I don't understand.

[tom kelley]

As a Gatewood resident I often drive north on California Av. through the Morgan Junction. Since the Rapid Ride stops have been installed, I often find myself as the first car at the light unable to proceed because the bus is stopped in the middle of the street due to the sidewalk having been extended into the curb lane. Because cars turning north off of west bound Fauntleroy back up behind the bus when the light turns green I have nowhere to go. The same thing happens when the left arrow northbound turns green. It happens often that I sit through a green light with nowhere to go. Was this a well executed idea?

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[JV]

Tom, the bus stop was a solution that created a bigger problem. There WAS a bus lane, but they wanted to give the bus priority so cars don’t slow them down.

“Traffic’s bad? Take the bus.”

“The bus causes a traffic jam at Morgan junction? Take the bus.”

A bad policy creates a worse problem. (see also plastic bag bans…thanks Nanny Government!)

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[kgdlg]

I think the curb bulbs are in general a very good idea, especially on two lane streets, to give buses priority to stop and load people quickly. It seriously cuts a lot of time off a bus commute, and this matters when getting people to ride buses.

That being said, this is a particularly bad location for this concept. I know it well, and I know the situation described above well. Planners should have considered the stoplight and the actual impact it would have on movement of traffic in and out of the intersection. In addition to the normal back-up here, the round building next to this stop is an SHA building with many disabled folks who require special boarding on the bus. This will double the back-ups since this loading takes twice as long if not more.

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[waterworld]

Here is an excerpt from an article posted by Mike O’Brien on the Seattle Transit Blog last November, explaining the benefits (to transit riders) of curb bulbs and some of the other features of the RapidRide lines. O’Brien is specifically talking about a north-end route, but the RapidRide line in West Seattle will incorporate many of these same features. Metro claims the overall reduction in commute time on these lines is or will be 20%.

Bus Bulbs: Bus bulbs are a brilliant low cost/high return investment. There are 35 locations identified in the Transit Master Plan (TMP) where bus bulbs would be installed along Route 5. The benefit of bus bulbs is easily illustrated.Anyone who rides the bus is familiar with this experience. When the bus pulls out of traffic to pick up or drop off a passenger, it only takes a few seconds, but often the bus is trapped by passing traffic, forcing the bus to wait up to 30 seconds or more before there is an opening to re-enter the travel lane. This happened on my trip north, but could be a thing of the past if Prop 1 passes. Bus bulbs extend the sidewalk or passenger platform out to the travel lane, allowing buses to quickly drop or pick up passengers while remaining in the travel lane. Then the bus can be on its way without waiting for traffic to clear.

On average, each bus bulb can save up to 8 seconds for a bus. With 18 bulbs in one direction, that’s 2.5 minutes off of each trip, every day, indefinitely into the future. These minutes alone add up to a regular commuter, but they also bring significant savings to the system. Route 5 makes about 75 trips in each direction on a weekday. The minutes saved add up to over 1,600 service hours for this route. Those 1,600 service hours saved can be re-deployed to add more service to the system every single year, without us having to pay for additional service hours year after year.Aside from providing a travel time benefit, when bus bulbs are paired with crosswalks, they serve to narrow the crossing distance of arterials, making it safer for pedestrians.

Transit Signal Priority. The TMP calls out 14 traffic lights to be modified for transit priority in this corridor. Buses are given priority at a light when an approaching bus signals to the traffic light, causing the light to stay green if it is currently green until the bus passes, or switching to green earlier if the light is red. It is estimated that these changes will save up to 10% of wait time at each signal. This means more time saved for bus riders, and more service hours for the system.

Queue Jump Lanes. Four queue jump locations are identified in the TMP for this corridor. These are implemented at busy intersections and allow the bus to clear the intersection ahead of other vehicle traffic. Queue jumps can save up to 25% of travel time at these intersections. While riding the Route 5, at 85th and Greenwood, my bus missed a complete light cycle. A queue jump would have allowed the fifty of us riding the bus to get through that light swiftly and in advance of other vehicle traffic.

The beauty of these investments is that while any single one may make a rather modest savings in time, when combined, they start to add up to a real meaningful travel time savings for each rider. Metro estimated up to a 20% time savings on each corridor upgraded.

I’m not defending the choices of location for the curb bulbs, but one thing may get better when the RapidRide service actually starts up in the fall: with the level-entry design of the buses and the changes in how fares are collected, the buses should spend significantly less time at the stops.

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