The wacky anti-bus campaign

I'm really starting to get sick of this shit.

Look, transit is good, right? The easier and cheaper it is to get to Boston or DC by bus or train, the less likely people are to rent or own cars. And buses are good; what I've been complaining about recently isn't buses, but people telling me that we should only have buses and not trains.

Private transit is a very good sign. If you follow transit advocates from the hinterlands like Sheryl Gross-Glaser or Helen Bushnell, they have a hard enough time trying to convince governments to provide transit to their citizens as a public service, as opposed to some charity for the desperately poor and disabled. The idea that it might ever be a profitable business is completely off their radar. But here in New York City we have so many people who want to ride buses that private operators are flooding in. Isn't that great?

Well, some people look at this and all they see are problems. In September 2008 it was Councilmember Alan Gerson and Manhattan Community Board 3. In October 2008 it was CHEKPEDS and Assemblymember Dick Gottfried. In May 2009 it was Gerson again, Borough President Scott Stringer and CB1, and again I proposed a solution. In April 2011 it was Gerson's successor Margaret Chin, State Senator Daniel Squadron, Assembly Speaker Shelly Silver and Assemblymember Dan Garodnick, and a raft of studies.

Now Silver, Squadron and Chin have gotten together with Commissioner Sadik-Khan and agreed on a bill to allow the city to regulate the buses. Fortunately they don't have a Republican sponsor in the Senate, which means that they probably won't pass a bill this year.

Okay, remind me why we need a bill? Well... everyone just ...kinda wants one. The complaints are actually pretty incoherent. Let's take a look.

1. The buses often idle. "Some neighbors believe" they can make residents' asthma worse (Gotham Gazette).
2. The buses make it "difficult to maintain a steady flow of ... pedestrian traffic" (Gotham Gazette).
3. "and automobile traffic" (Gotham Gazette)
4. and "to regulate trash and parking" (Gotham Gazette).
5. Competition also creates "the possibility of accidents and even violence" (Gotham Gazette).
6. Parked buses "could tie up deliveries, and other businesses in the area will be affected as well" (Tribeca Trib).
7. "Noise" is a problem, according to Council Speaker Quinn. (Greg Mocker).
8. The buses park in local bus stops. (Tri-State).
9. "People's homes and businesses are being blocked by buses, commercial areas, residential areas," says Senator Squadron. Whatever that means (Metro).

Many of these things are already against the law. We have laws against littering, idling, double-parking, and parking in bus stops. Do we really need a permit system to enforce them? Others are just vague and bizarre, like the city should create a pre-crime unit to arrest people before they commit violence. But the biggest complaint people seem to have, according to last year's press release, is that they're messy. Squadron's favorite phrase is that Chinatown is "like the wild west." It's "chaos," Chinatown is being "overrun" with "no clear rules." The proposal would "create a clearer system" that would allow the bus companies to operate "in harmony with the local community."

That part also makes no sense. To me, everything about Chinatown is chaotic and overrun, with no clear rules. Sometimes I really like that. Are they going to make laws against durian, fish and those little beckoning cat sculptures too?

The remaining concerns speak to a deeper issue: the allocation of street space. As with much of what goes on in New York, that's the real issue; the rest is just smoke. But it'll have to wait for another post.

The Lurch

Last week I asked bus advocates to answer these questions: "Is there a bus you love? What is it, and why? How often do you take it? Would you complain if someone replaced it with a train that was at least as fast?"

One of the reasons I asked is that bus advocates so often come off as scolds, telling us that in this new economy we're going to have to make do with less, so we should all get used to buses. Then they try to tell us that buses are really just as good as trains. Yeah, right.

My daily commute involves two subway trains and a local bus. I also take express buses on a regular basis, and I'm a pretty frequent passenger on commuter trains and Amtrak. I'm intimately familiar with rail and buses, and all other things being equal I'd take a train over a bus any time.

