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| Metro Transit opened the Downtown Seattle Transit Tunnel in 1990, and for
the opening of the tunnel they placed a fleet of 235 Breda ADPB350's into
service. The ADPB350s is a dual-mode, 3 door, articulated transit coach. The 3rd
axle on the trailer is powered by a Detroit Diesel 6v92TA engine at 350H.P. It
is coupled through a "V" drive adapter to a ZF4HP590 automatic
transmission. The center axle is powered by a 275HP Fuji Traction Motor with AEG
Westinghouse chopper control. The coach has a rather cantankerous mode selection
switch on the dash that operates independent of the master switch to
control which mode the coach is in. In the Downtown Seattle Transit tunnel, the
poles are automatically raised and lowered by use of a switch in the drivers
compartment. They also have Delachux trolley retrievers incase of de-wirement.
Coaches 5000-5002 were built in Italy in 1988, while the remaining coaches had
their bodies built in Italy and final assembly done in a warehouse in Issaquah,
Washington by Breda in 1989 and 1990. When new, these buses replaced AMGeneral diesel 10240's and MAN SG-220's. Starting in 2004, the Breda's themselves were replaced with New Flyer DE60LF coaches, with Caterpillar diesel engines and Allison Ep50 "Hybridrive" Transmission systems. The Last Breda in revenue service in the Downtown Seattle Transit Tunnel was coach 5169, Which made its final run January 24th, 2005 on route 71 run #9. While they were still in service Coaches 5019-5021, 5194-5210 were leased to Sound Transit and repainted into Sound Transit colors for use on the 550 from 1999 until retirement in 2004.
Coach 5034 has been preserved by the Metro Employee's Historic Vehicle Association
and made the last run in the tunnel in electric mode on Sunday March 20th, 2005
with a Special Members-only fan trip. The trip lasted a little over 2 hours, and
consisted of two round trips through the tunnel with photo stops made at each of
the stations.
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