Fifty new buses will increase JUTC’s daily rollout to 315 - Vaz

The 50 new buses that arrived in the island on Wednesday, August 23, will boost the Jamaica Urban Transit Company’s roll-out capacity to 315, ahead of the start of the 2023-24 academic year in September. This, according to Minister of Science, Energy, Telecommunications and Transport, Daryl Vaz.

He pointed out that this represents an increase of 175 units, or 125 per cent, over the number that the Jamaica Urban Transit Company (JUTC) was turning out daily when he became transport minister in May 2023.

“We are coming from a roll-out of about 140 buses when I took the transport portfolio,” Minister Vaz said. He explained that since then, the JUTC has utilised a process of emergency procurement of spare parts to have an additional 125 units ready for roll-out in September when the 2023-24 academic year begins, bringing the total to 265. “We are now looking to roll out about 315 buses for back-to-school [in] September, which includes these 50 buses,” Minister Vaz added.

He was speaking on Friday, August 25, at Kingston Wharves Ltd, where the buses were being offloaded from a vessel docked at the port.

Vaz said that there had been some delays in getting the buses into the island based on the type of vessel that was used to ship them.

“Finally, the buses are here after an approximate two-month delay from the original estimated time of arrival due [to] the way in which the buses were shipped,” the transport minister said.

He explained that the vessel was not the traditional ‘roll-on roll-off’ ship where the buses could be driven on and off, but rather a ‘lift-on lift-off” that involves the use of cranes to load and offload the units.

The shipment included five 45-seater electric buses, forty 45-seater compressed natural gas (CNG) buses, and five CNG buses with a capacity of 34 (passengers), which will facilitate disabled passengers. Vaz said that the process to acquire the buses was over the tenure of three transport ministers and acknowledged his predecessors, former ministers Robert Montague and Audley Shaw, for their role in the undertaking.

He pointed out that he was on the receiving end and declared that his predecessors were the ones who “put in the work”.

He thanked Kingston Wharves Ltd and the Jamaica Customs Agency for their urgency in facilitating the offloading and ensuring the clearance of the buses, respectively, “to get them off to the depot immediately to start the pre-service to get them out on the road within the next week”.