First Impressions...

Yesterday I had my first opportunity to ride both MAX and Front Runner (besides opening day).

Having rode the Front Runner cars in Los Angeles and Miami, I had a pretty good idea of how nice the Bombardier cars will ride and I was not disappointed. The cars are very smooth and benefit by the fact that the tracks are exclusive to Front Runner so heavy freight trains will not cause the trains to ride rough (except for the expansion north of Ogden).

My original plan was to ride the 45 to TRAX and then catch the 35M. However, I walked over to 1300 East and decided to walk over to Van Winkle instead of walking north to Murray-Holladay road because I did not feel like walking that far (totally ignoring the 213 which was closer but of no use). At this point I decided I would not ride the 35M at all and ride Front Runner up to Ogden and do photography all day.

I caught the 307 at about 6:30am and took it to State and 200 South. The bus was one of the new 2007 Gillig Advantage BRT buses but the good news it had no wrapped (in fact I only rode one bus with a wrap yesterday!!). Most new low floor buses and especially most of the newest buses UTA has bought lately seem to rattle really bad but this one was so bad. The biggest rattle came from the farebox.

Next I took the 500 over to the Central Station to catch Front Runner. I had 4 minutes from the time the 500 arrived to my train was scheduled to depart and I had to buy a ticket. I walked over to the ticket machine closet to the bus area and it was dead. So then I rapidly walked over to the far side of the platform and bought my ticket and jumped on the train.

The train left right on time at 7:25am. Being a reverse commute train, there was not a lot of passengers on board but the southbound trains looked packed. I was able to snag one of the sets of seats with a table so I sat up and did some writing as I enjoyed my ride. We stayed on time for most of the trip except when we had to meet a southbound train at the passing siding around Centerville. Despite leaving Farmington about 5 minutes late we still pulled into Ogden on time.

I then walked over to Union Station and did some photography and then walked to Washington and 25th and caught a 612 up to the Ogden Sign by the Ogden River on Washington Blvd. I then walked back to 25th and Washington taking pictures along the way before catching a 603 out to the McKay Hospital.

It was about 11:00AM at this point and I was hoping to find someplace to eat but nothing was standing out to me. The only thing within walking distance was Taco Bell but I stopped drinking soda seven weeks ago and that is all they offer for drinks so that was no go. I decided to catch the 625 which took me over to the Ogden Regional Medical Center. I walked down took some pictures of the toll booth then walked back and took the 612 back to Washington and 25th. I did see a couple of Chinese places that look good along the way but by the time I noticed them were already were passed them and I didn't feel like walking at that point.

From 25th and Washington I walked back to Union Station, took some more pictures, purchased a water from a machine at the transit station and caught the 1:08pm train back to Central Station. This train was packed and we did have a UTA Police Officer check for tickets on this trip. We arrived on time back into Salt Lake and that ended part I of my day.

I will continue this story next time...

Related articles by Zemanta

• EU plans "open" rail network to help cut freight emissions

Fast Buses get more stops...

2007 Gillig Advantage BRT bus on Utah Transit Authority Route 313
Originally uploaded by jmdspk

While going through the changes that will take place to bus service on April 26th, I noticed that UTA is quietly adding bus stops to many of the fast buses that were started in August.

When these bus routes first started, I pointed out that the negligibly increase in speed would not make up for the loss of potential riders due to fewer bus stops. For example my wife works at 3500 East and Bengal Blvd just around the corner from Smith’s. The old 32 bus used to provide direct service from our home to her work. The few times I took her to work I noticed that there was passenger standing at every bus stop along Bengal Blvd to catch the 32. How many of these people still took the bus when faced with a much longer walk just so the bus could be a few minutes faster?

What it comes down to is that the market potential for the slightly faster service does not equal the market penetration of the additional stops. This brings into question how well the 3500 South BRT line will do considering it is replacing the 35, not supplementing it.

UTA is not the only one to fallen into this trap. Amtrak the company that never learns from its history keeps making this mistake. On the northeast corridor between Washington DC and New York it has tried a non-stop or one stop express train several times in order to save a few minutes between the two points. However, every time they try it the train is discontinued in about a year because the time savings (most recently 10 minutes) does not justify the loss of riders from making fewer stops.

Metro in Los Angeles made the same mistake with the Gold Light Rail line. It created an express service but once again the time savings was not enough to justify not stopping. The train loadings become very uneven and this express service quietly died in the latest changes at Metro.

So how does this compare to Europe and Japan who are building a bunch of high speed rail lines or New York City that offers express subway trains?

Do you really think that France and the rest of Europe plus Japan just decide to build a high speed line for the fun of it, or because it would be cool? When they decide on which lines to build a high speed line they look at rail routes that are at capacity already. For example the first TGV route in France was between Paris and Lyon. This route was running over capacity so something had to be done so they built a new rail route. In addition, the TGV did not replace the regular trains between Paris and Lyon, it supplemented them.

In New York the situation is the same. The express subway service supplements the existing local subways that are already at capacity.

So when should fewer stop service be implemented?

Only to supplement existing service when that service is at capacity or you create a line were the time savings will create new marketing dynamics.

Danger with the Bus Riders Union

I have mentioned it before but after the complaint session this past week about the service cuts and the calls for a bus riders union, I think it's time for me to go over again the problems I have with it and the problems it can cause especially since I saw some of the rhetoric coming out at the protest.

The biggest thing I see happing is a direct attack on the rail programs. By demonizing the rail programs they create an us versus them attitude which will only lead to failure on both sides. First and foremost the voters want rail and have voted for it twice. Rail construction is not taking away from bus service.

In fact by making blatant attacks on TRAX and FrontRunner they are actually doing more harm than good. If you look at what financial numbers the UTA presents (which are not that great but they are all we have to work with), there are some things that are clear:
1. That revenues have gone up over the last 10 years.
2. That revenues went up substantially when both TRAX lines opened
3. That bus ridership has gone down over the last 10 years (and it started before TRAX).
4. That TRAX gets 14 million riders per year and the bus system gets only 21 million
TOTAL and that includes they entire system.

So what the numbers say is that the two TRAX lines are carrying 2/3rds as many riders as the entire bus system.

What this says is the problem is not TRAX but the bus system and how UTA is running it. Also you have to look at our cities as a whole and why they are not attracting bus riders.

Instead of looking at TRAX as the big evil one take a look at some issues that UTA has:
1. Poor equipment utilization: Ski Buses and Fast Buses are an example.
2. Almost no bus shelters in the system: Considering are weather extremes shelters are needed. Denver is doing a much better job providing shelters. Blame UTA and the cities.
3. UTA is falling into the same transit mentality planning which says duplication is bad (only in the way UTA does it: 307 and 320 on top of each other, the old 11 and 7 on top of each other, the list goes on).
4. UTA by trying to avoid duplication actually worsens it's market penetration possibilities and decreases ridership potential.
5. The UTA has gone to a grid systems. Grid systems have proven they only work if bus service is more frequent than every 20-minutes. While that is good for their new frequent routes, all the other routes are hurting because of the grid design.
6. Where UTA has made people transfer, like on Redwood, State, crosstown routes at TRAX, they did not create time transfers. In fact in some cases the if you are traveling westbound and need to transfer to a route beyond TRAX, the bus you needs leaves 2 minutes before you get there. UTA needs to work on timed transfers.
7. The way the buses like 4500 South/4700 South, 3900 South/4100 South were cut at TRAX also shows that UTA doesn't understand marketing dynamics. Life doesn't end at the TRAX stations it is only a stopping point.

UTA has problems but attacking the rail program is not the solution but attacking the direct issues with the bus system is.