Eco-Friendly Electric Tayo Buses to Be Operated in Haeundae from November
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The City of Busan has announced its plans to operate two electric Tayo buses from BEXCO to the aquarium in Haeundae via the Nurimaru APEC House.
The Tayo buses are public buses decorated as Tayo, Rogi, Lani, and Gani, the main characters of the Korean children's animation Tayo, The Little Bus, aired on EBS.
The bus fares will be 1,500 won for adults, 1,000 won for youths and 500 won for children.
The City of Busan released its plan to operate the buses, which are currently running in Seoul and highly popular among children, to provide a new source of entertainment for kids visiting Haeundae Beach and increase local tourism.
In addition, during the ITU Plenipotentiary Conference in October, the eco friendly electric buses will operate from BEXCO to help promote the city’s eco-friendly image.
The buses are an example of “automatic-battery-swapping vehicles” which were developed with a total of 24.7 billion won in research investment from the Industry Academic Cooperation Foundation of Korea Aerospace University, the Korea Automotive Technology Institute, the Korea Testing Laboratory, LSIS Co., Ltd, PMGROW and more. The City of Pohang has been conducting trial runs using the vehicles as shuttle buses for a senior welfare center along two routes (22km) since November 2013.
Drained batteries mounted on the buses are automatically exchanged for charged ones at Quick Battery Changing Machines (QCM) installed at bus stops within one minute. Therefore, buses don’t require a long period of time to charge their batteries like existing plug-in electric vehicles. There are also no limits to their driving range as well.
For more information, please contact the Tourism Promotion Bureau at (051)888-4294
Main characters from the popular cartoon “Tayo the Little Bus” aired on EBS.
(Photo courtesy of Seoul City, ICONIX ENTERTAINMENT, EBS)
