This bus was drawn in memory of the 11 lives lost in the terrible school shooting that took place in Graz on Tuesday at 10am.
I decided to draw this bus having visited Graz a few times whilst on holiday with my first and so far only two tram rides were rode in Graz back in 2003. Some of you might remember me uploading photos on this page of some of the trams and the sole articulated bus.
My thoughts are with all who are involved in this terrible tragedy.
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Holding Graz has been a loyal customer of Mercedes-Benz buses in both 12m/15m rigid and 18m articulated form for a while now whereas back then the fleet was quite diverse with not just Mercedes-Benz but MAN and Neoplan which all worked alongside the tram fleet which was also diverse.
Today the fleet is mostly Mercedes-Benz Citaro 2s which are all-diesel with some fairly recent additions being articulated hybrids. The electric buses which have been on trial have been made by other lesser known manufacturers including Hyundai who are most known for car production but seem to steadily be getting into the bus market.
Currently as a mark of respect of the recent events, the bus fleet are wearing support ribbons on their fronts as the drawing suggests as depicted by no.35. Route E6 as seen on this bus also goes past the Dreierschützengasse High School where the terrible incident took place.
The Mercedes-Benz Citaro 2 has proven to be yet another popular type from the German vehicle manufacturer, sold in France, Germany, Austria to name a few whilst sadly not as popular here in the UK as this type can only be seen at airports. Early variants of the Citaro 2 were not all up to Euro 6 standards, some were Euro 5, and one good way to tell this is the engine grill which would be located on the right side plus the bus lacked the rear mounted bulk heads and instead the whole rear end was identical to the Mercedes-Benz Citaro facelift. Some of these actual Citaro 2s can be found at Graz in articulated form.
The Citaro 2 replaced the facelifted Citaro and is still in production to this day alongside Mercedes-Benz's electric eCitaro a type which has been trialled at Graz but not purchased yet as the Citaro 2 is the main vehicle of choice there now as these buses replace older Citaros with classic and facelifted body whilst some older Citaro 2s have already departed to other operators around Europe.
Meanwhile the livery is one you might have seen me take on before, the livery seen in the drawing is the 'Verbund Linie' livery which is seen across the Austrian district of Styria although depending on which city or area of Styria the colours would be different. Makes me think that the Styrian bus network is franchised, a strong reminder of what West Yorkshire will be seeing soon with a new standard livery.
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