CTA Tattler

Is the 2.5 MPG what the manufacturer says the buses get or is that the actual CTA average?
Anyone who rides the bus knows that there a a lot of drivers that deliberately drive slow either because they're ahead of schedule or some who are just jerks.
I been on many buses where the driver keeps the speed just below the upshift point, which definitely kills the MPG!
And I'm not writing about a bus in heavy, stop & go traffic.
So what will the actual CTA MPG be of these new buses?
Certainly a lot lower than the pie-in-the-sky figure from the manufacturer.

Even a 1 mpg increase in a huge fleet of buses has an impact. City buses are the perfect application for a diesel/electric hybrid. Hybrids thrive in stop and go traffic and that's a buses life!

Once AGAIN, Huberman shows he is awesome. I love this guy!

Hey, that's awesome! New busses -- we need them, and they'll be such a nice improvement over the most broken old ones. I wonder what routes these will get used on? Plus, it'd be great to have a bus that didn't pull away from the bus stop with a cloud of choking, filthy diesel exhaust behind, especially on those muggy summer days. (Even if the change was MPG-neutral, I'd be pro-hybrid if it meant less of that nasty, nasty exhaust.)

I wonder what the long-term funding implications are for CTA to lease a bus fleet. I'm suspicious of leasing for personal cars (it's like financing your car, only you don't own it in the end! Whee!), but if it means CTA doesn't get tied to a bundle of expensive rolling stock they have no choice but to maintain and keep in order, maybe it's a good move, especially if the lease is relatively flexible in terms of being able to extend it if the busses work out. I'd be curious to know more about that.

Sabrina -
It looks like they will own the buses at the end of the lease. The first paragraph of the CTA's news release says,
"The terms of the agreement allow CTA to lease the buses for 12 years and retain ownership at the conclusion of the lease."

Assuming these new superbuses are put on LSD express routes as most articulated buses seem to be, I especially hope they'll occasionally wander over to the left. Express drivers' unwillingness to get out of the rightmost lane is mindboggling.

Bob, I'll go you one better- where are the bus-only lanes on LSD or the larger main arterial streets? I'm amazed how car-oriented Chicago still is- practically every other major city at least has HOV lanes, when are we gonna catch up?

"Express drivers' unwillingness to get out of the rightmost lane is mindboggling."

I'm guessing you've never sat in the driver's seat of a large vehicle.

There are huge blind spots on the right side of any large vehicle, but a transit bus is somewhat worse than most because the mirror have to take into account that the front corner of the bus is going to be heading into bus stops far more often than the driver is going to need to make a lane change to the right in heavy traffic.

Every time a driver moves out of the right lane, s/he is putting their job on the line that they'll be able to get back again safely. The incentive to race to the other end is a slightly longer break at the terminal. The incentive to not get in an accident is to avoid unemployment.

I'm actually surprised that so many drivers choose to get out of the right lane! It's a gutsy move with a lot of added risk. And if they clip someone getting back in the right lane, those 30 seconds they saved me on the trip will be eaten-up by the 30 minutes we have to sit at the accident scene.

Many practical experiments have been done in heavy traffic to see if lane jumpers actually save any time over people who pick a lane, and stick to it. The results always show very minor, surprisingly small savings of time by the lane jumpers. Compare that to the risks they take each time they change lanes, and their actions don't make much sense. Do that with a large vehicle, and it's downright scary.

Rusty summarized some of the potential dangers of lane switching at high speeds.

Additionally, in moderate or heavy traffic, there's always the risk that the bus -- needing a much bigger opening to switch lanes -- might not be able to shift back to the right lane in time to exit. The consequences -- missing the exit or coming to a halt on LSD -- would each present a host of inconveniences or even some danger.

But quack is right - for the "greenest" city in the universe to not have so much as an HOV lane is kind of sad. Given that LSD and Michigan Ave have, like, a thousand bus routes on them, it would seem to make sense to give them their own lane.

And the costs are modest. Mostly some new paint and signs and maybe some traffic enforcement resources. In an ideal world there would be some simple lane barriers too, but that's not strictly necessary to get the thing up and running.

I'm confused on how a bus-only lane would work on Lake Shore.

Right lane: If the right lane is bus-only, how does traffic exit? Furthermore, if traffic backs up onto the Drive, now the bus lane is blocked with stopped traffic (fairly common at Belmont, to say the least).

Left lane: How do the articulated buses get in and out of the left lane while entering and exiting the Drive?

It's not really feasible.