Jarrett Walker has often cautioned us against using coincidental characteristics to judge buses and trains, and assuming they're universal intrinsic characteristics. For example, most buses operate in mixed traffic, and most trains operate in dedicated rights-of-way. Those trains, all else being equal, deliver more value than those buses, but a train operating in mixed traffic (often called a streetcar) delivers less value than a bus in a dedicated right-of-way (often called bus rapid transit), all else being equal.

I want to talk about a characteristic that I've observed in every bus trip I've taken but relatively few train trips. I believe bus professionals call it "ride quality," but I'll call it the Lurch, and I think anyone who's ridden a bus for any length of time knows what I'm talking about. Buses almost always have to change lanes. Unless there's a bus bulb, or they run in a curbside lane, local city buses have to do it at every stop. They also do it if they have to overtake another vehicle, or when preparing for a left turn across traffic.

This is a big deal for me and many others, including Adron Hall. I can get violent motion sickness, especially if I'm reading or writing or doing anything with any kind of computer. I get it in cars if someone else is driving, especially if I'm sitting in the back seat. I get it on buses and planes, but never on trains - with the single exception of the Acela Express. I get it most often on winding country roads, but I still get it on city streets, especially if the bus has to make a lot of turns.

I haven't taken any of the prototypical "BRT" systems in Curitiba, Bogota or Guangzhou, but all the pictures I've seen have space at some stations for the buses to pass each other, and that would cause a Lurch. Select Buses here in New York certainly do the Lurch. On the other hand, the rubber-tired subways of Paris and Montreal don't.

The only time you get a really strong lurch on a train is when the train changes tracks. One such switch that I know well are the one just east of the Times Square station on the #7 line, where trains can enter or leave either of the two terminal tracks. The other is just west of 75th Avenue on the Queens Boulevard, where F trains switch from the express track to the local track and back.

These switches can cause the train to lurch, but they're not Lurches. One big difference is that they're very predictable. I know almost exactly when the train will go over the switch before Times Square, and if I feel it I know that I need to stand by the doors on the right side of the train if I want to get out first. The train operators also know well in advance, and they usually slow down. Just when I was writing the last paragraph, in fact, I went over the switch at 75th Avenue and we didn't even lurch a little.

The big difference, I think, between a little lurch and a bus Lurch is predictability. Every train has a set of movements, but you can be confident that unless there is some extreme event (short stop, derailment, giant scorpion sting), those movements will not exceed a certain range. With buses, the range of possible movements is much bigger.

I mentioned this to Jarrett once, and he asked if it helped to have a low-floor bus. After a couple years' experience, I have to conclude that it doesn't. The movements may feel a bit different, but they're not significantly better. He has acknowledged this on his blog: "Ride quality in buses is improving, and guided busways may give buses an even more rail-like feel, but new rail systems will probably always have an advantage with their smoother running surface. Is the smooth ride of rail indispensible to a useful network? This can be a tough question whose answer may vary from one community to another."

Having lived in cities with all-bus networks, I definitely wouldn't say that the smooth ride of rail is indispensable, but it makes a big difference. As I said at the top, all other things being equal I'd choose a train over a bus any time, for that reason. And whenever a bus advocate tries to tell me that buses are just as good as trains only cheaper, I wonder: when was the last time that they felt the Lurch?

What I would pay for a comfortable ride

Three years ago I wrote a series about comfort, class and transportation. I observed that when it comes to transit, many segments of the population are too old for this shit. Some people are poor enough that they can't afford anything better and have to put up with the subway all the time. Some people take local buses, some take express buses or commuter trains, and some take taxis. Some people buy cars.

I don't want to buy a car. After seeing someone killed by a car, I simply don't want to be the person who kills someone else through a momentary brain fog. That option is closed for me.

I've tried local buses. Here in Queens they're not like local buses in Manhattan. They rarely parallel a subway line, so wherever I go they serve people without any other option. That means they're usually full of people, and at least some of those people don't know how to use cell phones or earphones.

I'd take this minus the seat belts. Photo: NHTSA.

