🚀 go-pugleaf

As an addendum to the BRT discussion that happened on these groups a
few days ago, I figured I would post an article from the San Francisco
Chronicle about AC Transit's new bus line that is modeled on the L.A.
Metro Rapid lines.  I do wonder if AC transit's express buses will be
frequent enough along this route for headway based schedules to save
people time.  12 minutes is a really long headway.

The original article, with pictures and a map is here:
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2003/07/15/BA184829.DTL

Introducing the speedy bus
AC Transit project in East Bay aims to be subway alternative

Michael Cabanatuan, Chronicle Staff Writer Tuesday, July 15, 2003


Oakland -- A new breed of bus is rolling through the East Bay,
threatening to change the way people ride what's always been seen as
the plow horse of public transportation.

AC Transit's 72R line stands out not because of its shiny white paint
job with green and red stripes, its oversized tinted windows or its
European design, but because of the ambition behind it.

The idea is to speed up and modernize bus travel. No more stopping at
every last street corner. No more lingering at stops to stick to a
schedule. Less time sitting at red lights and bus stops.

Instead, AC's buses are scheduled to zip along the 16 miles of San
Pablo Avenue, through middle- and working-class neighborhoods from San
Pablo to Oakland, in 20 percent less time than the fastest buses that
used to ply the route.

AC's project is one of two to three dozen being rolled out around the
country as transit planners look for faster, cheaper ways of moving
people than building light-rail or subway lines.

"It's a real change in bus psychology," said Jon Twichell, AC Transit
planning manager and the of the rapid bus service. "This frees buses
to just get up and go."

That's how it's worked in Los Angeles, where an experiment to cut the
time buses idled at traffic lights, bus stops or in stalled traffic
was such a success that the Metropolitan Transportation Authority
expanded from its initial two lines to four. Plans are in the works to
add two more lines every six months until 28 are operating.

"We had no idea it would work so well," said Rex Gephart, project
manager for LA Metro Rapid.

Other Bay Area transit agencies are also looking at rapid-bus service.

The Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority is gradually improving
its 22 line along El Camino Real. San Francisco's Municipal Railway is
studying the possibility of rapid-bus lines along Van Ness Avenue and
Geary Boulevard. And AC Transit is considering an advanced version,
with dedicated lanes and bus stations instead of stops, between
Berkeley and San Leandro.

Anyone who's been stuck on a crowded bus in rush-hour traffic knows
all too well the appeal of a speedier ride. Passengers are used to
standing elbow-to- belly button, hanging onto overhead grab-bars, as
the bus lurches through traffic, stopping at nearly every corner.

Rapid buses, on the other hand, stop only at major intersections. AC
Transit's stops are an average of two-thirds of a mile apart.

Rapid bus service also eliminates the carefully choreographed
timetables, the ones that force many bus drivers to sit and wait by
the side of the road or cruise down the street slowly so as not to get
ahead of schedule.

Instead, rapid buses start at a designated time, and drivers complete
their routes as quickly as possible. Schedules simply designate the
time buses leave their starting point and an estimated time they reach
the end.

AC's rapid buses are running between Jack London Square in downtown
Oakland and Contra Costa College in San Pablo every 12 minutes from 6
a.m. to 7 p.m. on weekdays.

AC, which is in the midst of severe budget troubles, is betting big on
the new service.

"The bottom line . . . is that the 20 percent running time reduction
is imminently doable," Twichell said. AC's hope is that ridership on
the line will increase 25 percent.

Although the San Pablo Rapid started service last month, some of its
fanciest features have yet to be installed. Infrared devices in the
windshields will send signals that will hold some green lights for
rapid buses and make red lights turn green faster. Bus shelters,
outfitted with digital signs that tell passengers when the next bus
will arrive, will be installed in the next few weeks.

"We're working all summer to get everything running nicely," Twichell
said. "Then, after Labor Day, when the kids return to school and
people go back to work, we'll start the marketing campaign."

So far, riders seem to like the new rapid service, though they're
still getting used to the changes.

"It was real fast," said Norman Johnson, a College of Alameda student
and basketball player who caught the bus in Emeryville and rode it to
downtown Oakland. "It's a big improvement."

Others took a more skeptical view.

"So this is the new rapid transit system," said one man who didn't
want to give his name. "Most other cities get rapid transit on
tracks."

AC Transit's program, which cost $4.5 million to put on the road, is
modeled in part on Los Angeles' Metro Rapid, whose fire-engine red
buses have transformed bus travel in a city whose transit system is
more often ridiculed than copied.

Metro Rapid has cut travel times by 25 percent and boosted ridership
by 40 percent.

Visit the busy intersection of Vermont Avenue and Wilshire Boulevard
in the heat of a morning commute, and you'll forget you're in
car-crazy L.A. Hundreds of riders pile off buses on one corner, scurry
across a plaza and, with little or no wait, hop aboard other buses
that zip off toward their destinations.

"To tell you the truth, I didn't think it was going to work when they
first started it," said Ray Alcantar, a Metro supervisor whose job is
to choreograph the flow of passengers and buses during the morning
commute at Vermont and Wilshire. "But it works pretty well, and people
really seem to like it."

Passengers say the buses have sped their travels and made the bus an
alternative to driving.

"It's better service," said Ciro Mojica, a San Fernando Valley
resident who rides to downtown. "It's a lot faster because you don't
stop at every street."

Metro, Los Angeles's countywide transportation agency, started the
experiment after a study found that Angelenos wouldn't ride buses
because they were too slow. A subsequent study discovered that buses
spent half their travel time stopped.

So in spring of 2000, Metro started running rapid buses on two lines
-- along Wilshire, which stretches across the city, and on Ventura
Boulevard in the San Fernando Valley.

The expense, said Gephart, was minor -- especially compared with light
rail,

which costs $20 million to $30 million a mile to build, or subways,
which cost $100 million to $300 million a mile. Los Angeles' rapid-bus
system carries a price tag of $200,000 to $250,000 a mile, he said.

"It has a lot of impact," said Gephart. "For that kind of money, you
can get speed and frequency for the public. It's great."

Metro Rapid has prompted visits from scores of U.S. transit agencies,
including those in the Bay Area, eager to duplicate Los Angeles'
unexpected success.

And while Gephart admits it's strange to have people visiting Los
Angeles to learn about transit -- "we're not exactly known for our
transit system," he says -- he realizes that Metro Rapid offers hope
to other cities.

"If we can build a successful rapid bus system in L.A., where everyone
loves cars," he said, "anybody can do it."