‘This isn’t good,’ a prime TTC engineer warned colleagues after a crack was present in a brand new Proterra bus. ‘This might be massive’
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Weeks earlier than the board of the Toronto Transit Fee hurried a report off the ground, in a transit yard in Philadelphia, the electrical buses have been on hearth.
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The Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority, or SEPTA, had fought a shedding battle with its fleet of 25 Proterra Catalyst buses. Cracks stored displaying up within the our bodies of the buses, together with to the chassis, and so they appeared to defy any patching achieved by SEPTA’s engineers.
SEPTA solely had the buses on the street for about half a yr earlier than they have been parked in early 2020. Litigation adopted and Proterra filed for chapter in 2023.
Then, in June 2025, as SEPTA’s long-decommissioned Proterra fleet was rotting in a transit yard, an EV battery caught hearth. Forty buses – 15 of them electrical – have been destroyed.
Not rather more than a month later, the TTC’s board was handed a “inexperienced bus program replace” that boasted that Toronto had “one of many main fleet electrification packages in North America.” Buried deep within the 38-page report have been cryptic statistics on “physique inside and exterior faults,” plus “traction motor defects” that reduce the provision of the TTC’s 25 Proterra Catalyst buses by 30%.
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These points weren’t mentioned by the TTC board. Nothing was.
One of many TTC’s commissioners – metropolis councillor Dianne Saxe – was in truth so keen to just accept the report with out debate that when chairman Jamaal Myers requested for a present of fingers, she grinned and shot each of her arms straight up.
The TTC’s board might or might not have recognized concerning the SEPTA hearth. It’s not unreasonable, nonetheless, to guess that engineers within the TTC seemingly did – at that time, SEPTA had been telling the TTC about how awful the buses have been for years.
‘Nothing to fret about’
It was early within the afternoon of April 28, 2020, when Mike Macas realized a few crack that developed in No. 3727, one of many new Proterra buses.
Inside emails, acquired by the Toronto Solar in a freedom-of-information request, present that Macas, the TTC’s senior supervisor of auto engineering, didn’t take it evenly.
“Is that on the rear door?” Macas requested a colleague in an electronic mail, urging for one more TTC engineer to see how deep the crack went. “This isn’t good.” (The TTC declined to make Macas obtainable for an interview.)
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5 minutes later, he despatched one other electronic mail: “The crack seems to be to be rusty, but the bus is composite. The place did the rust come from? Did you test any extra buses to see if they’ve the identical defect?”
He added: “This might be massive.”
The following night, after discovering cracks in eight of the TTC’s 10 Proterra buses, Macas reached out to counterparts in Philadelphia and Seattle.
“We solely recognized these cracks yesterday,” Macas wrote. “In the present day we had a name with Proterra, who’s assuring us we’ve nothing to fret about. In fact!”
This was information in Seattle, however Jerry Guaracino, SEPTA’s deputy chief engineering officer, informed Macas they’d been patching up cracks since October 2019.
“Since completion, a majority of the physique crack repairs failed,” Guaracino informed Macas – and much more cracks had developed as well.
The buses have been being parked “till SEPTA is happy with Proterra’s response,” Guaracino added.
The TTC labored with California-based Proterra and the corporate that constructed the buses’ our bodies, TPI, to repair the cracks. Toronto had a difficulty that Philadelphia didn’t – in September 2020, COVID-related restrictions stored these corporations’ officers from crossing the border.
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Macas informed his workers a few workaround: They’d examine the buses remotely, utilizing VR goggles.
‘High quality issues’
The Proterra automobiles have been 25 of the preliminary 60 buses the TTC purchased as a part of a head-to-head electrical bus trial. Final yr, the TTC pulled the final of its Proterras off the streets.
Related steps had reportedly been taken in cities together with New York, Miami and Austin, Texas. Working struggles had been reported throughout North America: Seattle; Duluth, Minn.; Asheville, N.C. The Metropolis of Edmonton had filed an $82-million lawsuit.
There have been fears of one thing worse.
