English: Finally I can catch up to the exciting developments with buses in Leicester, where things have been developing at quite a rapid pace lately! Arriva Midlands ordered a batch of 24 Wright Streetdeck Electroliners (of the slightly aesthetically-compromised low-height variety) for the services 47, 48, 50 and 51. They were expected to enter service last October, but for some reason or another (rumour had it that the landowner of the depot was refusing to permit the installation of charging equipment for the new buses), they didn't begin entering service until last month... six months late!

Another batch of funding for new electric buses has been jointly secured by Arriva and Kinchbus, with electric buses intended for Arriva's services 5/5A and 127, as well as the virtual entirety of Kinchbus's network, save for the Skylink. Until then, it remains to be seen how long the new buses stay faithful to their allocated routes. The electrics have already appeared a handful of times on the 127, with one occasionally working a single peak-time journey to Loughborough Pitsford Drive in the morning. Unfortunately, I have thus far been unable to photograph any of these events for various reasons. Last Wednesday morning it was raining. As much as I prefer this livery over the regular Journey Mark Eco livery used elsewhere in the country, primarily because of the green-blue gradient, I do have a feeling that painting all the buses green will cause some confusion (mainly) to people living outside Leicester, due to the lack of public transport integration outside the cities, including a lack of multi-operator tickets outside the cities, combined with confusion over which operators run particular services due to their similar paint schemes. I have a feeling that, in this part of the country at least, the wider counties have yet to gain the benefits of public transportation integration, which especially affects people who travel from the county into the city.
But enough of all that waffle.

Wright Streetdeck Electroliner 8017 is seen arriving at St. Margaret's Bus Station in Leicester ahead of working a service 51 to Braunstone.