I'd love to take commuter rail or an express bus, and I'd be willing to pay the full $5.50 or $6.25. Unfortunately, the commuter trains from here only go to Penn Station, and I almost never need to go to anything near Penn Station. There are no express buses that stop anywhere in Sunnyside or Woodside - anywhere west of the BQE in fact.

That leaves taxis or car services. But those are just a little too expensive. It's almost always at least $10 including tip to go anywhere in Queens, and usually more. Manhattan is $20 or more. I can afford to pay up to $7 each way, but $20 is not worth it.

I'm not faulting the car services. We're talking one guy who is devoting all his attention (well, maybe 90% of his attention if he's on the phone) to taking me to work. He deserves the money. But I don't really want one guy to be driving just me around. I'd be happy in a bus or a van, with one guy or woman driving six or ten or twenty of us around.

With these choices, you can see why some people buy cars. The best way to get them to stop buying cars is to offer a ride to Manhattan at a higher price point - $5.50, perhaps - and see if enough people will take it. There is a real demand for service that is a cut above the subway. That need is being felt even more urgently today, since I threw my back out last weekend. It would help, of course, if the buses had a lane of their own so that they can be even close to time-competitive with the subway. But I would leave earlier, and pay up to $7.50, for a ride that would guarantee these things:

1. A full-size seat in rush hours
2. A seat with elbow room on off-hours
3. Reasonably clean vehicles and stations
4. Not to have to listen to someone else's music, cell phone conversation, video or video game
5. Not to be asked to accept Jesus
6. Not to be asked to buy peanut M&Ms
7. Not to worry about amateur acrobats making their one big mistake when they're above my head
8. Corridors, stairways and escalators that are not so overburdened that I have to constantly fight left-huggers

I have to say that I myself am bothered by the idea of a more expensive class of transit. I still remember the disgust and disapproval I felt for the first-class cars on the Paris metro and commuter trains. Why would I want to replicate that?

I have to keep reminding myself that there is a class system in transportation, and there always has been. Transit cannot create a classless society by itself.

Games people play behind the wheel

In transportation there is almost always conflict, or at least the potential for conflict. Even on the most deserted road there are times when one person will want to go faster than the person in front. We have systems for resolving these conflicts: traffic laws, traffic cops, traffic signals.

But these systems are never followed 100% of the time. There are people who feel that the laws are wrong, or that the laws don't apply to them, or that the laws don't apply in a particular case, or that a particular law applies in a case when it actually doesn't. Enforcement is never 100%, and in many cities is far less.

When people aren't following the laws, they resolve conflicts with games of power and cunning. Sometimes one person will defer to another, giving up the transportation advantage for moral rewards. Sometimes a faster or more agile driver will slip into a place in line or a parking space and simply block the other vehicle from getting it.

Many times the conflict is played out in contests of weight and nerve in addition to speed and morals. In games of tailgating and chicken, a more brazen driver, often with a larger vehicle, will charge at another vehicle. The driver gives no hint that he or she is prepared to stop, leaving the impression that a collision will result if the other vehicle doesn't get out of the way. Honking the horn can be used for added intimidation.

When a challenge of chicken or tailgating is issued, the other driver may yield immediately, moving out of the way. The driver also has the option of ignoring the challenge and continuing on their path at the same speed. They may also answer the challenge, honking their horn in return and either speeding up for chicken or slamming on the brakes for tailgating.

If the second driver does not back down, the first driver faces the same choice: back down, continue or escalate. this continues until one party backs down or a crash ensues.

In such a system, pedestrians and cyclists have several disadvantages. In space-grabbing games, we take up only a small fraction of the space that a car or truck can occupy. In tailgating games, we usually go slower than motor vehicles. But it's in games of chicken that we have the worst disadvantages.

We don't usually have loud horns. I've fantasized about buying a portable air horn, but I think without backing it up with a large vehicle I'd be asking for trouble. We don't have speed, but most importantly we don't have mass and we don't have armor. If we lose a game of chicken with a car or truck, we usually pay with our lives.

