told the Guardian that he would welcome the quieter, greener buses on his city’s streets, saying current buses are like “throbbing, belching machines that emit their fumes like wounded war-elephants”.

Since 2008, London Mayor Boris Johnson has introduced over 1,300 hybrid buses onto city streets, and all-electric single-decker buses have been in use since 2013. It was previously thought that all-electric double-decker buses weren't feasible – their size makes them too difficult to efficiently power with electricity alone. BYD, the Chinese firm that will build the new all-electric buses, can provide batteries that will "apparently be light and cheap enough" to power London's iconic double-deckers. The first pilot bus will begin operating on London's Route 16 this October.

More news from London: