Today it is raining and windy. But I cannot stay at home and have to leave. To the Nationaal Transport Museum(National Transport Museum) in Nieuw Vennep. Bus 340 and 397 brought me to this place. It is located in the former Bolos licor factory. Next to old transport means you see a Dakota, some museumbuses whivh are still in use and the recently received first metro of Amsterdam. Much must be done to get this model back to its original state.

After the visit with line 397 to the Elandsgracht in Amsterdam. Here I took a picture of an articulated electric bus. Connexxion uses them on the lines between Amsterdam and Uithoorn/Aalsmeer.

Is is bad weather, so why not a ‘quicky’ to Almere Centrum. And just in time to see there also a BYD-bus in services with Keolis-Allgo

Back in Amsterdam to De Boeleaan close to the VU-University. Metroline 51 between Amsterdam Zuid and Amstelveen Westwijk will go out of service as from beginning March 2019 till somewhere in 2020. The line will be renovated and extened to Uithoorn.

After a few pictures in the cold wind, the rain had stopped, I went back home via Amstelveen busstation.

On Saturday 26th of January the destination was first the region Voorne=Putten. This is south-west of Rotterdam and from Haarlem easely to be reached via Schiedam. First by thrain and than from Schiedam by Metro to Spijkenisse. From here EBS-buses are going to places in Voorne=Putten like Brielle, Oostvoorne and Hellevoetsluis. Also from here there is a frequent bus service by Connexxion. Line 104 to Oudorp and Renesse via Hellevoetsluis and Stellendam. Here one can change to Connexxion bus 436 to Middelharnis.

The idea was to go the Brielle, Hellevoetsluis back to Spijkenisse. But the weather was not so on my side. So I just went up and down to Hellevoetsluis to take some pictures at the busstop Amnesty International lane.

Than back to Spijkenisse. I brought in the snackshop(unfortunately closed on Sunday’s) something to eat and after some pictures by metro to Rotterdam Zuidplein

Rotterdam Zuidplein is the busstation for all the buslines going south to the Hoekse Waard, Goeree Overflakkee and Dordrecht plus all the ‘corners’of Rotterdam South

After w while I left the Zuidplein and by metro to station Rotterdam Alexander.

From Rotterdam Alexander via Rotterdam Central by train to Delft. After a few month the buses from Connexxion will be replaced by buses from EBS as they won the concession. So indeed time to pay this Connexxion area a visit. It might be the last one.

First HTM tram 19 and than Connexxion line 30 to Zoetermeer station Centrum west. Also here Connexxion services the area. Today a short visit. But Monday next the area will be visited more intensive

Arriva services the route Leiden-Zoetermeer with R.Net line 400. In Leiden again a Connexxion bus.

The weather was so and so. Sometimes light rain but the whole day cloudy

In July the new concession for the public transport in North Holland North started. This is the area roughly north of the line Castricum-Alkmaar-Hoorn-Enkhuizen. Today, 21 January, it was time to pay this area a visit.

Here under pictures on the various locations. From left to right Den Helder, Schagen, Alkmaar and the big one in Hoorn.

The first city was Hoorn. One hour taking pictures of the new fleet. Later in the day I discover that almost all new buses are stationed in Hoorn. Partly are from Connexxion and partly from TCR(Taxi Centrale Renesse).

With line 135 via Middenmeer-Den Oever en Hippolytushoef to Den Helder. Here are hardly buses. Luckely the articulates Solaris in Connexxion colors could be seen. See in the set first pictures at the beginning of the blog.

In the next stop Schagen various scholarbuses left the station. It was Monday. It speaks for itself that these buses are only running on weekdays and also not in the school holidays.

Last stop Alkmaar. I saw these buses already in Hoorn and Schagen, but here there were more. The BYD-electric buses numbered in the serie 7500. For the rest only the (old) green colored Connexxion buses. Some with TCR logo.

