Fresno Area Express upgrades with N/S Wash

 

Covering more than 110 square miles over the city of Fresno, California, Fresno Area Express operates 18 fixed routes, various paratransit activities, and provides transportation to nearly 9.6 million passengers annually.

With a  fleet of 136 fixed-route buses and over 50 paratransit buses, Fresno understands that prioritizing a clean and inviting bus, both inside and out, is key to an effective and reliable transit service.

Over the past year, Fresno has partnered with N/S Wash to complete the commission and installation of two new bus wash systems.


Built as part of the facility’s original infrastructure in the 1980s, Fresno’s previous bus wash system was out of date and no longer served the agency’s needs.

“It still had the blowers, where you had to get on the bus and go to the back and blow everything out the front door,” said Gregory Barfield, Fresno Director of Transportation. “Having moved to cloth seats and many other things, that just was not an option anymore.”

In 2023, during the remodel of an annex building adjacent to the old bus wash, the Fresno team decided it was time to not only upgrade the bus wash but relocate the vaulting system to be nearer the bus wash and make additional upgrades to the nearby CNG fuel island.

“It was a much bigger project that allowed us to come into the 21st century with the bus wash that was going to better suit our needs,” Barfield said. “We didn’t actually choose the equipment until we were well underway on the reconstruction of the actual wash itself, and we were able to identify the system that would best suit our needs and requirements.”

According to Barfield, selecting a new bus wash system was fairly simple. The agency needed a bus wash that could accommodate a 60-foot articulated bus, would utilize an updated vacuum rather than a blower system, and could facilitate a two-lane system to increase the number of vehicles washed per day – the agency was looking to run as many as 100 vehicles a night as part of their standard refueling and vaulting process.

N/S Wash was able to meet all these requirements with two of their Nautica 4M Rollover Wash Systems.

 

The Nautica 4M Rollover Wash System is a rollover wash machine engineered to wash vehicles of all sizes, including vehicles up to 14′ tall. Speed and versatility are the benchmarks of the 4M Series. This machine can double wash a bus in under 3.5 minutes and a heavy truck in under 8 minutes. High-quality features include brushes with hand-woven bristles, which are extremely durable but still soft, and an intensified rear wash program to effectively double-wash the backs of vehicles. According to Barfield, one of the most critical features of the bus wash was moving away from the push mechanism into a vacuuming system.

“We tend to detail four or five buses a week and we were having to take all the seats out, wash them individually,” Barfield said. “So, this has really been helpful in cutting down on the time and energy that were putting into cleaning the buses every day.”

After selecting a bus wash system that fit their needs, Fresno began working with the N/S Wash team to lay groundwork for the installation. “Now we are at the point where they have turned over the system to us, but they still come on site on a regular basis to help continue training and follow up.”

“They did all the installation work and made sure that our team understood every piece of it,” Barfield said.

While the project itself took about 11 months to complete, Barfield said the N/S Wash team has been by their side every step of the way to assist with training and system maintenance.

“We are now at a point where they have turned over the system to us, but they still come on site regularly to help continue training as follow up for our overnight bus wash crew,” Barfield said. “We really appreciate the dialogue and partnership with NS. Anytime we have questions or concerns, they immediately respond with whatever we need. That’s the kind of partnership you want from a vendor.”

According to Barfield, N/S Wash has provided the agency with the ability to not only maintain a clean and inviting environment for its ridership, but helped to increase efficiency as well.

“The new system has really helped cut down on some of the biggest pain points that we have had with cleaning the buses,” Barfield said. “Including getting us to a point where we are able to move through our peak number of buses each night. We have been very pleased with the whole experience.”

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