The comments thread on my previous post about Vancouver got into a bit of discussion about the quality of the city’s bus network. I thought I’d dig into that a bit deeper, as while the Skytrain is the “show-pony” of the transit network here, it’s really the buses which still do the donkey work of the system.
Thankfully, Vancouver releases absolutely fantastic information about the details of operating its bus network, so we can look at how each bit of it performs as well as getting an idea around the overall performance of the network. For example, there’s a pretty detailed analysis of the system’s productivity in terms of boardings per revenue hour of operation:
What this shows is that there are a number of extremely high-performing routes, but generally a big bulge between around 25 and 90 boardings per revenue hour – which actually is still quite a lot when you think about it. Over the past three years Vancouver has engaged in quite a major process of service optimisation – in an environment of little new funding ensuring that the services available are used in the best way possible. This has led to quite an increase in the average boardings per revenue hour:
Overall, in the last couple of years it seems Vancouver have managed to increase bus patronage quite a lot without increasing the amount of service kilometres. Effectively they’ve worked out how to run a more efficient system.
Moving towards looking at sub-regional trends, the analysis highlights an important impact of the “Canada Line” – the most recent extension to the city’s Skytrain network. Much like the future effect of improvements to Auckland’s rail system, the result of this project has been a significant improvement in the efficiency of the bus network in the area – as routes can now operate as feeder services rather than long-hauls:
It’s pretty likely that we could replace the words “Canada Line” with “City Rail Link” and “Richmond” with “Western Auckland” and get the same results in the future. I do think that the effect of the CRL on enabling a more efficient and effective bus network is probably one of the most important benefits of that project – and a benefit that probably hasn’t been quantified to the extent that it needs to be in helping justify the project.
Much of the rest of the document looks at the performance of individual bus routes across the network – something that the Pedestrian Observations blog has thankfully aggregated so I don’t have to. Some interesting results are:
- The 99 b-line route and the 9 route traverse similar ground in an east-west direction and carry nearly 80,000 weekday bus riders. I do think the “Broadway corridor” these routes run along will become a successful further addition to the Skytrain network at some point in the future.
- Around 30 routes carry more than 2.2 million passengers a year, the equivalent of Auckland’s Northern Express route.
- Having really good quality bus routes (like the b-line services) are a great way to build ridership for future rail. The Canada Line replaced the old “98 b-line” and the Evergreen Line will replace the existing “97 b-line“. Getting a really frequent Onehunga-Airport-Manukau bus route in place will be critical for the future success of rail to the airport I believe.
Buses often don’t get as much good press as flash trains, but in Vancouver’s case we can see how buses have done a really good job in situations appropriate for what they’re good at. Furthermore, they manage to complement the rail network incredibly well, effectively extending the catchment of what is a relatively sparse system. Much of the success of Skytrain is actually thanks to the rather less glamorous Vancouver bus system.
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One of the reasons that the B-lines work really well in Vancouver is their long stop spacing,
Their stops are about 1km apart cf the regular stops which are 3-400 metres apart, which means B lines are much quicker than regular buses on the same route,
Is it just me that is thoroughly confused by the first graph?
Damn, I was actually going to ask you about that graph tomorrow. I can’t make heads or tails of it but I’m certain it must be showing something very useful!
I thought I was just too phick to work it out…. Explanation anyone…?
“It’s really the buses which still do the donkey work of the system.” I read somewhere that Public-Private Partnerships were in some way responsible for this – the local government was being held to ransom for millions of dollars each year. Is that true?
And most of Vancouver’s high-traffic buses are…… trolley buses!
Tell that to the dummkopfs of the Wellington Regional Council and NZ Bus.
I’ll have a stab at interpreting the graph. The horizontal axis measures revenue hours, so what we’re looking at is the allocation of bus resources betweens routes with different numbers of boardings per hour. At the top you have a few very high-performing services which generate extremely high rates of boarding with a small investment in revenue hours. The bulge lower down probably represents services which generate an “average” level of boardings. From a bang for your buck approach you’d like to see the lines at the top getting longer and the lines at the bottom getting smaller, indicating that resources are being placed in well used routes.
If you love to geek out over transit numbers, the appendixes with the route-by-route detail are fascinating – not just ridership stats, but also population and job numbers served by each route. Would be interesting to compare with Auckland’s numbers.
Great post here Peter M. Certainly a lot of things Auckland can learn from.
