Shaping the future of buses in Europe: Outcomes and directions from the EBSF and EBSF_2 projects

EBSF—European Bus System of the Future and its follow-up EBSF_2 are two research projects funded by the European Union and led by UITP with the aim of developing a new generation of buses across Europe. Within EBSF the accomplished goals were to increase the bus attractiveness by testing innovative vehicles. Coherently, EBSF_2 is now committed to raise the image of the bus through solutions for increased efficiency of the system. The environmental concern and the need to save energy are also behind the majority of both projects’ innovations. These are tested through demonstrators, i.e. on vehicles operating in several European cities, and performance are independently evaluated. The paper describes the methodology and the test process adopted in both projects, and reports the results so far achieved and the new challenges ahead, with the research objective to provide advanced knowledge for further applications beyond the European projects field.