onibus biarticular

CURITIBA (06)
Images From a Bi-Articulate Bus

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Destination Curitiba, capital of the state of Paraná.
Photographs of the center of Curitiba, taken from the rear of a bi-articulate bus

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A bi-articulate bus in front of Shopping Estação.

Double harmonica

Articulate buses are common in The Netherlands, since a few decades. I took such a regional bus, painted in yellow, to the high school during the eighties of the past century. Initially, when this bus type was introduced, many students went to the back, in order to experience the sometimes hefty movements when the bus was rounding the corners. Some even dared to stand in the ‘harmonica’ space. When I was traveling to the Dutch city of Utrecht for a job interview, I first met a bi-articulate bus, which follows the route to the university campus ‘De Uithof’. In 2005, I met the orange-red bi-articulate buses in Curitiba, who follow two different, fixed routes. The buses, introduced in 1992, follow specially designed bus tracks, thereby avoiding traffic jams.

Tube

The many bus stops along the tracks of the ‘ônibus biarticular’, as the bi-articulated buses are called in Portuguese, have the shape of a elongated tube, the so-called ‘estação-tubo’, with turnstiles at both sides, and ticket- and payment facilities. As a result, no delays occur when boarding. The bi-articulate buses have the capacity of 270 passengers. According to the numbers of the City of Curitiba, at least two million Curitibans make use of the nearly two thousand buses and four hundred bus services, on a daily basis. The City subsidizes part of the bus fare (2.20 reais in 2008), and the prize is significantly reduced (to 1 real only) on Sundays and holidays.