HOCHBAHN buses

It’s hard to imagine Hamburg’s streets without them: HOCHBAHN’s buses can be seen driving around all over the city 365 days a year. All the bus routes together make up almost 1,000 kilometres, with over 1,400 stops on almost 120 different routes. Here’s another impressive statistic for you: HOCHBAHN buses travel well over 50 million kilometres every year, which is equivalent to more than 1,350 circumnavigations of the earth. 

E-buses at Hamburg’s service: the revolution is already underway 

All HOCHBAHN buses will be emission-free in future. This revolution is already in full swing on Hamburg’s roads. We will gradually be replacing all 1,100 diesel buses with e-buses by 2030. We have only been ordering zero-emission vehicles since 2020. 

You can find all background information and further facts about Hamburg’s e-buses here.  

But even the diesel buses that are still in service in Hamburg now, in many cases, emit considerably less nitrogen oxides and fine particles than their predecessor models. That’s due to the fact that, since 2018, we’ve only been deploying vehicles that meet Euro 5 and Euro 6 standards. 

MetroBus Line 5: one of the busiest routes in Europe

Probably the most well-known HOCHBAHN route is the MetroBus Line 5 that runs between Burgwedel and the Main Station. With around 60,000 passengers a day, it is not only one of the most frequently used bus routes in Hamburg but in the whole of Europe. HOCHBAHN deploys particularly large articulated buses of the CapaCity L type. Measuring 21 metres in length, they are a whole three metres longer than conventional articulated buses and have up to 125 seats – creating a 20 percent higher passenger capacity.

Of course, these will also be replaced by emission-free successor models at a later date. The first electric articulated buses will be in operation in Hamburg from summer 2021 onwards.

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Passenger information on board

We want to persuade even more people to take the bus, and in order to do that we need both efficient vehicles and the right passenger information. Ensuring a consistently high level of service throughout people’s entire journey is crucial. It is not enough simply to deliver a conveniently timed and on-time connection. The comfort of our vehicles, as with our new e-buses, is equally as important as making sure information is communicated in a clear way on board. With this in mind we’ve been fitting all existing Euro 6 buses (those that aren’t yet about to be taken out of service) and zero-emission buses (over 700 vehicles altogether) with dual monitors since 2021. Our e-buses are already fully equipped with this technology when they leave the production plant.

A software update will then also enable the display of real-time data in the future. For example, before entering the next stop, passengers will receive an overview of all possible transfer connections - for the bus, the subway, the S-Bahn, and regional transport. The forecast arrival time for the next stops is also displayed.