BRT [vs] Commuter Rail.

[tufsu1]

no disagreement jeffrey...I'm just making sure the folks who complain about transit headways (including those of the new riverside trolley) aware

[thelakelander]

BRT on Philips is a farce.  Eliminate the existing bus duplicate routes in that area, run a regular bus with decent reliable headways and call it a day.  What's proposed is way overboard and detrimental to the economic development future of that entire corridor.

[arb]

BRT on Philips is a farce.  Eliminate the existing bus duplicate routes in that area, run a regular bus with decent reliable headways and call it a day.  What's proposed is way overboard and detrimental to the economic development future of that entire corridor.

Agreed!

[Ocklawaha]

AROUND THE WORLD ON BUS RAPID TRANSIT (BRT)


CIVIS BUS CORP


BOMBARDIER CORP (Guided Bus Technology)


VAL DE MARNE


LOS ANGELES


VANCOUVER


PHILEAS BUS CORP


CURITIBA BRASIL


PITTSBURGH


OTTAWA


ORLANDO


LAS VEGAS (Docking Feature)


DENVER


ADELAIDE


LEEDS

The BRT concept is actually quite good, not too expensive or obtrusive and upgraded enough to make for a much better ride and a much better opportunity to connect.

Current 40 minute -/+ on most routes almost guarantees a LONG wait for connection's, if for example your bus leaves Rosa Parks Transit Center downtown at 5:00 pm and arrives at University Blvd and Philips Hwy at 5:25 a close connection might mean another 40 minute wait in the afternoon sun. 1 hour and 5 minutes elapsed and you STILL haven't gotten on the second bus... and when you do? Another FARE! With the BRT plan and "Real time information" (hopefully NEXTBUS or GOOGLEBUS) one could check the location of the connection before leaving work, go to Rosa Parks at the optimum time to meet with the University bus and make a seamless transfer at what one hopes is a better, larger, COOLER-WARMER, friendlier station. Total time to the connection maybe 30 minutes from work to a seat on the University Bus.

Bus lanes or HOV/Transit lanes could slice another 5-10 minutes off the trip in this example. True BRT branded buses with actual low floors, and "docking" would make these buses as convenient for the disabled or wheelchair bound passenger as someone completely ambulatory. Some BRT buses have 110 volt outlets, and overhead bag racks, both of which would be helpful to attracting our business community out of their cars. A MJ-TU-Folio clip and present coupon good for one FREE one day pass and promoted as a FREE SAMPLE would bring worlds of good will and introduce a whole city to mass transit thinking.  By anyone's measurement our BRT will be A VAST IMPROVEMENT but it falls short of being a mass transit panacea.

The whole trouble with JTA's thinking on this is the FACT that they have laid out 2 primary BRT routes RIGHT NEXT TO "FUTURE" COMMUTER RAIL! Yes, I understand that even BRT will have many more stops then a Commuter Train, and that this is designed as a DUVAL system so it shouldn't interfere. My argument is "SHOULDN'T" isn't good enough, come back with a statement from the FTA director that we will still be considered/funded for parallel commuter rail and I think we'd all back off. The other problem? While I know that the creative juices have already flowed into these corridors and Uncle Sam would take a dim view of a sudden change of plan, would it really be so hard to keep the plan but REROUTE the buses? Current plans for Philips and Roosevelt it would seem could easily be shifted to HENDRICKS-SAN JOSE and POST-CASSAT-BLANDING with the same end points and MUCH more populace and busy routes.

Do we REALLY want to risk our commuter rail and streetcar/Skyway systems on the brink of what might become another Republican Tax-Cutting, Rail Hating, Pro Highway, Anti-Transit Governor?  Does Obama have ANOTHER 4 years? Is it worth the trouble to have deluxe buses at the expense of everything else? Or even at the expense of a "WHAT IF" or "MAYBE" from the Federal Government? This is why I stand against the BRT plan as-is.


OCKLAWAHA

[thelakelander]

]The BRT concept is actually quite good, not too expensive or obtrusive and upgraded enough to make for a much better ride and a much better opportunity to connect.

You'll probably need to provide better detail on this one.  Ock, I know you understand the differences, so this post is really for new readers out there.  

There are so many things considered or called BRT that its hard to throw them under the same category because they're structurally different.  For example, the dedicated busways in these images above will cost you more to construct than LRT.













^These tend to work the best but isn't the point of BRT supposed to be that it's cheaper?  That positive goes down the drain when you have to spend extra millions on building the dedicated lanes.

The Orlando and Denver systems are completely different as well.  While our proposed BRT corridors will have a bus running up and down them frequently, JTA is attempting to have these routes used by all buses. The Orlando and Denver systems are nothing more than short downtown shuttles that either loop around a few streets (like our PCTs) or directly connect major destinations along a compact strip with rail.  Sort of like the bus that connects TRE to Dallas/Fort Worth's airport.





Below is closer to what we're calling BRT.  A branded bus on regular streets with super expensive stops and queue jumps.  We can do this without going to the feds and screwing up our chances for commuter rail happening within a decade.

[CS Foltz]

lake............maybe its just me, but I get the impression that JTA's game plan revolves around the Governments trough! "Do the minimum to qualify for a chunk of money and thats all folks"!

