Make
way for the BRT
Will
car-crazy Honolulu adjust to a lane-hogging, Bus Rapid Transit system?
Maybe it has to.
Karl Kim
May 29, 2002
Yet some big questions loom about our city’s plans. How will more buses fit into our already crowded roadway system? Who will benefit from these improvements? Why not fixed rail? But most importantly, why should I and so many other Car Talk enthusiasts support a plan that will limit the number of lanes and parking spaces in order to accommodate transit for the masses?
According to the Texas Transportation Institute, congestion annually costs Americans 4.5 billion hours of delay, 6.5 billion gallons of wasted fuel and a whopping $78 billion in lost wages. Add to that the increased air pollution as well as the aggravation associated with being stuck in traffic, and it is easy to understand why "congestion management" has become big business for urban planners. To the simple-minded, cures seem obvious. Build more highways. Add more lanes. Increase vehicle speeds.
But the problem with these solutions is that they are predicated not just on the assumption that driving is the preferred mode of travel, but that we as a society should continue our long-standing tradition of catering to the car.
Tipping the balance
BRT tips the balance in favor of the bus — that lowly, lumbering mode of transport that we have come to loathe. The bus conjures sensory images of smelly diesel fumes and even smellier people pressed up against each other in what could only be described as a really bad way to move around. Who in their right mind would want to take the bus when they could drive? For many, busing is a cruel form of bondage, a painful experience that need only be endured until the bucks, car keys and freedom arrive.
BRT, therefore, involves a serious make-over for the bus. Riding the bus becomes faster, more convenient and hassle-free compared to driving, hunting for parking and fighting traffic. Instead of being on the bottom, travel by bus becomes a better way to go. Buses will receive preferential treatment by creating lanes or bus malls (like on Hotel Street) dedicated exclusively to buses, by allowing them to cruise unimpeded on highway HOV (high-occupancy vehicle) lanes, or by granting buses traffic-signal priority (technology which either extends a green light for buses or enables buses to preempt other vehicles at intersections). Investing in bus stations, shelters, fare collection technologies and traveler information services, the public image of bus transit is enhanced. Through improved vehicle design with low-floors allowing for roll-on, roll-off for persons in wheelchairs or for bikes and strollers, wide doors, curbside precision docking and attractive interior design, the bus-commuting experience becomes more accessible and comfortable. With electric motors, buses can be both quieter and less polluting. Instead of the standard 40-foot bus, the BRT fleet includes a combination of articulated and bi-articulated vehicles which can carry more than 200 passengers. Advance purchase of tickets or passes or electronic "smart cards" hastens the boarding process and the "dwell time" at stops decreases significantly. Through more efficient route planning, stops are minimized and overall travel times decrease. By integrating the development of stations and trunk routes in key travel corridors with supporting land-use policies, we can plan and achieve greater densities within the urban core. More activity and more people surrounding stations and stops ensure not only that there will be a continued source of new riders, but importantly, that there will be all kinds of amenities (Starbucks Coffee shops, newsstands, retail services, etc.) available to the bus patron.
Buses are better
Consider our options in Honolulu: In spite of the claims that there is plenty of room for more roadways, you gotta wonder where we would construct yet another highway. There are some really spooky ideas out there — like building a reef roadway, or a trans-Ko‘olau mountaintop expressway, or simply double-decking all of the H-1. If you think these ideas are really ridiculous consider the sad fact that we did build the H-3. One has to ponder why we built that billion-dollar highway to nowhere instead of a fixed rail system linking ‘Ewa to downtown and East Honolulu. Because of the chronic failure to address the very real transportation needs in the urban core, we desperately need to do something.
BRT is a hybrid solution, capturing the best features of light-rail systems while capitalizing on the lower costs of using buses. There has been a renaissance in light rail. Since 1980, new systems have opened in 12 cities in the United States: Baltimore, Buffalo, Dallas, Denver, Los Angeles, Pittsburgh, Portland, Ore.; Sacramento, San Diego, San Jose, St. Louis and Salt Lake City, as well as in northern New Jersey; several others (Minneapolis and Seattle) are planning new systems.
Typically these systems use an overhead power source and operate both in exclusive and shared right-of-way environments. Light rail has been an impetus to urban re-development as businesses, and mixed-use establishments and housing scurry to re-locate around stations. Many of the systems connect university campuses, shopping centers, amusement parks or other high-volume activity generators with residential areas and downtown centers.
The nagging problem, of course, with light rail is its high costs — it averages about $35 million per mile for construction and routinely higher operating costs (either on a per vehicle revenue mile or per vehicle revenue hour) than bus-based systems.
There is also, obviously, another big problem with rail. Once you put it down, it is difficult and expensive to reroute it. Buses are inherently more flexible. It is much easier to add vehicles or change scheduling and integrate buses into an urban environment than working with LRVs (light-rail vehicles) that need both a guide way and a power source. With light rail, there is generally the added problem of the visual blight and clutter of overhead power lines strung throughout our city. There have been some exciting developments in bus vehicle technologies — new propulsion systems, new fuels, electric and hybrid motors and other enhancements designed to make buses quieter, less polluting and more comfortable. It is also much easier to subcontract the operation of buses to the private sector, allowing both for competition and private-sector participation in transportation services.