Sunday 20th January 2019. It is blue sky and sun but fresh. Around zero. again a nice day to go out. Destination The Hague. From the Central Station with line 28, an electric VDL-bus, to the Zuiderstrand.

From here over the beach, wrestling with the sand to Kijkduin. A nice walk in the sun with the wind in my back.

Then by bus back to the railway station. On my way to Haarlem I made a stop over in Leiden. Here I could see and make pictures of the trainreplacement buses to Schiphol Airport.

From the pictures you can see that the sun was already trying to disappear. After one hour taking pictures of the regular Arriva buses and these trainreplacement buses I travelled back home

On January 19 an other sunny but freezing day. I decided first to go to the modeltrainfair in Houten. On the station I took a picture of a minibus on line 48 to Schalkwijk-‘t Goy.

After the fair a visit was paid to the railway station of Driebergen=Zeist to see how far the works are. Of course also here pictures were taken.

From Driebergen=Zeist by Intercity to the station Amsterdam Bijlmer ArenA. The destination was Schiphol Airport to take pictures of the train replacing buses to Leiden and Amsterdam Sloterdijk. This weekend Schiphol Airport could not be reached by train

After one hour the sun disappeared and with line 300 I returned home with many pictures on my memory card

We start with the pictures of the trains as mentioned in part two.

With the Qbuzz train I continued my trip first to Sliedrecht and than onwards to Gorinchem.

After taking some pictures, I boarded the train to Gorinchem.

First aim were the buses from Qbuzz. But here we see also buses from Arriva(concession Rivierenland) and Arriva(concession Brabant)

From Gorinchem I travelled with line 387 to Utrecht Centraal Station. After some pictures there I ended this round trip. The train brought me back home.

In Dordrecht we see old MAN-diesel buses. These were original from Connexxion from their Amstelland-Meerlanden concession. Pending the new electric buses we see them in Dordrecht.

Also we see here Connexxion buses for the line 166 to Rotterdam Zuidplein via Heinenoord.

Since Qbuzz is short of buses, two buses from U-OV Utrecht are in Dordrecht as well.

And of course we see the ‘big’ Qbuzz buses. Red, blue and green. The Arrive Hybride buses from the serie 5400 got their Qbuzz sticker and are back in Dordrecht.

Dordrecht is the end of the line for three trainsservices. Two NS-servcies. One coming from ‘s Hertogenbosch via Breda and one from Roosendaal. Type train is the Flirt.

Qbuzz took over from Arriva the train services to Gorinchem-Geldermalsen including the trains. These can be seen in part three of the visit.

De nieuwe naam voor de busconcessie in het gebied tussen Rotterdam-Dordrecht-Gorinchem. Kortweg dus DMG. Sinds December 9, 2019 Qbuzz took over from Arriva to perform bustransport. A complete new fleet came.

On Friday January 18th I had the whole day to visit this new region. It was sunny but cold.

Zwijndrecht was the starting point. Here two ‘big’ lines 391 and 488 come by.

Smaller buses for the local transport are ending here.

After a while I went with line 488 (a red R.Net bus) to Dordrecht. See next blog.

During the last visit I had one day to take pictures of buses in Santiago. Buses of interest were the new BYD-electric buses recently put in service. But also I took pictures of the ‘old’ buses which I have seen during the lasts visits.
On January 16th, I flew back to Amsterdam.

Like the last years, during the first weeks of January 2019, we flew to Chile for family visit and relaxing on the beach.

But always when I am there, I try to spent time on taking pictures of buses and metro’s.

Normally we stay one month, but due to circumstances, I myself stayed ten days. During these ten days, we spent most of the time in the costal village Papudo. Papudo is almost two hundred kilometer of Santiago. The interlocal buscompany Turbus has its terminal for the buses from Santiago. As a fact they are the only company. Turbus has a monopoly on the line Santiago-Papudo.

The bustransport between Papudo and La Ligua and between Papudo and Valparaiso is done by smaller buses.