CAT test drives zero-emission bus as it looks toward Chatham's future

The future of Chatham Area Transit is much quieter.

It's also more energy efficient, environmentally friendly and less expensive long term.

That was what CAT officials say should be the takeaway from a demonstration Monday of an electric bus that will be making its way around some of the transit system's routes this week.

The bus - a 40-foot, third-generation vehicle dubbed Catalyst - is on loan from the Greenville, S.C., company Proterra, which has partnered with CAT in a recent grant application to the Federal Transit Administration to bring as many as eight similar electric buses to Chatham County.

CAT CEO and Executive Director Curtis Koleber said local riders have a chance of catching the bus in the next couple of days on Route 14, the Abercorn Local; Route 31, the Skidaway/Sandfly; and possibly Route 17, to Silk Hope.

"We're excited to show off the zero-emission vehicle," Koleber said, adding that because it's entirely battery powered, the bus has a substantially smaller impact on local air and noise pollution.

While CAT expects to receive word on whether it received funding for the eight electric buses under the FTA's 2017 No-Low grant program sometime in September, Kolber told a group of riders present for Monday's demonstration that one way or the other, electric vehicles are in the agency's future.

CAT has already been cleared by the state of Georgia to use $4.6 million from the state's GO! Transit grant program to buy three electric buses, a rapid charger, three diesel buses and cutaways for the system's fleet. And along with their consent to apply for funding under the FTA's $55 million No-Low grant program in May, board members adopted a system-wide policy of near-term and long-term emission reduction for the transit system that limits all of their future fleet purchases to low or no emission vehicles.

According to that policy, transit system staff have found that although the upfront costs for low or no-emission vehicles are higher, the lifetime costs of these vehicles are expected to be less.

In addition, two longtime CAT drivers who had taken the loaner bus for a test drive Monday said the electric vehicles also provide for a smoother, quieter ride.

"Hopefully CAT will buy more," said Earl Mason, who, with fellow driver Louis Givens, started working for CAT as a driver in the early 1990s. "The buses were totally different 23 years ago. But each time we get new buses, we step up."