Emily's right about the ridership on Geary justifying light rail, but here are some reasons for instituting BRT anyway. First of all, you should understand that high-quality BRT performs for the customer almost the same as rail. The buses are different and little bigger. The floors are low, so you simply step across onto the bus instead of up stairs onto the bus. Passengers pay their fare at the station, not when they board the bus, so when the bus pulls up, it can just discharge and take passengers quickly, just like a subway. A BRT bus has at least three doors, not just one or two, to facilitate quick boarding, just like a subway. The biggest difference between a bus and light rail is that light rail vehicles are usually bigger, and when you have high ridership bigger vehicles cost less to operate. With moderate ridership, it's smarter to have very high frequencies rather than bigger vehicles, but Geary, with its three minute headways, could operate very effectively and more affordably with five-minute headways and light rail vehicles instead of BRT buses. So now you understand the concept and the differences. Here are some reasons to institute BRT anyway. 1. Political. The main opposition to the project comes from many merchants, not just a crazed leader or two, who are legitimately worried about impacts to their business during construction. Laying track instead of pavement is a hugely larger impact. 2. Capital Cost. BRT, even with buying new rolling stock and everything, costs somewhat less than light rail. And the city's capital budget is extremely limited. They can't even build the bicycle network with the current capital budget (now helping to increase our capital budget to accomplish those things should be something we consider). 3. Bigger buses. It might be possible to buy triple-articulated buses for Geary BRT. They're doing that in Curitiba, apparently. This negates some of the operating cost advantage of light rail. 4. Thinking ahead, politically. Most lines in the city do have the correct ridership numbers for BRT, so a successful model to be applied elsewhere would help alot! This argument is somewhat defeated by the existence of the Van Ness BRT project, which should be finished sooner. 5. Beyond Geary and Van Ness. BRT provides flexibility that rail cannot. BRT buses can still operate outside of the constructed BRT routes. This will enable some creative routing of the Geary buses at the west end of the route to pick up passengers. This is critical for inner Geary east of Van Ness where rail would be extremely difficult to place above ground (not impossible) and where putting it underground is out of the question, cost-wise, for the next 10-20 years. This will enable the buses to continue operating in the event of a flood, fire, earthquake, festival, or other such event that renders the constructed BRT corridor temporarily unusable. Just some more thhoughts. Dave
Hi all,
I just wanted to throw my two cents in here since I won't be able to attend tomorrow night's meeting. Better, faster transit on Geary is a great idea. However, I am worried that BRT is not the right option for Geary. With between 55 and 75k riders/day now, BRT's capacity will be maxed out soon. Plus, BRT will never attract the extra ridership that rail will.
I am usually all for saving as much money as possible on expensive city
projects. However, on this one, I have to urge you all to ask the TA to
consider rail as an alternative. Not only does the ridership now justify the investment of light rail, but heavy rail (subways) have been built on *much* less ridership.
Just some food for thought before the meeting.
Best, Emily
__________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com _______________________________________________ Transpo mailing list Transpo@sfgreens.org https://list.sfgreens.org/mailman/listinfo/transpo