Public Transit - Bus Systems

While having a discussion with friends and family last night, the topic of empty buses came up. Why on earth would a local or regional transit company run buses that no one rides? One friend mentioned seeing buses near his house (which is decidedly exurban, near rural) with one or two riders.

While I have not studied every bus system that exists, I have experienced bus systems on the west and east coasts of the US, as well as in Europe. I've made some conclusions about bus systems on my own which I'll share here.

First, you'll find bus systems in pretty much every metro area, whether they work or not. They often exist as a result of governmental mandates meant to do the right thing by providing public transportation. I don't honestly know how many actually pay for themselves, but I know that many are subsidized by various governments. The obvious conclusion is that subsidizing bus systems that don't work is a waste of money.

So, what makes a bus system work? It seems to boil down to four things. The first is obvious - the cost must be reasonable. But not so fast. Many bus systems are subsidized because politicians think they exist to serve the needs of the economically disadvantaged. So, instead of making the cost commensurate with the length of the trip, or the value of the trip, they concern themselves with making sure the cost is as low as possible, thereby losing even more money than they should. If we're going to subsidize those in financial need, let's do so using other means, and treat buses simply as transportation.

The second consideration is cleanliness. Now, I think this one is more obvious. It's a public health concern, and I'm sure you know many who would not ride a bus because it's filthy. It's probably worthwhile to include comfortable as well. A bus doesn't need to be plush, but should be more comfortable than sitting on concrete. If these things are taken care of, public perception can be improved.

Possibly the most important consideration is available routes. One story of mine that demonstrates this is my attempt to take the bus for a first day of work. This was many years ago, but has stuck with me since. I left home 2 1/2 hours before I was to start, to make sure I got there on time. (Keep in mind, the office was a 20 minute drive from home.) After a number of transfers and layovers, I finally arrived at work 45 minutes late. That's 3 hours and 15 minutes by bus, when it would have taken me 20 minutes by car. In fact, I started cycling to work shortly after, and that only took me 35 minutes. I have not ridden the bus in this city since, though I have done so elsewhere on many occasions.

The lesson here is that routes must be sensible. That's a function of 2 things - planning and the layout of the city. If the city is laid out poorly, it's hard to make routes work no matter what. However, routes can be planned poorly in an easy city to plan for, and routes can be maximized for any city to be the best possible under the conditions.

It seems that the easiest areas to plan for are ones with a central target area, especially one with a grid layout. To simplify this, just plan spur routes to carry people to and from the central area, and loop routes to take people around and through the grid. I've seen this layout work in a number of situations.

The last consideration I'll mention is frequency. Buses not only have to take you where you want to go, but when. If the bus only comes every two hours, it's not very convenient. However, if one comes every 3 minutes, and there aren't many riders, the expense is just too great. Balancing these two needs should bring the optimum frequency. Of course, they should be reliable as well, or the frequency doesn't matter.

So, if a bus system maximizes all these things, and boosts public awareness, it should function well for the people.

One of my favorite examples of a functioning system is State College, PA. For a metro area of only about 80,000, half of whom are Penn State students and gone in the summer, its buses are frequently filled. They're free while on campus, but have a flat fare off campus. Buses go where people want to go, and are frequent enough to make them convenient. They're about 55% subsidized, mostly through Federal funds, but the system works.

Let's hope that more transit systems can start to get it right.