Vancouver has really hit the mark in terms of delivering an integrated model , the network is simple, Translink have grasped hierachy of modes, spatial and urban planning better than most and service delivery is high. The “dummkofps” at Wellington Regional Council and NZ Bus have just spent two weeks looking and meeting with the transit agencies in Vancouver, Eugene, Seattle and San Francisco and there is much to to be said about a one network approach and true integration – views on trolley buses, bike racks on bus,pedestrians, cyclists, shared space etc etc etc might be quite different from the assumptions often made in this blog. Quite happy to share our findings observations when we finalise over the next few weeks. Not sure about the comment on PPP – holding government to ransom for millions of dollars as it relates to Vancouver as the funding and governance model is clear and aligned right through the value chain.
Regards
Zane Fulljames
Zane, thanks for your comment. I knew you had been visiting Vancouver, Seattle and San Francisco — three great trolley bus cities — which was why I delibrately put that comment of mine under this post.
The Dominion Post recently reported you as saying Wellington should consider scrapping its trolley bus system — which the ratepayer and taxpayer have recently spent millions upgrading. Fran Wilde leapt in to support you.
You may have been misreported. Maybe not. Whichever, I would very much appreciate hearing your “views on trolley buses, bike racks on bus,pedestrians, cyclists, shared space etc etc etc” when you are able to give them.
Meanwhile, I note that GWRC has now abandoned its crazy plan to dieselise the Seatoun 11 and Lyall Bay 3 (both of which have recently been rewired from Kilbirnie to their terminii) and now only the minor 5, 9 and 10 are to go, leaving all the remaining trolley routes as “core” routes.
I’d be interested to hear what you think about this.
Unfortunately I wasn’t misreported at the time 🙂 on trolleys but this was made based on the information available at the time. I have done a 180 in terms of trolley buses but the real issue lies with the network and the cost of upgrade and this will be a complex issue to work through.
Primary reasons for the study tour to Canada and the States was to look at regulatory, funding , governance and operational models and performance of Trolley’s and Hybrids. It was also to test our “radical” thinking as an organization that there should not be a dominant mode in PT but rather mode optionality and we saw some outstanding examples of “mode symbiosis” ( a recent term i have been playing with :-). We are huge supporters of bikes on buses, bike racks on bus and at shelter – just need to figure out how we can make this happen as we trudge through the regulatory constraints, also supportive of modal share of bus lanes where there is a continuous flow only by vehicles other than bus i.e. only bus can stop for boarding and alighting passengers as long as we are not penalized for timetable delay :-). Lastly, whilst by no means do we have expertise in urban design/spatial planning we get the concepts of shared space better than most, have seen it in action and keen to explore what we can do to add value and operate within shared space rather than being an “intrusive” mode.
Zane Fulljames
CEO NZ BUS
Thanks again for your illuminating comments, Zane. It would be difficult to make a busman’s visit to Vancouver, Seattle and San Francisco and come away believing trolley buses are outmoded. 🙂 They also work well in smaller cities, think Solingen, St Gallen, Salzburg and Arnhem (the latter calls itself “Trolleystad” or “Trolley City”).
I take your point about the network upgrade. I had heard about 2007 that Vector was negotiating with NZ Bus over the substations, but it seems not much came of that. However since 2008, almost all the overhead on all the core routes that GWRC’s latest iteration says will remain has been upgraded and renewed except, bizarrely, on Karori Park which has been diesel operated since February because of the tunnel works, which would have allowed upgrading its 1954-era wires without interfering with services. I hope GWRC has not ordered a stop to upgrading the overhead, after the embarrassment it suffered when numerous people pointed out that the overhead wires of Route 11 had just been replaced at great cost, yet GWRC was proposing to dieselise this route…
I note that GWRC proposes to remove trolleys from the 5, 9 and 10, but the other six routes would all be high-frequency “core routes” — only one diesel route in Wellington City would similarly be a HFC — the Airport Flyer.
See:
http://www.gw.govt.nz/assets/Transport/Public-transport/Pics/General/Network-Diagram.pdf
It would thus be good if trolley bus use was promoted on these core routes, to get the best value for money from the huge investment in overhead and new trolleys in the past few years. Given the high fixed cost of overhead and the actual buses, the real cost per km run would drop significantly if they were run seven days from first bus to last; and the city and environs would be much more pleasant at nights and weekends — you should hear the racket the diesels make along Karori Road, Pirie St and the Parade on a still night.
Yes I know GWRC claims Transfield would want more if trolleys ran at weekends. Well call their bluff. They don’t need overhead crews sitting around at weekends, they only need the same callback system that must be employed at present for when some overheight truck brings down the wires on a Saturday morning. They get fixed at once, not left till Monday morning.
cheers
mike
And it really is a no-brainier for the country as a whole than we move as much transport energy use to our own largely renewable electric sources as soon as possible. This would clearly be a much better investment in better balance of payments improvement than hoping that oil may be found and actually recovered from ultra deep water plays off the East Coast. But of course that would require a government with a more rational and less ideological approach to energy issues.