Now, it would be nice to get stricter about rush-direction no-parking enforcement, as many streets like Clark and LaSalle have an extra lane taken up by parked cars, which is freed (supposedly) during rush periods. There's your bus lane...only there are ALWAYS cars parked in the lane. TOW THEM!

Josh...

I'm sure it's possible for cars to exit and for buses to use the left lane exclusively. As long is not toodling along behind a bus and bypassing several exits, it's OK. Just go over to exit like you normally do. If a cop sees a car pass by two or three exits in the bus only lane, THEN slap him with a ticket.

I'm with Josh on this. It just isn't really feasable for a bus lane on LSD. Perhaps if there were some re-engineering to allow for some left-hand, bus-only ramps to get to and from a bus-only lane. But if buses have to change lanes to get to and from the bus-only lane to the ramps, it just won't work safely or efficiently. It's not even worth the cost of paint and signs to test it.

As for HOV lanes, the reversable lanes on the Kennedy would be perfect for a trial. They wouldn't help any CTA routes, but it might be interesting to see if they make an impact.

Clearing the extra lanes created by no parking zones on surface streets would do more to help CTA. While towing companies aren't world renown for their integrety, I'd be in favor of a pilot program giving private operators the authority to ticket and tow, and great leeway into where they drop-off a towed vehicle in exchange for a nice commission. Put video cameras on the tow trucks to document the tows actually happened, and that they were justified.

Give it a few years to test: Long enough to deflate the egos of a few drivers who think they're special, and should be allowed to block traffic. As long as drivers have the attitude of "they won't tow ME", CTA buses will be stuck behind these jerks.

Bus lanes might even work on a few streets once the parking problem is solved. Unlike LSD, you don't have the same dynamics as a high-speed road, and a bus lane on the right could be operated safely.

A better solution to traffic on Lake Shore would be to take it back to a purely recreational parkway/access road, get rid of the express bus routes and invest the money in improving rail service....

Chicagoans won't easily take to restricted lanes, and frankly, the cops have better things to police than that. Or they could bring back the reversable lanes on N. LSD (yes, there were once six lanes in the direction of rush hour travel).

I've always thought Michigan Avenue, from LSD to Millennium Park, would work very well if it had either a bus-only lane or was entirely closed off to non-commercial traffic and only had buses, cabs, delivery trucks, and the like during daylight hours. I cannot believe how incredibly slow traffic can be on Michigan Ave and I think it is mostly due to the cars with only one or two people in them. And there really is no main arterial for the east side of downtown other than Michigan Ave. That said, Chicago is indeed very automobile-centric and frankly it is one of the most frustrating things about living here.

Oh, you haven't seen automobile-centric until you've spent time in LA or Seattle.

Chicago is no New York, San Francisco or Portland, but you do have more mass transit choices than most cities.

Incidentally, you won't find much in the line of bus lanes in Portland, and the only HOV lane leads to Vancouver, WA, which is very automobile-centric despite it's proximity to tansit-centric Portland.

The two secrets are land use planning laws that make suburban sprawl nearly unhead of, and an attitude that transit isn't just for people who can't afford cars.

BTW... These hybrid buses will put CTA ahead of TriMet. Sure, TriMet is running all bio-diesel, and has experimented with propane and hybrid buses (they have 2 hybrids that are nearing the end of their useful lifespans), they're still spinning their wheels on moving into the next era in transit fuel efficiency.

Kudos to CTA for getting ahead of the curve on something!

Bus-only lanes would work significantly better on surface streets than on LSD.

These roads NEED 100% peak direction no-parking enforcement:
-Broadway (Sheridan to Diversey)
-Clark (Diversey inbound)
-Lincoln (Belmont to Sedgwick)
-LaSalle (all areas)
-Michigan (just lose the right lane during rush...right turns and buses only)

-Northbound LSD/Belmont intersection needs to be right lane buses only.

These roads could probably use it:
-Milwaukee? Not terribly familiar with ye olde 56
-Western
-Ashland
-Halsted (Belmont to North Ave.)

That's just a starter list. Most of those streets are significantly meter-only parking anyway, so it's not like there'd be a lot of lost parking.

"I've always thought Michigan Avenue, from LSD to Millennium Park, would work very well if it had either a bus-only lane or was entirely closed off to non-commercial traffic and only had buses, cabs, delivery trucks, and the like during daylight hours."

