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Mayor to reveal bus design winner Aston Martin designs Routemaster
(about 4 hours later)
The Mayor of London is to announce the winner of a competition to design a new version of the Routemaster bus. Sports car manufacturer Aston Martin is joint winner of a competition to design a new Routemaster bus for London.
Designers were invited to submit ideas with the best entry set to win a first prize of £25,000. The Warwickshire-based firm's winning entry was a team effort with leading architects Foster and Partners.
They were asked to consider key features such as an open platform to allow passengers to get on and off quickly and easily and disabled access. They share the £25,000 first prize with bus, coach and truck design firm Capoco Design, based in Wiltshire.
The jump-on, jump-off double-decker bus was withdrawn from regular service in London in December 2005. A Transport for London spokesman said the first of the greener and more accessible, hop-on hop-off, double-deckers could be in service by 2011.
Other key features designers were asked to consider were a good use of interior space and green technology. The original Routemasters were phased out from regular service by the end of 2005 as they were inaccessible to wheelchairs or pushchairs.
The competition closed in September. Tendering process
The competition, in which children were also invited to take part, attracted about 700 entries.
The winning designs will now be passed on to bus manufacturers, following a competitive tendering process, to develop into a final proposed design.
The Aston Martin-Foster bus design envisages a highly-manoeuvrable, zero-emissions vehicle, with solar panels built into a glass roof, full accessibility, warm lighting and wooden floors.
The Capoco design combines what the company describes as "the best of the old with the best of the new".
The Capoco Design retains the Routemaster-style front engine
It has a low flat floor to allow easy access and will be low emission, but will also retain the Routemaster-style front engine and open rear platform.
The youngest winners were nine-year-olds Thomas Staricoff, from Brighton, and Olivia Carrier, from north-west London, who received £200 worth of bicycle vouchers for their drawings of what a new bus should look like.
London Mayor Boris Johnson said: "We have had a phenomenal response, with ideas submitted from around the globe, and we now have, in our joint winners, two stunning designs that allow us to go forward and produce a truly iconic bus fit for 21st Century London."
But Labour's transport spokesperson on the London Assembly, Val Shawcross, said: "The design competition may have been fun and the winning designs are extremely impressive, but this is not a serious way to make policy and not a worthwhile use of public money.
"I have yet to hear one convincing argument for why London needs a new double-decker bus and until Boris comes up with some, Londoners will see this as little more than a vanity project."