Why no Rapid Ride buses on Luminaria Tour? (neighborhoods, school)

[Pink Jazz]

With the Luminaria Tour sold out, I was wondering, why can't ABQ RIDE use Rapid Ride buses on the Luminaria Tour? Last year, the Luminaria Tour was operated using 700- and 900-series buses, and I assume it will be the same this year.

Before anyone says they are too large, you should keep in mind that they actually have a narrower turning radius than the 40-foot buses (300/700/900-series) since they bend in the middle.

Does anyone know why Rapid Ride buses aren't used for the Luminaria Tour?

[Zoidberg]

My only guesses are cost of operation, some special training required for operation of the longer buses, traffic worries, neighborhood concerns (illogical ones of course), or some obscure union agreement provision.

[yukon]

ABQ Ride may run the Rapid Ride routes on their regular routes that night, I don't remember. TBH, I prefer the school buses on the tour. It's very hard to see out the windows at night on the city buses that have wrap advertising over the windows.

And thank goodness they aren't stopping the regular routes at 3:00 this year. That totally sucked last year.

[jfaught]

Actually, we tried using a Rapid Ride a couple of years ago. We did a practice run and it could not make the tight turns in the neighborhoods.