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Well of course. But I feel that the buses should be much faster (BRT, anyone?), and should funnel traffic to and from a well-funded and expansive railway system with a moderate to high capacity, so that rail transit is never far off and has easy access.
Buses in general tend to be tied in traffic except for those that are BRT and even then the cost of BRT isn't that much cheaper than rail. Busses have more function and flexibility that funneling into rail. People love rail because it is about the only from of transit that can sometimes keep up with or beat a car if there is enough traffic but in most systems the busses are the back bone for those who are truly carless.
What people tend to forget about public transit is that it is PUBLIC meaning it is going to stop to pick up/drop off people(which slows things down greatly) and it is going to take what ever route it is scheduled to do(which may or may not be the most efficient for you).
The slow speed of the bus, street car, and public transit in general is why people who could afford to buy cars and for whom a car is useful abandoned it years ago. Where I live if you use the bus you need to plan to arrive about 30 mins. early just in case the bus runs late so you don't run late. With a car it is possible to arrive 15 plus or minus.
There are times when public transit is an good option, but to use public transit when it is not or expect it to always be an good option is a bit much.
However, BART extensions are very expensive. Any new extension is going to do rather badly on a per rider basis, as the higher ridership areas are already served. BART to San Jose costs $5 billion.
You'd get far more riders build a new underground subway in San Francisco or something in Oakland for that cost.
For example, there is talk to build a Geary subway in SF. They are working on BRT and it'll likely not get separate lanes and will open in like 2022.
There are a few bus lines, a mix of local an express on the route (The 38 buses) and they have 50k passengers a day. It also takes 1 hour on the bus to get to downtown on that route. (meanwhile only 20 minutes for me in Oakland).
Can anyone explain how a route that has 50k passengers daily on the bus can't get priority for a subway? Oops, the bus riders are the wrong demographic. But hey we've $5B for hopefully 22k riders (BART has notoriously way overestimated their projections in the past.) on an unproven corridor.
That's the kind of stuff that annoys me to no end. There is a route that is literally bursting at the seams, and they are still looking for funding for the $230M they need for BRT, while BART somehow gets $5B to serve 22k people, and another $500M for the Oakland Airport Connector that is projected to serve 5k daily riders.
they dont like being mugged. when the streets become again safe, the buses and trolleys will fill up with people.
please dont say they ride the metro in paris, when they have to yes, but otherwise anybody that can gets a small car & does so bek of the thug element there.
the issue friend is crime. in america if you got a car and can pay high rent you just dodge it, but not on public transport-- that is the preferred transport for the gang banger. and he is dying to get next to you.
Low ridership but if you have jobs in some secondary districts you might be able to get decent ridership
That's what they've tried to to do in Dallas, which actually has a fairly extensive light rail system now (85 miles, 62 stations). Yet only 44,982 commuters use public transit (1.48% of MSA commuters). It's not about changing the "culture" of transit there. It's simply that it's much faster for the vast majority of people to drive to work.
Also, using your car isn't "free," it still costs money to operate and burns gas. You still have to insure and register and maintain the car. You're just optimizing its use by combining trips, which is a smart strategy to use if you want to drive less. And if ordering online, the better strategy is to order multiple items to mitigate the expense of that $10-15 shipping fee. The point of online ordering vs. a car-based shopping trip is to provide an alternative for someone who doesn't have a car, not to prove that it costs less in all circumstances. In everything, there are choices--we choose what we do (or don't want to do) to suit our circumstances, which aren't all the same.
So long as you have light rail lines running within parallel to each other within a few feet of one another. Reality is lines don't run that close together. Even parts of Manhattan aren't within 1/2 mile of a rail stop, although generally they are within 1/2 mile for most of Manhattan. There's, I think, 9 lines in Manhattan and it's 33 square miles. Most people would generally consider it to have rail most everywhere, although not with 1/4 mile.
