Explaining Transit's Secret Language

[dougskiles]

This looks like a good book that should be on the city council's required reading list.  Should we take up a collection and buy some to hand out?

Human Transit: How Clearer Thinking about Public Transit Can Enrich Our Communties and Our Lives by Jarrett Walker

http://www.amazon.com/Human-Transit-Clearer-Thinking-Communities/dp/1597269727/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1331210252&sr=8-1

The article is informative too.

http://www.theatlanticcities.com/commute/2012/03/teaching-language-transit/1438/

Some of my favorite sections:

Instead of focusing on speed, we should elevate frequency; instead of debating technology (e.g. light rail v. bus) we should consider geometry; instead of glorifying direct service we should build more connections; instead of linking transit with restraint we should associate it with the "freedom to move."

The most obvious “motorist’s error” is confusion about frequency. In urban transit, frequency is freedom. Frequency is how transit approximates the freedom that’s inherent in your car or bike. Frequency also governs waiting, which is everyone’s least favourite part of using transit. Finally, frequency determines how well lines can fit together into a network, so that you can go anywhere easily, not just to points in one line.

Connections are a tough issue. I devote two chapters to them and they probably need their own book. But the geometry of transit presents us with a simple choice. You can accept the need for connections and in return get simplicity, high frequency, and a high degree of personal freedom for the customer. Or you can try to avoid connections by running a few direct services from everywhere to everywhere else. That approach yields low frequency and a network so complicated that nobody dares to explore it outside of the one or two routes they know how to use. One of the chapters is called “Connections or Complexity?” Because that really is the choice.

So when transit agencies do run that low-ridership service, as most do, it doesn’t mean they’re failing, as anti-transit conservatives often assume. It just means they have a goal other than ridership. Coverage goals, often expressed by a policy like “95 percent of population will be within walking distance of service” cause service to be spread out over large areas despite low ridership.

[Ocklawaha]

This looks like a good book that should be on the city council's required reading list.  Should we take up a collection and buy some to hand out?

Human Transit: How Clearer Thinking about Public Transit Can Enrich Our Communties and Our Lives by Jarrett Walker

Connections are a tough issue. I devote two chapters to them and they probably need their own book. But the geometry of transit presents us with a simple choice. You can accept the need for connections and in return get simplicity, high frequency, and a high degree of personal freedom for the customer. Or you can try to avoid connections by running a few direct services from everywhere to everywhere else. That approach yields low frequency and a network so complicated that nobody dares to explore it outside of the one or two routes they know how to use. One of the chapters is called “Connections or Complexity?” Because that really is the choice.

Required reading? I'd be in favor of holding down certain members of JTA and COJ leadership and having that paragraph tattooed on their foreheads.

OCK

[dougskiles]

^And it is not just JTA and council who struggle with this.  We have had pages of discussion on this forum about what constitutes "too many connections" with relation to a Skyway extension and a new streetcar.