Tag Archives: bus

Frequency Mapping

Last week, Jarrett Walker had a great post illuminating the basic reasons for ‘frequency mapping,’ where a transit agency maps out transit routes that meet some threshold for frequent service (such as buses every 10 minutes, or 15 minutes, etc).

There are many degrees of frequency and span, but in general, most transit agencies’ service can be sorted into three categories of usefulness based on these variables:

  • The Frequent Network runs often enough that you don’t have to plan your trip around a timetable.  That typically means every 15 minutes or better all day, but it needs to be more frequent than that where aiming to serve relatively short trips — as in the case of downtown shuttles for example.  If you aren’t willing to plan your life around a bus schedule, you are interested only in the Frequent Network.
  • Infrequent All-day services are the rest of the service that runs all day.  This network often relies on timed connections.
  • Peak-only service exists only during the peak period.  It mostly takes the form of long commuter-express routes that add lots of complexity to a system map but represent very specialized services for limited markets.

These three categories are useful in such completely different ways that I would argue they are at least as fundamental as the three basic categories of urban road — freeway, arterial, and local — that virtually all street maps clearly distinguish.

We have some great examples of this in DC.  The entirety of the Circulator network is, in essence, a Frequent Network.  The Circulator aims for 10 minute headways, the routes are fairly simple and easy to understand, and thus people can look at the map and understand where the bus is and where it’s going.

WMATA’s bus map for DC, however, doesn’t make this distinction.  While there is a extra color designation for Metro Extra service (meeting the Frequent Network threshold), the other color distinctions merely show which jurisdiction the bus route operates in.

DC Bus Map WMATA crop

The distinction between which services operate only in DC (in red) and those which cross into Maryland (green) isn’t really important for a rider.  Furthermore, the overwhelming use of red for the DC routes makes it hard to follow those routes across the map, seeing where they turn and what streets they travel down.

DC Bus Map WMATA legend

Blue services with dashed lines, however, is indicative of MetroExtra (for some reason, a separate brand from Metro Express), and at least makes a effort at differentiation based on frequency – but that tends to get lost in the visual complexity of the overall map.

There’s a common phenomenon of ‘rail bias,’ (hat tip to The Overhead Wire) where riders will opt for riding a train rather than a bus.  However, rail systems tend to have several key attributes that make them more attractive – the investment in the infrastructure both enables and requires a high frequency of service, and the route structure is almost always simple enough to convey in an easily-understood diagram or map.

The lesson from Jarrett’s post is that simple mapping based on frequency can help address some of the perceived shortcomings of buses.  Even without addressing route structure, this is a relatively simple improvement in communication that helps riders a great deal.

Weekend Reading – Hauling Freight

Amtrak-UP

Amtrak and Union Pacific trains pass each other. Photo by SP8254.

While American passenger rail often leaves much to be desired, our freight rail network is second to none.  This privately owned and operated network often finds itself at odds with desires for increased passenger service and high speed operations.

Hauling the Freight: Freight rail companies have been reluctant to embrace the recent enthusiasm for high speed rail.  In a recent article from the Economist, railroads expressed all sorts of concerns, from technical considerations for offering mixed-speed service along shared passenger and freight lines to a complete re-regulation of the industry, which was de-regulated in 1980.  One such pending requirement will be use of Positive Train Control (PTC) on all routes where freight and passenger trains share the same tracks.

Freight railroads fear a return to the bad old days.  From the Economist article:

Federal and state grants will flow to the freight railroads to help them upgrade their lines for more and faster passenger trains. But already rows are breaking out over the strict guidelines the [Federal Railroad Administration] will lay down about operations on the upgraded lines, such as guarantees of on-time performance with draconian penalties if they are breached and the payment of indemnities for accidents involving passenger trains. The railroads are also concerned that the federal government will be the final arbiter of how new capacity created with the federal funds will be allocated between passenger and freight traffic. And they are annoyed that there was little consultation before these rules were published.

There have been some heated meetings between freight-railroad managers and FRA officials. Henry Posner III, chairman of Iowa Interstate Railroad, ruefully notes that freight railroads, in the form of passengers and regulation, “are getting back things that caused trouble”.

Prior to de-regulation, American railroads had obligations to offer money-losing passenger services, dealt with heavy taxation, and paid for their own infrastructure in the face of heavy subsidized interstate highways undercutting their core markets.   Mark Reutter documented these challenges back in an excellent 1994 Wilson Quarterly article entitled “The Lost Promise of the American Railroad.”  One core issue is defining the best balance between public and private interests.  America’s railroads are private enterprises, and back in the day where they dominated all travel and enjoyed de facto monopolies on various markets, they were regulated accordingly.  As transportation infrastructure financing shifted towards public funding (such as the interstate highway system), the regulatory structure did not evolve to meet the new realities.

The current debate is essentially one of re-defining the proper roles for each of the partners in this mother of all public-private partnerships.  Yonah Freemark at the Transport Politic suggests that the Economist’s take isn’t as dire as the railroads might make it seem:

If the public is committed to the funding of improved tracks along privately owned freight corridors, it has the right to demand that those companies allow passenger trains to run along them. From that perspective, the freight companies have little room to complain.

But the federal government does have a long-term interest in promoting investments that offer improvements in both freight and passenger offerings. Freight lines that run through the center of cities should be moved to new routes that detour, allowing passenger services to take over these access corridors much more essential for people than for cargo. Lines running both passenger and freight trains should be expanded to three or more tracks to allow multiple running speeds in both directions. Projects could theoretically be sponsored by public-private partnership, using both government and freight company funds directed to investments that benefit both.

These changing roles are not without tension.  The California High Speed Rail project has run into problems in their negotiations with the Union Pacific Railroad.  Likewise, DC has been involved – CSX’s rebuilding of the Virginia Avenue Tunnel to a double track, double stack standard is a direct example, and the impacts on passenger rail in the region are unclear.  CSX is poised to see a huge jump in traffic with the opening of new, larger locks at the Panama Canal.  MARC has big plans for future expansion and Amtrak has an eye on electrification to Richmond – how these projects will all fit together is unclear, indicative of the larger dialogue and coordination that needs to happen regarding freight and passenger rail.

Coordination needs to encompass technical questions (standards for train control? shared track? dedicated track? electrification?) as well as financial ones (who will pay for these infrastructure upgrades? what kind of control will come with public dollars?).

Get on the Bus: Aaron Renn writes about bus service improvements over at The Urbanophile, building off of this New York Magazine piece on New York’s new select bus service.  The article outlines many relatively cheap and easy to implement programs that can vastly improve the bus experience – fare pre-payment, limited stops, exclusive lanes, multi-door boarding, etc.  Renn writes:

[C]learly there is enormous opportunity in the US to start transforming the transportation infrastructure of our cities with high quality bus service in a way that is faster, cheaper, and much more pervasive than we’d ever be able to achieve with rail.

In the piece, Jarrett Walker highlights Jay Walder’s quote on taking bus lanes seriously.  He also notes, however, that such seriousness is not without compromises.  Others, such as Cap’n Transit have noted that while these bus improvements are tremendous, we should be careful to not oversell them, as many often do with terms such as a ‘surface subway.’

Cross-posted at Greater Greater Washington