A bus lane or bus only lane is a lane restricted to buses, and generally used to speed up public transport that would be otherwise held up by traffic congestion. Often taxis and high occupancy vehicles or motorcycles[1] and bicycles may use bus lane as well, though these uses can be controversial since they can reduce the capacity of the bus lane for its originally intended function. Bus lanes are a central part of bus rapid transit.
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Bus lanes give priority to buses and cut down on journey times where roads are congested with other traffic. A bus lane is not necessarily very long, as it may only be used to bypass a single congestion point such as an intersection. Some cities have built large stretches of bus lanes amounting to a separate local road system, often called a busway system.
Bus lanes are normally created when the road in question is both likely to be congested and heavily traveled by bus routes. Entire roads can be designated as bus lanes (such as Oxford Street in London or Fulton Street in New York City), allowing buses, taxis and delivery vehicles only, or a contra-flow bus lane can allow buses to travel in the opposite direction to other vehicles.[2] Some bus lanes operate at certain times of the day only, usually during rush hour, allowing all vehicles to use the lane at other times, and it is common to have bus lanes in only one direction, such as for the main direction of the morning rush hour traffic, with the buses using normal lanes in the other direction.
Bus lanes may have separate sets of traffic signals, to allow priority at intersections.
According to the American Public Transportation Association (APTA)[3] and the National Transit Database (NTD),[4] the world's first designated bus lane was created in Chicago in 1939.
The first bus lanes in Europe were established in 1962 in the German city of Hamburg. Other large German cities soon followed, and the implementation of bus lanes was officially sanctioned in the German highway code in 1971. Many experts from other countries (Japan among the first) studied the German example and implemented similar solutions. On January 15, 1964 the first bus lane in France was designated along the quai du Louvre in Paris and the first counter-flow lane was established on the old pont de l’Alma on June 15, 1966.[5] On 26 February 1968 the first bus lane in London was put into service on Vauxhall Bridge. By 1972 there were over 140 km of with-flow bus lanes in 100 cities within OECD member countries, and the network grew substantially in the following decades.[6]
The El Monte Busway between El Monte and Downtown Los Angeles was the first busway in the USA, constructed in 1974.[7]
In Sydney, the pavement of a bus lane is coloured red; bike lanes are coloured green.
The installation of bus lanes requires additional space to either be constructed (increasing the impact of the road on the surrounding area, and possibly requiring private land)[8] or taken from existing lanes, reducing the capacity of the road for private vehicles. The latter is especially controversial with many road users when this is actually an ancillary reason (i.e. when local authorities want to explicitly combine improved public transport options with reducing or at least not improving convenience for motorists).[9]
They can become inefficient if weak traffic enforcement encourages illegal parking on them (for example in shopping areas). The bus then has to merge back into traffic, which may be totally stopped, causing substantial schedule delays. They are also often used by vehicles not authorized, which reduces their capacity for the intended purpose.[10]
Some network lengths of bus lanes in major cities, listed by buses per km of bus lane):
| City | Country | Population (million) | Buses (#s) | Population per bus | Bus lanes (km) | Buses per 1 km of bus lane |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Helsinki | Finland | 0.6 | 470[11] | 1,238 | 44[12] | 11 |
| Sydney | Australia | 4.3 | 1,900 | 2,260 | 90+[13] | 21 |
| Santiago | Chile | 6.5 | 4,600 | 1,400 | 200 [14] | 23 |
| London | UK | 7.5 | 6,800 | 1,100 | 240[15] | 28 |
| Singapore | Singapore | 4.5 | 3,775 | 1,200 | 155[16] | 29 |
| Seoul | South Korea | 10.4 | 8,910 | 1,167 | 282[17] | 32 |
| Madrid | Spain | 7 | 2,022[18] | 2,720 | 50[19] | 40 |
| Bogotá | Colombia | 6.7 | 1,080[20] | 6,200 | 84[21] | 45 |
| São Paulo | Brazil | 10.9 | 14,900[22] | 730 | 155[23] | 96 |
| Kunming | People's Republic of China | 5.7 | ~ | ~ | 42[24] | |
| Hong Kong | Hong Kong (PRC) | 6.8 | 19,768 [25] | 666 | 22[26] | 899 |
The busiest bus lane in the United States (connecting to the Lincoln Tunnel in New York City) carries at peak times approximately 700 buses per hour, an average of one bus every 5.1 seconds.[27]
In contrast the Cross Habour Tunnel in Hong Kong carries 14,500 buses per day,[28] or an average of about 605 an hour all day (not just peak times), but the bus lane must give-way to all the other road-users resulting in long queues of buses.
| Country | Highway | Bus lanes (km) | Section |
|---|---|---|---|
| South Korea | Gyeongbu Expressway | 137.4 | Hannam IC (Seoul) ~ Sintanjin IC (Daejeon) |
| Hong Kong (PRC) | Tuen Mun Road | 8.5[29] | So Kwun Wat ~ Sham Tseng |
The introduction of bus lanes can significantly assist in the reduction of pollutants[30]
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