Free Electric Buses Win Sustainability Award

WALNUT CREEK, CA — Walnut Creek's Downtown Trolley has received a 2018 Sustainability Award by Sustainable Contra Costa. It's one of six county organizations and two local individuals recognized.

The bus route is subsidized by the City of Walnut Creek and provides free fare bus service seven days a week, at 15-minute intervals on weekdays. The free route circulates through the city’s downtown core, with layovers at BART and Broadway Plaza, a large regional shopping center.

The Downtown Trolley is one of the most successful routes in the entire bus system in terms of ridership, carrying 256,615 passengers in the period between July 2017 and June 2018.

The four-trolley replica electric buses replaced a fleet of diesel trolleys that had reached the end of their expected service life. The all-electric system eliminates the internal combustion engine, and the larger electric batteries store more energy.

It is one of the first public transit authorities in the nation to implement a fleet of in-route, inductively charged electric buses.

The award winners were chosen for their groundbreaking roles in community leadership, food system innovation, resource management, economic sustainability and lifetime achievement. They were honored at the 10th Annual Awards Gala held in Pleasant Hill last month.

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— Image via NASA