Fleet Size The fleet (all the vehicles owned or licensed in the bus system) should be tracked regularly by the regulatory authority. More importantly, fleet capacity should also be tracked. The effective capacity of the fleet is influenced by the availability and
utilization of buses.
Shortage of transport capacity may be due to inadequate fleet size. Often, however, the number of available vehicles would be adequate if they were more effectively utilized. Inefficient operating practices, such as full-vehicle despatching, may result in inadequate capacity even if there are surplus vehicles.
Surplus vehicles may cause severe traffic congestion in terminals and in the surrounding streets if there is insufficient parking space in the terminals.
Surplus vehicles will also result in increased costs and reduced profitability, because the fixed costs of each vehicle must be spread over a smaller number of passengers than would otherwise be possible.