The system proposed by Mayor Harris and city transit chief Cheryl Soon consists of two components — a regional, high-speed BRT linking Kapolei to Middle Street and an in-town system for serving Downtown, Kaka‘ako, UH-Mänoa and Waikïkï. The city plans to spend an estimated $234 million on highway improvements (zipper and express lanes, new on/off ramps, transit centers and park and ride lots) for the Regional BRT; $388 million for the In-town BRT (exclusive and semi-exclusive lanes, stops and stations); and $440 million for new buses and Handi-Van vehicles. An additional $181 million in annual operating and maintenance costs also needs to be factored into the cost projections. Before freaking out with sticker shock, consider the fact that 62 percent of the capital costs are expected to be paid for by federal sources, with the remainder being financed principally by debt. The neat thing about this hybridization of transit is that it enables us to utilize both federal transit and highway funds to cover our costs.
Density by design
Whenever you talk transit, especially for the masses, it is really a lead-in for something much larger, more profound than simply accommodating cars easing traffic congestion. It’s an opportunity to reexamine the very fabric of our city, how it comes together and functions, how pedestrians, bicyclists and others move about, and how we enhance the sense of place quality of life, and our sensory experience. In order to improve our physical and social environment and our psychic well-being, we do need real alternatives to driving. In order to unshackle our city from being taken over by the private automobile, we need to invest in mass transit. There are, no doubt, many who would be served by a better bus system: students, low-income commuters, people running simple errands, persons with disabilities — and people who just don’t want to put up with all the accoutrements of driving (insurance, registration, gasoline and repair bills, car loans and speeding tickets). We also need to recognize that as the third-fastest aging state in the nation, with one of the highest life expectancies on the planet, we need to vastly improve transportation services for senior citizens. They, like the other denizens of our bus system, deserve increased mobility and access to safe, clean, reliable transportation. Increased urban density, co-location of housing, retail and service establishments, and improved transit provide, moreover, an antidote to sprawl.
Although BRT is less expensive and less intrusive than a rail system, opponents to the billion-dollar plan have already lined up against it. They fear the loss of driving privileges and the significant decrease in on-street parking and travel lanes for cars. The planned In-town BRT will eat up two lanes of traffic for exclusive bus use (with shared use at intersections for turning). This will affect major arterials such as South King Street, Kapi‘olani, Dillingham, Pensacola, Ke‘eaumoku and University. Of the 12.8 miles within the urban core, 38 percent of the system would run in exclusive transit lanes located in the median strip, while 29 percent of the system would operate along the curb in semi-exclusive lanes. Transit stops in the middle of the street are designed to be 8 feet wide, 160 feet long and approximately 13 inches higher than the street.
These platforms would be accessed by signal-controlled, marked crosswalks in compliance with the Americans With Disabilities Act. Others oppose the city’s efforts because they feel that it hasn’t gone far enough. They contend that buying more buses and adding a few more ramps and express lanes is too little, too late. What’s needed, they say, is a more extensive system of public transit including an automated, elevated rail system. BRT may merely be but a start —– paving the way for other innovations in urban transport.
In spite of its risks and costs and our proclivity to do nothing about our increasing traffic and dependency on the car, BRT represents a bold compromise (another oxymoron), between buses and rail, between new technologies and familiar travel patterns, between what we need and what we can afford, between the traffic engineers and urban planners, and between those who drive and those just along for the ride. n
PHASE I
"A building-block system of components," is how one Honolulu City Council aide described the Harris administration’s Bus Rapid Transit package, which coalesced out of the three-year O‘ahu Trans2K planning process as the transit component of the O‘ahu Regional Transportation Plan. Formulation of all this has involved literally hundreds of community meetings.
"It’s not like fixed rail, where the city would have to build the whole system at once," the aide explained. "With this approach, we can stop it if we decide it’s not working."
The phased-in, piecemeal approach might help explain why so much of the news reporting on BRT has been fitful and unclear, and why public debate about total cost and potential impacts on the city’s traffic-choked streets has been so muffled and uncontentious, if not nonexistent.
Herewith is a condensed guide to the machinations at Honolulu Hale:
Now moving through the City Council are various funding and plan amendments for Phase I of the BRT, the Iwilei-to-Waikïkï route. The project’s Supplemental Draft Environmental Impact Statement completed its public-comment period on May 7. The Department of Transportation Services is currently reviewing and responding to the input before releasing a Final EIS as early as late summer.
Meanwhile, Harris’ budget request of $35 million for the city’s share of the cost of Phase I was never an issue in the Council’s budget negotiations, an indication that the project has substantial Council support. The request will be voted up or down following a public hearing on Wednesday, May 29.
And lastly, Bill 34 would amend Oahu’s Development Plan Public Facilities Map to designate the streets involved in Phase I of the BRT as transit corridors. The joint Transportation/Planning committee unanimously passed the bill out for second reading on May 17. It goes before the full Council for public hearing and a vote, also on May 29. Then the bill goes back to the joint committee and then to the full Council for a final vote on June 26. Assuming the budget request and Bill 34 both pass, the city will be ready to proceed, pending the release of the Final EIS.
"When we began looking at transit alternatives three and a half years ago, we started by asking people what they wanted," said Councilmember Duke Bainum, chair of the Transportation Committee and mayoral candidate. "The answer was very clear, a bus system that is faster, quicker, more reliable — and flexible enough to grow and change with the city."
—Curt Sanburn
For more information about the BRT, visit www.OahuTrans2K.com.