The scariest thing, and a significant factor in cyclist and pedestrian injuries and deaths, is that many drivers play chicken with us anyway. They aim heavy vehicles at us at high speeds, as though we were protected by two-ton cars. Some of them are psychopaths who are well aware of our greater vulnerability, but after some uncomfortably close observation I'm convinced that the majority are simply acting out of habit and treating us like cars.

If you treat pedestrians and cyclists as cars, you wind up thinking that it's okay to charge at us. The worst you're likely to do is dent my fender, right? Of course the reality is that you can do much, much worse, as people do every day. For those of us who are still in touch with reality it has a chilling effect, which is why you see so few pedestrians and cyclists on stroads.

Us and you and how much you should love your buses

"Don't you think I've heard the talk? Nobody's going to tell me who to love." - Freedy Johnston

When Will Doig told us, "It's time to love the bus" last month, he was repeating a mantra that I've heard over and over from other proponents. Kate Slevin, Joan Byron, Aaron Naparstek, Walter Hook - the message is always the same: buses are just as good as trains but cheaper, we can't afford trains, so you should love the bus.

Photo: Ben Fried / Streetsblog

You know what I've never heard any of them say? "I love the bus." They may get excited about a snazzy bus system in some faraway country where they'll never live, but not about buses that are here and now. They never say, "If we had this kind of bus, it would make my commute so much easier." It's never about them, it's about you.

Contrast this with a train advocate like Ben Kabak or Alon Levy, or a bicycle advocate like Doug Gordon or Clarence Eckerson. When they talk about trains or bikes, it may be about you, but it's also about them. You get the feeling that Ben would take an apartment off Second Avenue when the subway opens, and that Doug cares about bike lanes in Brooklyn because he can imagine himself riding on any of them.

I don't know how Doig or Slevin or Byron or Hook get around. In New York I'm guessing it's not by bus, or else they'd be late to every meeting. I know that Aaron likes to ride bikes: I've seen his Dutch cargo bike in person and in photos.

To be fair, journalists, advocates and consultants aren't supposed to be thinking about themselves all the time. But you'd think they'd be able to find one person who loves buses, and prefers them to subways, for themself. If they can't, how can they ask us to do it?

To anyone I called out here, or to anyone who advocates buses instead of trains, you're welcome to prove me wrong. Is there a bus you love? What is it, and why? How often do you take it? Would you complain if someone replaced it with a train that was at least as fast?

Fearmongering

I was really annoyed by Elizabeth Rosenthal's article in the Sunday Times, which led with this sentence: "In a quarter-century, at the rate Nigeria is growing, 300 million people — a population about as big as that of the present-day United States — will live in a country roughly the size of Arizona, New Mexico and Nevada." OMG! Can you imagine! I have visions of everyone from New York City crowded into Area 51, the population of Los Angeles stuffed into the Gila Wilderness, and the residents of New Jersey overflowing the Grand Canyon.

Nigeria's land area is 351,649 square miles. The current population is 162,471,000 for a density of 462 per square mile. If the country hits the 300,000,000 people total that Rosenthal suggests, it would have 853 people per square mile. That's a big jump, but today there are 39 countries that are denser than that. Okay, some of them are urban microstates like Macao and Monaco, or poor countries like Bangladesh and the Philippines, but there are other quite respectable First World countries where people lead a decent lifestyle and even have quiet places to go outdoors. How upset would we be if Nigeria turned into South Korea, Israel or Belgium?

To her credit, Rosenthal does acknowledge that birthrates and even populations have been declining in many countries around the world, and that the birthrate is even declining in Nigeria itself, but that seems only a small obstacle on her rush to sound the alarm. She makes no mention of the fact that there are tens of millions of people living comfortably in denser countries, and in denser areas of low-density countries like the United States and Canada.

There's even a correction to Rosenthal's article, stating that she originally said that Nigeria was only the size of New Mexico and Arizona. The fact that she chose two (and later three) of the emptiest states in the country is telling. In fairness, the biggest states are the emptiest, and to find some that add up to 352,000 square miles with higher density would require more than the magic two or three. But choosing Arizona and New Mexico creates an unnecessary contrast that can distort the emotional impact.

