Inside London's new 'ultra-modern' buses on Route 63

A fleet of all-electric, "ultra-modern" buses with a "cutting-edge design" is being introduced on a London bus route. Transport for London (TfL) said passengers would be able to "work or relax" on board, with access to mobile phone holders and charging points.

The buses also have a new look with skylights, larger windows and wood-effect floors to create an "open-feel". They are being unveiled on Route 63 as part of attempts to drive passenger numbers back up to pre-pandemic levels.

The new buses also have high-backed seats, up-to-date digital signage boards, bigger wheelchair and buggy areas, and improved CCTV. TfL said investing in vehicles which are "cleaner and safer" was "essential to growing bus use in London".

[Jonny_____]

Interesting thing about this is that the north has had many of these features including wood effect flooring, USBs, free WiFi & skylights on their buses for a number of years, operators such as Transdev Blazefield, Go North East, Trent Barton are prime examples

[avo-ws]

Give it a week an the usb sockets will have gum in them because people are weirdos. Can imagine a lot of phones getting pinched too

[mountainsnotwaves]

Aside from all this, can we just get decent climate control inside buses?? So we dont freeze in the winter and burn in the summer??

[thatguyswavomeer]

Really nice to see that London is now having a standard of buses similar to that of Warsaw.

[jainee]

Dont ever place your phone in one of those holders, its asking to be stolen. Why would tfl encourage such a thing?

[hildaelson]

Glad to see London catching up with the rest of the UK. I used to live in the Midlands and then moved up to Scotland, both of which have had these facilities for years.

[mattcolour]

Had buses of the same standard for most of the last decade up here in Edinburgh… Glad London is getting them too.

[vadimen]

Really nice to see that London's standard of buses is getting closer to that of Chisinau( Republic of Moldova), only that in Chisinau most of them are electric.

[williamleonard]

Don't miss the chance fo getting into something that will earn you more than your so called unsecured job

[AgecaseV]

About time London caught up, we have had these buses over 5 years now

[mybigjak]

here is a wild thing, whant to know what get people back on buses? speed, reliability, frequency and a fair price, 6km/h average speed for the buses in london is something that must be fixed

[flavoursofsound]

Every time I get on a bus outside of London it feels like I’ve upgraded to business class: soft, high back seats that are also deep, USB chargers, WiFi, quiet and actually feels like you’re getting somewhere.

These new buses are the step in the right direction so I won’t knock it, but people weren’t avoiding buses because of the pandemic. I used to love London buses but now I loathe them.

Hard shallow seats were becoming more commonplace. They’re getting slower and SLOWER, routes getting shorter (why can’t I get the 15 to Paddington or the 4 to Waterloo or the 23 to Liverpool Street anymore?), bus stops keeping getting moved about I lose track of where buses go now, and the endless automated announcements… it’s like a real life version of those dystopian future sci-fi movies:

- yOu mUst weAr a fAcE cOveRing oVeR yOur nOse aNd mOuTh…
- the bus will wait here a short time to help even out the service (why? As if the bus wasn’t slow enough)
- you must stay with your buggy at all times (whilst the parent leaves the buggy for 2 seconds to actually pay for their fare… ffs)
- there are seats available on the upper deck
- pLeAsE hOld oN tHe bUs iS aBouT tO mOve (thankfully this was scrapped)

[matthewholden]

I like the bracket that allows the thief’s to easily snatch your phones without all the hassle of having to threaten you or establish if you have a smartphone!!

[joshlikescola]

These kind of features (charging, nice seats, etc) are worth investing in because, relative to the price of the bus, they are pretty modest. Remember these will be in service for ~20 years (although we are yet to see how electric buses fare over these time periods), so getting these things right from day one is absolutely worth it.

I would argue nicer seats with decent legroom also increase your capacity, because people don't have to sit in them in funny ways to feel comfortable, making them more likely to block the seat next to them with bags, etc.

[JBFlytography]

Hardly news. These buses have been in service all over the UK for a while now.

[SobrietyandSolace]

As a disabled person who heavily relied on my phone before I was forced out of London this could have been a lifesaver so many times i was left stranded without a way to get home (imagine you travel with a contactless card and you run out of money in your current account because they overcalculate how much you are spending then fix it the following Sunday, you could do a balance transfer or failing that use Apple Pay or other method using the phone . It also means you can use transport apps to count down the stops you have left/where to get off/get your next connection without worrying about totally draining your battery with location services on. This would have saved me having to ask strangers for help who would then immediately try to take advantage of me

[thomasyoung]

Give it 40 years and we might be able to have a bus half as good as this …

[danielwhyatt]

This is absolutely fabulous. They should’ve really emphasised that this was an electric bus in the video title. It looks really wonderful and really fits with the feeling of London. Especially including a wood texture flooring. Love it. I hope they do get the funding they need to roll this electric bus model across the whole of London. Bravo

[Hugo-bv]

Is there heating in the bus in the winter or it’s just as cold as all the rest of the TFL scrap metal?

[lenmarfox]

Wow, in my town its a miracle to get a bus on time. Soo much for the levelling up programme.