Transist isn't free freedom either. It's just paid for by the taxpayer. In 2011, light rail in Sacramento cost the taxpayer roughly $31 million for 15 million boardings, roughly $2 per boarding. Additionally, it collected a little over $1 per boarding for the user. It didn't pay for any of the capital costs, but we'll ignore that. It'd be like you went to the gas station and paid less than $1 a gallon for gas, your $900 insurance bill became $300, your $18,000 basic car became $6,000. Sure, that makes it more affordable but there's no free lunch.
Bus systems have the lowest cost per vehicle revenue mile and revenue hour, $3.1 and $45, respectively, but the highest cost per thousand passenger mile, $616.4.
BRT systems cost per vehicle revenue mile were almost as low as bus systems’, $3.6, and the cost per thousand passenger mile was 24% lower, $496.9.
Light rail systems have the highest cost per vehicle revenue mile, $9.3, and the second highest cost per passenger mile, $578.
Metro systems cost less than LRT systems per vehicle revenue mile, $6.5; the most per vehicle revenue hour, $152; and the least per thousand place mile and thousand passenger mile, $49.2 and $282, respectively
Balanced against construction cost:
Quote:
On average, bus rapid transit (BRT) costs $10.24 million in 1990 dollars per mile to build. This figure is less than half that of that for light rail transit (LRT), $26.4 million and one-tenth of metro rail transit (MRT), $128.2 million. However, in some situations BRT can be more expensive per mile than LRT, and some LRT systems have exceeded the per-mile cost of MRT projects.
As you can see, there's almost no justification for light rail. With a cost per passenger mile of 58 cents versus a buses 62 cents, it just isn't worth it. Of course, the same is true for buses. With the average bus not being as energy efficient per passenger mile as the average car, perhaps it would make more sense to setup a carshare program to provide welfare transit to the low income rather than bus service. Of course, it would probably have to be means tested whereas transit is not to avoid abuse, and means testing basically is the dell blow for welfare in this country. Look at Social Security/Medicare. Massively popular welfare programs, not means tested. Transit is means tested by it sucking so most people would rather pay more to drive so they don't have to take it.
42,064 people in the DFW metro commuted by public transit in 2005. Since 2005, two new light rail lines have been built, and that number rose to 44,982. There are currently 3,033,514 commuters in the Dallas metro (that's an increase of 271,971 from 2005). Was moving an additional 2,198 people around on mass transit worth the additional billions?
42,064 people in the DFW metro commuted by public transit in 2005. Since 2005, two new light rail lines have been built, and that number rose to 44,982. There are currently 3,033,514 commuters in the Dallas metro (that's an increase of 271,971 from 2005). Was moving an additional 2,198 people around on mass transit worth the additional billions?
Depends. Can you really put a price tag on a "transit boom"?
Charlotte finished a light rail line in 2007. The metro went from 16,049 transit commuters to 17,573 transit commuters. Build it and they will ride it. With a few more $462 million investments, they might reach 28,000 riders some day.
That sounds well and good if you have a spoke and hub system with lines feeding into a CBD. But what if the vast bulk of a region's employment is scattered all over the place (with a weak CBD)? Are you going to build individual rail lines to all of these suburban locations? And why would people ride them if they can drive there and park for free?
Quote:
Originally Posted by BajanYankee
That's what they've tried to to do in Dallas, which actually has a fairly extensive light rail system now (85 miles, 62 stations). Yet only 44,982 commuters use public transit (1.48% of MSA commuters). It's not about changing the "culture" of transit there. It's simply that it's much faster for the vast majority of people to drive to work.
Does Dallas really have any secondary job centers dense for enough for significant transit ridership? I suspect most of those light rail have few residents nearby nor many jobs but mainly park and rides, which will only get high ridership if the downtown is hard to drive and especially park in.
Suburban Toronto, which is much denser than Dallas gets much higher non downtown ridership. Even nassau county long island has 2.5 times bus riders (which cant be center city commutes) than Dallas has transit riders.
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