The bottom line is that population density isn't always bad. Whether it's good, bad or indifferent depends on how much of the land's resources are being used up. For Nigeria, Rosenthal doesn't give us much detail.

Fearmongering may seem like a good idea at the time, but it can easily backfire and put an entire campaign in jeopardy. It's dishonest, and it's too much trouble.

Calming big boulevards

You know that big ugly boulevard near you? Maybe when it was built it was the Champs-Elysées of your town. Maybe it wanted to be, but things didn't turn out quite right. Or maybe your town planners had a less ambitious model, like the Miracle Mile or Route 66.

Whatever the ambitions, today that boulevard is a stroad. It's one of the most dangerous places to drive or walk, but people keep going there anyway, because that's where the Target and the Old Navy and the Barnes and Noble are. Even though it's one of the most popular shopping streets, it brings in a relatively small fraction of the tax revenue.

There are a number of remedies that can be taken for a stroad boulevard (boulevaroad?). I want to focus on one particular remedy that combines traffic calming and transit expansion; we can call it green tracks.

The poster child for this method is Paris, in particular the Boulevards des Maréchaux. This is a ring of boulevards that runs just inside the city limits. They replaced the "rue Militaire" that ran along the inner extent of the fortifications built between 1841 and 1844 under Prime Minister Adolphe Thiers and torn down between 1919 and 1929 after they proved unable to stop heavy artillery in the Franco-Prussian War. The road is divided into 22 segments, each named (more or less) after one of the military leaders who bore the rank of marshal under Napoleon.

Paris's Boulevard Ney. Photo: Minato Ku

I've visited a few of the Maréchaux many years ago, and they were all pretty unpleasant places to walk. Definitely not what comes to mind when you think of a stroll through Paris. Even though they had trees, cafes and fairly wide sidewalks, they were noisy and felt dangerous. The 4-5 lanes of unbroken traffic and the long gaps between crosswalks made the boulevards feel like a barrier; I rarely crossed them, and usually took parallel streets when walking home from the metro. I never took the mixed-traffic "PC" bus, after trying once or twice and finding it slow and infrequent.

At its core, the design of the Maréchaux privileged cars at the expense of pedestrians and transit riders. The city of Paris found an excellent way to adjust that balance in favor of the more sustainable users. They built a trolley.

Here in the United States, we have basically two ways of building a trolley. We can build "light rail" which operates primarily in an old rail right-of-way or highway median with some mixed-traffic or dedicated segments, or we can build a "streetcar," which operates entirely in mixed traffic. Jarrett Walker in particular is fond of slamming streetcars for offering no mobility improvements over buses. Both, notably, minimize the amount of street space reallocated from cars.

Boulevard Victor with green tracks trolley. Photo: Minato Ku

The Tramway T3 takes a third approach. Its entire route, except for intersections, is physically separated from all other vehicles. This helps trolley passengers get to their destinations faster, because they are much less likely to get stuck in traffic. To underscore this point, and to simply look nice, the right-of-way between and around the tracks is covered with sod. This evokes the grassy medians where trolleys have traveled in other cities - for me particularly, the "neutral grounds" of New Orleans.

The Saint Charles Streetcar in New Orleans. Photo: Infrogmaton / Wikipedia.

The right-of-way of this new Paris trolley was not previously a train line, or private property. It was street. Two lanes of these boulevards were simply taken from cars and reallocated to transit. The sod has the additional function of marking the right-of-way as "not car space" and thus discouraging any use by cars.

The last time I was in Paris, the T3 was not yet running, but the street space had been reallocated. It made a huge difference. There weren't as many cars, and they were going much slower. The noise was much less oppressive. Crossing the boulevard was easier and felt much safer. There were two sets of pedestrian refuges at each intersection, not just one. But wherever I've seen street-running trolleys, they're always more predictable than cars, and therefore safer. They almost never leave their tracks.