ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (KRQE) – Ten ART crashes in twenty days. Now we’re seeing the latest two, both on Wednesday, both in Nob Hill, and both just like all of the other crashes.
First, we get the driver of a muscle car trying to cut through the ART lanes to turn in the middle of a block. The second is another familiar sight as the driver of a pickup truck, runs a red turn arrow and collides with the bus.
So what does it take to fix these buses?
The City says they didn’t expect to have so many crashes in such a short period of time, but they did prepare for issues along the route, just in case. “We have two buses that were damaged pretty extensively,” said Danny Holcomb, the Transit Director for the City of Albuquerque.
Those two buses have been taken off the route until they’re fixed. The Transit Department expects the repairs to be completed by February.
But what about all of the buses that have been involved in fender benders? How does the city take care of these? “One of the things we did when we ordered these buses is we got a bunch of spare parts because we knew there were going to be issues out there,” said Holcomb.
Holcomb says they have $300,000 in replacement parts. “Mirrors and fenders, windshields and windows and wheelchair ramps, doors, the whole slew of different parts,” said Holcomb.
On top of that, he says a lot of the parts are interchangeable with buses they already had.
We also asked the city if they’re worried about running out of buses, they say if they’re forced to take any more buses off the route, they’ll have to change the schedule.
The City says they’ve already started receiving checks from insurance companies. They say the two buses that are out of commission will cost about $80,000 to repair.
