NY Times features BRT as solution for Poor Cities

[Lunican]

Buses May Aid Climate Battle in Poor Cities



More images: http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2009/07/10/world/0710BOGOTA_index.html

BOGOTÁ, Colombia â€" Like most thoroughfares in booming cities of the developing world, Bogotá’s Seventh Avenue resembles a noisy, exhaust-coated parking lot â€" a gluey tangle of cars and the rickety, smoke-puffing private minibuses that have long provided transportation for the masses.

But a few blocks away, sleek red vehicles full of commuters speed down the four center lanes of Avenida de las Américas. The long, segmented, low-emission buses are part of a novel public transportation system called bus rapid transit, or B.R.T. It is more like an above-ground subway than a collection of bus routes, with seven intersecting lines, enclosed stations that are entered through turnstiles with the swipe of a fare card and coaches that feel like trams inside.

Versions of these systems are being planned or built in dozens of developing cities around the world â€" Mexico City, Cape Town, Jakarta, Indonesia, and Ahmedabad, India, to name a few â€" providing public transportation that improves traffic flow and reduces smog at a fraction of the cost of building a subway.

Full Article:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/10/world/americas/10degrees.html?_r=2&hp

[Jason]

providing public transportation that improves traffic flow and reduces smog at a fraction of the cost of building a subway.

Well DUH!! 

[Lunican]

The article was fairly positive on BRT, but the only alternative they mention is a subway, which is kind of ridiculous.

Looking through the photos of the system, it looks pretty hideous. Almost like a temporary system for a carnival that's in town this week.

[thelakelander]

Interesting article.  Here is a quote from the article that we should keep in mind when we talk about BRT locally.

Bus rapid transit systems have not always worked well in cities that have tried them, either. In New Delhi, for example, the experiment foundered in part because it proved difficult to protect bus lanes from traffic. And a system that does not succeed in drawing passengers out of their cars just adds buses to existing vehicles on the roads, making traffic and emissions worse.

[Dog Walker]

Anybody who recommended a BRT system in New Delhi has never been in the traffic there.  I have, and sometimes wake up screaming from recalling it in a dream.  There ARE no lanes, not even to separate traffic traveling in opposite directions.  Totally the most insane traffic in the world.

[ProjectMaximus]

I think I recall someone (Ock or Lake) posting a very positive video of BRT where it has been successful, and I think that too was of Bogota. It's interesting and eye-opening, but getting that kind of BRT infrastructure in Jax would probably cost more than a comprehensive commuter rail and streetcar would.

[Ocklawaha]

Firestone, Phillips, Standard, General Motors and perhaps GATE, are all alive and well in Jacksonville.

NATIONAL CITY LINES ANYONE?

In the morning and the afternoon, in Bogota, the maid must wipe the carbon sulfur crap off the windows, floors and furniture. hideous? Worse then that, it's filthy, been there done that.

B.O.H.I.C.A.

OCKLAWAHA