Skip to main content

San Francisco to have all-electric bus fleet by 2035

An all-electric bus fleet is coming to San Francisco by 2035. The commitment stems from an agreement between mayor Mark Farrell and the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA), which operates Muni – the city’s public transit system. Muni manages a fleet of zero-emission electric trolley buses and a fleet of low- emission electric hybrid vehicles. The SFMTA is rolling out new electric buses with higher capacity battery systems that supply power for its vehicles along several hybrid routes.
May 21, 2018 Read time: 2 mins

An all-electric bus fleet is coming to San Francisco by 2035. The commitment stems from an agreement between mayor Mark Farrell and the 4802 San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA), which operates Muni – the city’s public transit system.

Muni manages a fleet of zero-emission electric trolley buses and a fleet of low- emission electric hybrid vehicles.

The SFMTA is rolling out new electric buses with higher capacity battery systems that supply power for its vehicles along several hybrid routes.

Additionally, the agency plans to advance its technology when manufacturers can prove electric buses can withstand heavy ridership and steep hills. It would also consider new facilities that can charge a large fleet and develop an infrastructure to power vehicles in service or on the street.

John Haley, SFMTA’s transit director says: “While the battery technology is emerging rapidly, it isn’t quite ready for primetime. Manufacturers aren’t yet producing the number of all-electric buses San Francisco and other urban areas would need, nor could we guarantee that the vehicles would work for the required 15 years with heavy ridership and challenging topography.”

The SFMTA intends to buy a limited number of zero-emission battery electric buses in 2019 and evaluate how they perform on crowded and hilly routes.

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • Toronto pushes for fully-electric ferries 
    January 19, 2022
    Report from Canadian city suggests replacing four vessels over a 15-year period
  • Rating agency Standard and Poor Tolling sees a bright future for tolling
    September 6, 2017
    Few disruptions appear on the horizon for global toll road operators, with the US poised to become a better bet for major investment, according to ratings agency Standard and Poor’s (S&P’s) Global Ratings’ 2017 report, which rates toll road operators according to their ability to raise capital. The outlook is generally stable for business conditions and credit quality for toll roads worldwide. One positive exception is the US where the overall outlook is ‘positive’ as S&P expects traffic growth to increase
  • UK to ‘ban petrol and diesel cars by 2035’
    February 6, 2020
    A  ban on purchasing new petrol, diesel or hybrid cars and vans in the UK will be brought forward from 2040 to 2035.
  • Keeping people on track is RATP’s raison d’etre
    June 14, 2018
    In Paris, RATP Group’s autonomous Metro Line 1 is carrying 750,000 people a day across the city. Ben Spencer is invited into the control room to take a look at how the system works Paris is visited by millions of tourists each year, keen to see for themselves stunning attractions such as the Eiffel Tower, Arc de Triomphe, Notre-Dame, the Louvre, the Seine and all the rest. But while the best-known sites of the City of Light tend to be on the surface, there is a lot going on below those iconic grand boule