Kinetic Melbourne is a bus operator in Melbourne, Australia, operating a fleet of 575 buses on 45 bus routes, as well as seven SmartBus routes. It commenced operations on 31 January 2022, taking over all routes previously operated by Transdev Melbourne. It is a subsidiary of the Kinetic Group.

History

In October 2021, the Victorian Department of Transport awarded Kinetic Melbourne a contract to operate the Melbourne Bus Franchise until June 2031.[1][2][3] It commenced operations on 31 January 2022.

On 2 October 2023, Kinetic acquired two routes, 510 and 512, with 10 buses from MorelandBus.[4]

Services

Kinetic Melbourne took over the operation of 52 routes spanning Melbourne's metropolitan area,[5] which include three SmartBus orbital routes and the Doncaster Area Rapid Transit (DART) routes.

Fleet

Kinetic Melbourne commenced operations with 531 buses transferred from Transdev Melbourne.[5]

As part of the contract, 36 zero-emissions buses will be introduced to the fleet by mid-2025 and 341 of the 531 buses will be replaced with low to zero-emissions buses.[1]

As at February 2024, the fleet consists of 592 buses.[6] Most buses are painted in the Public Transport Victoria livery, except for SmartBus liveried buses that have retained this livery for use on SmartBus routes.

References

  1. ^ a b New bus franchise to jump start zero-emission pledge Department of Transport
  2. ^ Kinetic wins Victorian Government Contract to run a third of Melbourne's bus network Kinetic Group 5 October 2021
  3. ^ Melbourne Bus Contract Delivers Volgren Jobs Boost Australasian Bus & Coach 17 November 2021
  4. ^ "Kinetic expands Melbourne operation with additional government-contracted bus routes". Kinetic. 15 August 2023. Retrieved 10 September 2023.
  5. ^ a b About Archived 29 January 2022 at the Wayback Machine Kinetic Melbourne
  6. ^ Kinetic Melbourne Australian Bus Fleet Lists

External links

Media related to Kinetic Melbourne at Wikimedia Commons