I take it you are unfamilar with what happened when the city tried that just a couple decades ago on State Street. The foot traffic on the street declined dramatically. If you recall, even just five years ago State Street was pretty run down with many vacent storefronts. A major reason was it was still recovering from the time that cars had been banned. It is sort of difficult to advertise the presence of a shopping district when you keep out a very large portion of the people coming through the area.

While it would be nice for transit riders to have bus lanes across the city, care has to be taken about how a parking ban affects the neighborhood people are traveling through. Sacraficing an inner neighborhood for the convinence of those who live further out isn't exactly a great move for the overall urban structure.

I don't have much problem taking away parking for residents. If owning a car is important to you, then finding a home with parking should be, too. But many little mom & pop businesses can only get off the ground by locating in the commercial property that line some of these major streets. If there's not enough parking to sustain those small businesses, the neighborhood will go downhill pretty fast.

This is less of a problem in the morning rush, when many of these businesses haven't even opened for the day yet, but the afternoon rush can prove problematic.

Many times neighbors will fight parking lots in favor of green space, but the city should adopt a policy that if a newly vacant lot can provide enough parking to allow a better traffic flow -- especially for buses -- that should be considered in any planning.

Still, turning these streets into pedestrian unfriendly quasi-freeways bisecting neighborhoods isn't the greatest idea, either.

The thing that could save Chicago is what has made it automobile-centric in the first place: A plethora of alternate routes.

The least auto-centric cities are generally freaks of geography, with huge bottlenecks in nearly every direction. For example, unlike the Chicago River, a bridge every block isn't even possible with the East River between Manhattan and Brooklyn. Downtown San Francisco essentially has a bay on two sides, and huge hills on the other two sides. Downtown Portland has only a half dozen river bridges on one side, huge hills on the other side, and tiny passages squeezing between the two in the other two directions.

With a grid pattern of streets with few significant interuptions, drivers have historically had multiple choices in routes to downtown. There aren't any significant barriers that can be best beaten by using mass transit.

Still, a bus lane with a short interuption for a neighborhood shopping district may be better than no bus lane at all. As new "no parking" zones are identified, they should be reserved for buses, and not simply opened to traffic. And enforcement of the parking bans must be absolute.

Two other things that have helped in Portland have to do with how buses move. The first is that Oregon law allows for a flashing "yield" sign on the back of a bus. When the driver activates that sign, drivers are required to let the bus move away from the curb, and back into traffic.

Second, when streets are rebuilt, instead of building bays for buses to pull out of traffic for stops, islands jutt out to the traffic lane so the bus doesn't have to force their way back into traffic. (Of course drivers hate these. They're usually only found on streets with neighborhood shopping districts where pedestrians also appreciate the way traffic has to stop so often, and there's another parallel major street nearby.)

Another idea would be to use more near-side bus stops at major intersections, but then give the bus the ability to get an early signal that allows it to pull away in front of traffic in the next lane without having to fight their way into traffic.

Of course some might point out that there are a lot of CTA drivers who force their way back into traffic, purposely stop in the middle of the road instead of pulling into bus bays, and jump the light. But those drivers are doing those things with great risk of accidents now, too.

So many things that could be done. So few people in city government who are seriously interested in doing them.

Sorry, re: my previous post

I mean RIGHT lane. It's possible to have a bus-only lane on the RIGHT and still have cars exit.

speaking of buses pulling back into traffic, my dad (who grew up in Chicago in the 50s & 60s) informs me that there used to be a rule for drivers that no one else seems to have heard of. I even asked a bus driver once & he had never heard of it either.

At the light, the car parallel to the bus's front end (ie, both at the line), gets to go when the light changes, but everyone else behind that car is supposed to wait for the bus to pull out. You can pass the bus once you're moving, of course!

My dad, as infrequently as he drives in the city, still follows that rule, I've noticed.
Anybody else heard of this?

Congestion charging seems to be working in London. Maybe Chicago could look into a form of that.

Good idea.....

I can't tell from the press release what these buses are using: diesel electric? gas electric? Some other meaning of "hybrid"? Anybody figure it out?

Either way it's great news. Maybe some of them will even have springs and shock absorbers.

I don't see where buses would be changing lanes more than twice -- once after entering LSD, once when getting ready to leave.

For evening commutes in particular, northbound traffic generally lightens after Belmont sufficiently that there's plenty of time to plan that upcoming lane change. And it's less problematic to move right at that point as traffic in the right lanes is much more open and moving more quickly.

Diesel/electric, Davey.

And they haven't invented the shock absorber that can deal with Chicago street maintenance yet. ;)