Tag Archives: MAN NL-313

Bus Photo of the Month: June 2023

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MAN NL-313

Location: Jaffa Road, Jerusalem, Israel
Operator of Vehicle: Egged
Date of Photo: July 7, 2022

Today, green Egged buses such as this one will operate on Jerusalem’s Route 3 between the Central Bus Station and Western Wall.  As of tomorrow, that will no longer be the case, as a relatively new company called Extra takes over the route.  If you are reading this from somewhere such as Europe or Israel, the idea of a route shifting from one operator to another is probably one with which you are familiar.  In this type of model, a government agency (in this case, the Israeli Ministry of Transportation) determines routes and service levels and operating companies, such as Egged, Superbus, and Extra bid on tenders to provide the service.  Conversely, in North America, transit agencies determine the routes and service levels and often operate the services themselves with their own buses and personnel.  Even if an agency contracts with an operator to provide service (such as Loudoun County Transit in Northern Virginia, which is operated by Keolis North America), the vehicles are owned by the transit agency and their appearance remains identical, even if the contracted operator changes.  Not so in Israel.  With the change to Extra as the route’s operator, passengers will be on brand new buses with a different livery and different drivers.  While there are instances where buses get transferred from the prior operator to the new one or staff leaves one company and joins another, neither is a given.  It is just one of many differences in how transit operates in different places around the world.  

For more photos of Egged MAN NL-313 buses, please click here.  

New Photos from Israel & Washington, DC Added

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VDL Bus SB230 76273
The summer travel season is well underway, and photos from my adventures in May and June are now available for your viewing pleasure here on Oren’s Transit Page.

Most of the new content can be found in the Israel section, where you will find new photos of the Jerusalem Light Rail, Egged buses in Jerusalem (including the Solaris Urbino 18 unit currently on trial), Egged Ta’avura buses in Jerusalem, Afikim buses in Jerusalem, Kavim buses in Jerusalem, and Superbus buses in both Jerusalem and Tiberias.  If you haven’t been to Israel lately, with the entry of the Golden Dragon and Yutong bus models from China and Solaris buses from Poland in to the Israeli market, there is quite a bit of diversity in Israeli operators’ fleets beyond the typical MAN and Mercedes-Benz buses that have dominated the scene for years.  You can also find photos of the exterior of the new Jerusalem High Speed Railway station (the interior of the much delayed station will be open to the public this fall if you believe the latest rumors).

In addition, new photos of various WMATA equipment types have been added as well.

Here is the complete list of pages with new photos in this update:

Bus Photo of the Month: May 2017

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MAN NG-313 35790

MAN NG-313 35790

Location: Herzl Street at the main gate of the Weizzmann Institute, Rehovot, Israel
Operator of Vehicle: Egged
Date of Photo: May 15, 2011

Today, the State of Israel marks the 69th anniversary of its independence.  One way in which the country celebrates this day is by decorating balconies, streets, and even cars (among other things) Israeli flags or just blue and white decorations of any sort.  Therefore, if one is taking pictures of just about any streetscape in Israel at this time of year (whether it be of buses or something else), it is hard to not capture some of these decorations in the photo, as I did here.

Although the State of Israel was founded in 1948, Egged, its primary bus operator, traces its history back to 1933.  In its earliest days, some of its buses even traveled to Syria, Lebanon, Transjordan, Egypt, and Iraq.  A more recent international route, a Tel Aviv-Cairo route, operated from 1982 until 1996.  However, Egged’s presence has always been strongest within Israel itself, and at one time just about every bus line outside of the Tel Aviv area was operated by Egged.  In recent years, the government has opened up the bidding process to operate these services to more companies, and Egged now only operates about 37 percent of scheduled bus services in Israel.  However, it still remains the largest operator.  

For more photos of Egged buses in Rehovot, please click here.

 

Water Water Everywhere

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MAN NL-313 27631 on Sderot Rothschild at Tzahal, Haifa, Israel, June 7, 2013

One of my favorite things to photograph are fountains, waterfalls, and other water features.  My stay in Haifa in June 2013 was not my first trip to the city by any means, however it was just before a fairly significant change to the city’s transportation network would take place.  About two months after that visit, the Metronit bus rapid transit network began service.  However, the dedicated lanes that the system would ultimately use were constructed and being used by local buses as early as 2009.  The “Lin” station has a set of fountains constructed in the very wide median between the bus lanes as the road widens to go around a traffic circle and sculpture at the next intersection.  Needless to say, once I discovered this, I made a point of getting a photo of a bus at this location with the fountains in the foreground.  The photo you see here is the result.