Enterprise journal Quick Firm reported a door broke free whereas a Proterra bus was operating in Des Moines, Iowa. In Ithaca, N.Y., the native transit company figured the best way Proterra constructed the buses, the rear axles would finally fall off. Its seven buses have been retired in 2024, having been deemed unsafe.
The bizarre cracking concern seems to stem from Proterra’s use of a composite materials, reasonably than the standard metal, to offset the large weight of the buses’ batteries. A public radio station in Philadelphia, WHYY, reported in 2021 that SEPTA discovered that composite was made up of resin, fibreglass, carbon fibre, metal plates and balsa wooden.
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Proterra had the backing of the Biden administration and Silicon Valley hype, however by the point SEPTA started patching cracks, it already had a poor fame.
The TTC held a collection of inspection conferences beginning April 24, 2019, as its first Proterra buses have been coming into service.
“TTC informed it’s a younger firm, been informed of high quality issues,” the minutes of the assembly learn.
On June 12, only a few weeks into operation, “small stress cracks” had been discovered by the entrance door of three buses.
“Philly has (sic) the identical concern final yr,” the minutes for the June assembly mentioned. “Not new to Proterra, however they’re placing (in) an additional effort to look in that space.”
A few years later, in July 2021, no less than one cussed crack had confirmed too expansive for the steel plate fixed over it. A Proterra engineer had worse information: The entire TTC buses he had inspected had cracks to the underbody.
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No ‘structural issues’
In April 2022, the TTC board obtained a report that mentioned Proterra’s composite our bodies have been “inclined to cracking.” In addition they fell brief on a lot of benchmarks, together with driver and rider satisfaction, and had an particularly poor vary in winter. (New Flyer, which immediately makes up a lot of the TTC’s EV bus fleet, scored much better.)
Brad Bradford, who served on the board on the time, requested point-blank about which bus fashions had a chrome steel chassis. Bem Case, who had simply given the board a presentation on behalf of the TTC, mentioned Proterra and one other maker, BYD, didn’t.
“Is {that a} disqualifier for us?” Bradford requested.
Case mentioned the TTC had discovered “micro-cracks within the gel coat” of some composite-body buses, however there have been no “structural issues.”
The TTC stored working Proterras for about three years after that assembly. In a written assertion, TTC spokesman Stuart Inexperienced mentioned solely twice was a Proterra bus taken out of service resulting from cracks.
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Proterra filed for chapter in 2023, components grew to become more and more troublesome and costly to acquire, and the corporate that purchased Proterra’s transit arm, Phoenix Motor, refused to honour the buses’ warranties, Inexperienced mentioned. (Phoenix ignored requests for remark from the Solar.)
The TTC spent $32 million for the 25 Proterras, paid for partly by a federal program, however Inexperienced didn’t specify if that included upkeep prices. Phoenix, in a relative discount, reportedly paid simply $10 million US for Proterra’s bus unit.
The street forward
The TTC mentioned it’s donating what’s left of its Proterra fleet for components. Quick Firm reported every may be value simply $20,000 US immediately.
That loss did result in “useful insights,” Inexperienced mentioned, on electrical buses. The TTC’s fleet is now made up of 365 Nova and New Flyer automobiles.
“In 2017, the TTC took the place that we might be a transit business chief in cleansing and greening our fleet,” Inexperienced wrote in an electronic mail. “We started the e-bus program with the acquisition of 60 buses from three distributors as a part of a head-to-head evaluation in 2019-20. That proved extraordinarily precious in informing our bigger 340-bus procurement as a part of the 2025 capital funds.”
SEPTA declined to reply most questions from the Solar, citing its ongoing litigation. (The TTC mentioned it has no litigation associated to Proterra.)
SEPTA did verify its buses have been solely in service from summer time 2019 to early 2020. After the hearth, SEPTA had all Proterra buses moved from its property, a spokesman added.
Myers and Saxe of the TTC board didn’t reply to a request for remark. Mayor Olivia Chow and her present marketing campaign rival, Bradford, additionally didn’t reply to a request for remark.
jholmes@postmedia.com
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