Talk:Bus rapid transit

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Archives

2004-2007

[edit] Ozebus

Hi all, just a quick note to say thanks for starting the BRT page, could someone please add a link from this page to our website?
It's a portal to the Australian Bus Industry, and contains some really useful BRT resources and links.
The links to Monash Institute of Public Transport, Professor Graham Currie's work in BRT v LRT, and numerous conference presentations would add depth to this page.
Cheers!
Emily 125.168.104.190 (talk) 23:28, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

Hello Emily. I've added a follow-up about how to usefully add content to Wikipedia (rather than just website links) at the User_talk:Ozebus#Adding content page. Hope it's useful! —Sladen (talk) 23:56, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Split

It seens that the lists of the current systems should be separate. This currently reads as 1/3 article and 2/3 lists. I think it is about time each of those lists in different countries or continents should be separate pages. So where it says multiple is right. Really this article should only have exampls where appropriate, not all the systems in the world. Simply south (talk) 20:37, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

Seeing as nobody has objected after over two weeks i am going to try to split this but i could really do with some help splitting this. Simply south (talk) 20:31, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Neutrality question - Ottawa's claim of 10,000 pass/hr/direction

"Ottawa, Ontario operates one of the largest BRT systems in North America, with over 200,000 daily riders on the Ottawa Transitway, achieving peak capacities of 10,000 passengers per hour per direction."

This sentence contains two statements which are, at best, questionable. However, I've decided not to place a "neutrality questioned" flag for the moment, in the belief that consensus can be worked out.

"... over 200,000 daily riders on the Ottawa Transitway ..."

The operator has acknowledged (to an associate) that this figure includes "all" bus lines and passengers using the downtown reserved lanes (on Albert and Slater streets). Thus, passengers traveling "only" within downtown Ottawa, and those using bus lines which do not operate on the "transitway" system proper, get counted. This practice is misleading.

"... achieving peak capacities of 10,000 passengers per hour per direction ..."

This does not occur, and has never occurred.

To be blunt: if there is a place along the Ottawa transitways where one may stand and count 10,000 passengers riding past a fixed point during a clock hour, then that location is a closely guarded secret.

(Together with certain other details, such as time of day, season of year, and so forth.)

I have attempted to obtain clarification from the operator for more than a decade. This has been promised - multiple times - but has not been provided.

Conclusion: "Five-minute flows" of perhaps 700 - 900 passengers do occur on the Ottawa Transitway, and at multiple locations.

In other words, there are are multiple locations where one may stand and count 700-900 passengers riding past a fixed point during a five-minute interval. But nowhere is this sustained for a 60-minute interval.

The maximum hourly volume on the Ottawa transitway system is on the order of 5,000 - 6,000 passengers per hour per direction. That's impressive, but way short of the figure claimed.

Whether briefly or not, these issues need to be addressed in the article for the sake of NPOV. Ldemery (talk) 00:23, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

To reiterate this point again, while your individual observation may or may not be true, you need to cite the factual based evidence to support your assertion before your point can be accepted. The reason is simple, in addition to OC Transpo's continued claim of supporting both 200,000 weekday passengers/day and 10,000 per hour per direction[1], this claim is also cited by independent studies by research organisations such as the Transportation Research Board in their report TCRP Report 90: Bus Rapid Transit, Volume 1: Case Studies in Bus Rapid Transit, TRB, Washington, DC (2003).

And even accepting what you say could well be true, but this is not unique to the Transitway. "There is little doubt" that your claim could, and is, made of many transit systems, bus and rail. We have to at least be consistant and perhaps it is better to make changes to Wikipedia based on evidence (even disputed evidence) rather than an individual's opinion. Bigglesjames (talk) 07:15, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

The Transportation Research Board didn't do an independent study but just quoted OC Transit's numbers without auditing them. Here's an independent source that actually counted the number of passengers on the Ottawa Transitway and describes the claim of 10,000 passengers per hour as "A Legend": Ottawa Transitways: The Legend of 10,000 Per Hour.

Their independent assessment was that it actually carries between 3,500 and 5,000 passengers per hour, and that the OC Transit folks are just blowing smoke. By contrast they personally counted 8,000 passengers per hour on the Calgary C-Train, and thought the Calgary estimate of 10,000 phd was highly believable. (Calgary Transit's numbers are somewhat inaccurate, but mostly because the system is growing like Topsy and they are more concerned with getting the doors closed on the trains than with counting the passengers)

I wouldn't count on getting credible numbers out of OC Transit for the following reasons:

• They went about 450% over budget on building the Transitway, which suggests they're mathematically challenged.
• They ran out of capacity immediately after finishing it, which suggests their forward planning isn't all that good.
• The city is facing several hundred million $$$ in lawsuits over their recently canceled LRT system.
• The mayor has been indited on criminal charges for allegedly trying to bribe an opponent.

So you can make of that what you will, but I would tend to believe the chances of getting a believable answer out of the city government (or their lawyers) range from slim to none, and Slim just left town. RockyMtnGuy (talk) 18:56, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

Oops. I just checked the author of the aforementioned article, and it appears to be one Leroy W. Demery, Jr. who may well the same ldemery who made the original post under this heading. So, it may be the same person who has counted the passengers and wrote the article who is questioning OC Transpo's numbers. Well, it's a small world. However, if I had counted the numbers and come up with a completely different total, I would question it too. I've only counted the people on the Calgary C-Train, which is relatively simple. With buses its tougher - when overloaded they don't come on regular schedule, they come in bunches, and they don't consistently get packed full. However it would be really difficult to get up to 10,000 phd using ordinary transit buses. London double-deckers, maybe. RockyMtnGuy (talk) 19:47, 1 April 2008 (UTC)