Chattanooga Choo-Choo hugs Off The Grid

Apollo News Service

Chattanooga, TN - Twenty years ago, under popular mayor Gene Roberts, Chattanooga launched an effort to rejuvenate its deteriorating downtown. In 1992, the city opened what at the time was the world’s largest freshwater aquarium. That same year, the Chattanooga Area Regional Transportation Authority (CARTA) opened an electric transit vehicle (ETV) shuttle service with the aim of bringing people – and businesses – back downtown.

Chattanooga, which used electric streetcars from 1889 until shortly after World War II, modeled its ETVs after a battery-powered system in Santa Barbara, Calif. Though it initially encountered a few speed bumps, by 1996 the ETV transit system’s rubber-tired buses were running solely on American-made, 100-percent recycled, rechargeable, zero-emission electric batteries. The transit system has fueled Chattanooga’s downtown revitalization and created good jobs in the process.

Now CARTA is seeking funds from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act to buy hybrid buses for its non-electric, suburban routes.

Ron Sweeney, CARTA’s general manager, estimates that as many as a million passengers enjoy ETV service every year. Drivers pay to park their cars in one of three garages in or near downtown, and the shuttle itself is free.

“People want the shuttle because it’s a very convenient, safe way to get around downtown,” said Sweeney. “Where the shuttle runs, the businesses prosper, because it brings activity and people. There are requests from three or four different parts of town to expand the shuttle service into their area. As time goes, on we’ll need more buses so we can expand.”

The ETV shuttle program has also created good jobs. CARTA employs approximately 120 people full time, including 13 drivers and eight technicians who work on the downtown ETVs. Employees start off earning 75 percent of a top (diesel bus) operator’s rate of $18 per hour. After two years on the job, the pay increases to 80 percent of that salary. CARTA workers also have access to an employer-sponsored pension plan to which the company contributes.

In addition to its ETV shuttles, CARTA has 60 regular diesel buses that transport passengers between Chattanooga’s suburbs and its downtown. CARTA recently acquired two hybrid buses to begin replacing the diesel-guzzlers, and it has applied for Transportation Investments Generating Economic Recovery (TIGER) grants from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act to buy eight additional hybrids.

“We know it’s good for the environment around us, and for the nation to get us off foreign oil,” explained Sweeney.

Meanwhile, CARTA’s 15 downtown ETVs use no fossil fuels except for propane heaters, which only operate during the winter months. The shuttle buses are each 22 feet long and 92 inches wide. They seat approximately 25 people and run a 3.8-mile loop, from 6:30 a.m. until 11 p.m. Once a day, the ETVs are switched out for replacement vehicles with fully charged batteries, usually between noon and 2 p.m. The electric-powered batteries are stored in 3,000-pound cubes inserted and removed from the sides of the buses with forklifts. The batteries take approximately six hours to charge.

Most of the ETVs were built in the 1990s by a Chattanooga company called Advanced Vehicle Systems, which has since gone out of business. Ninety-five percent of the lead-acid batteries are made by Deka Batteries in Pennsylvania, and according to CARTA’s technician foreman Clifford Lowrance, regular maintenance on the batteries includes neutralizing the harmless sulfuric acid with tap water. The process uses no hazardous chemicals and doesn’t even require purified water. The batteries themselves are 100-percent recycled.

“These batteries last 1,200-1,300 cycles, or five-six years; there’s no waste,” said Lowrance, who started working at CARTA just after it was created and has logged 35 years on the job. “We monitor these batteries from cradle to grave. You’ll never find a battery in a river or in a field. And there’s very little carbon footprint because (the Tennessee Valley Authority’s) hydroelectric dams supply most of the energy."