Plymouth Citybus under Go Ahead have had a couple of goes with the Optare Solo, and its fair to say they have not lasted that long down here in both cases. The first batch came to us in 2010 and were one of the first signs of the new ownership. In fact their arrival and Go Ahead ownership was reported in the same PSV Circle news sheet
210 VU52UEE July 2011
213 MX53FEF
By early 2012 they were all at Go South Coast where they have had a long life – with all four only going in November 2021 – their disposal being recorded in this months PSV Circle new sheets, which has prompted this posting. Of course GSC (and Wilts & Dorset before them) were well used to the Solo and seem to have been able to run them a lot longer than many operators have.
3714 VU52UEE May 2015 ©KK70088 (creative commons)
All four of the batch have been kept together and were with Ensign in November. It remains to be seen if they go on to further service elsewhere (which would by surprising given their age) or end up being “recycled” – which sounds a lot nicer than “scrapped”…
Remember those when they arrived. The ex greyhound ones with the bigger engines like 223 224 went much better ! Mind u they didn't last long at go north east either after leaving plymouth in 2017.
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