[JeffreyS]

The JTA started down this path years ago thinking they couldn't get rail done.  Now that they can they won't change course as a function of "CYA" to justify the time and money they have spent over the years.  I for one would fully accept it if they said the climate has change so we are switching to the Superior mode for the community we serve.

[iluvolives]

Is there any such group functioning in JAcksonville?  If not, why not? Could be just the thing to jab JTA in the butt and get them thinking streetcar.  The best option for JTA would be to split into two separate organizations, with one focusing solely on public transit.

This is something my husband and I have talked about. I would think group could be started that worked with RAP and other historic districts to fundraise and promote bringing back streetcars. Obviously a community group wouldn't be able to raise much more than a drop in the bucket of what it would cost- but it would show that street car is something the community wants and we worked to contribute cash towards what the city and federal grants could put up for the project.

[fsujax]

I would suggest you contact SPAR or RAP, I believe there is a grassroots movement underway!

[CS Foltz]

I would suggest you contact SPAR or RAP, I believe there is a grassroots movement underway!

Not sure about RAP and SPAR is still an unknown entity, because of their new director! If there is a "grassroots movement" someone let me know so I can put my two cents in! Gotta get some rail going, no doubt about it................are you reading JTA? Bovines!

[Ocklawaha]

You are right Lake, I hope no newbies see this as support for the JTA BRT plan as-is. I do not support ANY BRT that will run alongside a potential rail route.

There are several (actually many more miles then the JTA plans for) roads and routes where a moderate BRT implementation would make all the sense in the world. BRT could be a real asset on Blanding, Normandy, Cassat, Lem Turner, Norwood, Hendricks, San Jose, Merrill, University, Edgewood and perhaps JTB. I think these routes should have some of the better infrastructure and would support HOV lanes, Que Jumping, Light Priority, TransLoc, Nextbus or Googlebus, and Trolley bus with Docking if our budget allowed. Total expense about 1/2 of the REAL price of streetcar/LRT. None of these routes would ever be considered for Commuter Rail so the much less money per mile for CR wouldn't play into the picture. Just stack it against surface street running rail transit.

I'm more then willing to lead a citizens group for transit, but I want the railroad foamers to realize that not everyplace is a good fit for rail. When the citizens agree that the right fit has been found then we need to act on that finding.

TransLoc, Nextbus and Googlebus are also used by rail agencies, the great thing is you can access most of these on your cell phone and virtually wipe out waits. If you've never seen these technologies in action check out our own UNF campus:
http://unf.transloc.com/

OCKLAWAHA

[fieldafm]

BRT could be a real asset on Blanding

Ock, do you know if JTA has any additional plans on Blanding?  They already have a stretch of dedicated bus lanes.  Will this eventually be expanded?  If so, how would you expand this along the tight stretches of Blanding through Cedar Hills?  Those routes have pretty decent ridership numbers.  Higher than Philips' routes even.

[JeffreyS]

No BRT until we take advantage of our rail lines. CSX A line, the S line and the FEC.

[Ocklawaha]

Yes they do, the plan is eventually to run from Roosevelt at FSCJ Kent down Blanding to Orange Park/Argyle. Their original idea was a sweeping "bigger then LRT" bus FREEway with such crazy features as wiping out the Cedar Hills Shopping Center with a massive socialized TOD (JTA-COJ owned and operated lease space + transit + social services). This mega-BRT idea seems to have been effectively killed by MJ and an army of concerned citizens. No doubt the plan is still to use the same route without being so damned warped with overkill.

I would continue the plan as-is with a couple of changes on the north end of the route. Post-Cassat-Blanding would be a straight shot from downtown to a very dense area on wide streets all the way. Post leads to Five Points where the BRT would turn north on Park all the way to Jacksonville Terminal.  I would use this as a mainline for the BRT making use of many of the better features and HOV lanes with rush hour restrictions. So the bus-only lanes would surrender to "autos sometimes" lanes, also usable for LARGE car pools 3+ or 4+ and ANY licenced transportation vehicle, school bus, taxi, Greyhound, Trailways, Cubana, etc. The other Blanding leg would turn on San Juan in Lakeshore and run east to the Commuter Rail/eventual streetcar interchange by Roosevelt Plaza. I would push Clay to do similar restricted lanes on Blanding, Wells and Kingsley.

These core routes would set up a future Normandy and Edgewood BRT service. They also surrender the majority of the trunk line to commuter rail and EVERYTHING east of Roosevelt to Streetcar. Of course all of these surrendered territories would still be served by local bus service connecting to the new systems.

Stations would be nice but certainly not the $50,000 dollar models, I would push corporate stations with nice amenities "courtesy of..." Buses would have TransLoc or Nextbus locating systems onboard, and depending on demographics some routes would feature docking buses (able to get railroad close to the platform through guide wheels, or guided bus tech).

BRT and RAIL could be done at the same time using different grant sources and simply being creative.

OCKLAWAHA

[arb]

Obviously commuter rail, it is the premier regional transit option. BRT is not planned as a regional system. Commuter Rail will be the spine of the system. Other modes will feed it and compliment it. 

While I (as in myself) do agree with you, try feeding that to JTA. They seem to have it mixed up.