Posts about Bus Lanes

Multiple sources have said that the District expects to get much of the operating funding for the Circulator from the National Park Service and/or Mall visitors. A Circulator on the Mall primarily benefits tourists, though with easy transportation to and from nearby neighborhoods, it could also help encourage tourists to spend some money at local shops and restaurants.

That funding might come from Circulator fares, parking meters on the Mall (where on-street spaces are now free and thus usually nearly impossible to get), or other sources. Specific details are not yet public and, based on the press release, may not be yet worked out between DC and NPS.

Circulator Phase 1 expansion. Image from the Circulator plan.

This is the diagram of proposed Circulator routes from a recent plan from DC Surface Transit, the public-private partnership that runs the Circulator. According to the press release, funds in the coming fiscal year will fund planning the actual routes, which might or might not be the same as some of these.

New fund supports bus priority around the city

In addition, Gray has added a $750,000 annual capital fund to support projects that improve bus service and reduce delays. This could presumably fund dedicated bus lanes, queue jumpers, signal priority, off-board fare payment or other projects that make buses a quicker and more appealing way to travel.

DC won a TIGER grant way back in 2010 to improve buses on several corridors, but 3 years later we've seen few if any changes. According to an email forward to me from DDOT, they are planning to use the money to optimize traffic signals downtown and install backup traffic signal power.

The TIGER money will also fund 120 real-time digital displays in some bus stops, "some minor bus stop improvements on 16th Street, Wisconsin Avenue, and Georgia Avenue," and "some bus stop safety features" on H Street and Benning Road, the email says. For a grant which was supposed to fund "shovel-ready" stimulus projects in the immediate term, though, it's taken quite a long time.

Finally, DDOT is working on a short bus lane on Georgia Avenue between Florida Avenue and Barry Place, a spot where buses get significantly stuck in traffic.

There is also an ongoing WMATA study looking at potential bus lanes on H and I Streets in the area north of and around the White House. This would be a more complex project, but it's important for DC to take some big steps that speed up buses significantly, in addition to small and easier steps like new signals.

Neighborhoods still benefit from performance parking

Another new fund creates a pool of money for neighborhood improvements in areas that adopt performance parking. The original performance parking law dedicated some of the extra money to neighborhood-specific projects, and around the ballpark, it has already funded new trash cans, benches, bike racks, and signs for a historic heritage trail.

Gray's budget eliminated the dedicated funding, but to make up for the loss, this new fund will let neighborhoods with performance parking still have some say in local fixes. This fund will have $589,000 for the rest of this current fiscal year and $750,000 a year in future years.

Bus cameras in San Francisco will not be used to ticket other types of moving violations such as speeding or running red lights. For now they won't even be used to ticket car drivers that block bus stops. Current law prohibits any use other than ticketing transit lane violations.

Even that limited application will make a big difference, though. San Francisco has 17 miles of transit lanes, but without enforcement they're no better at actually moving buses through traffic than 7th Street in DC.

If this idea works it could have a huge effect on bus planning nationwide. Bus lanes could become much more effective, and therefore likely to become more widespread.

Cross-posted at BeyondDC.

RTV stations will be more substantial, with features similar to those at Shirlington Station in Arlington. Photo by the author.

Not your typical bus

Unlike traditional bus service, RTV stations would be distinctive and covered, with real-time information for when the next one was coming and off-board fare collection. Stops would be between a half-mile and a mile apart, while buses would run frequently throughout the day. The buses themselves would be sleek, attractive and level with the station platform, allowing riders with limited mobility to get on and off more easily.

Meanwhile, Metrobus and the county's Ride On bus service would be restructured. New "feeder buses" would collect riders in neighborhoods and deliver them to rapid transit stations, reducing the need for park-and-ride lots.

When finished, the RTV system could receive between 165,000 and 207,000 riders each day, though the task force was realistic about changing transportation habits. "We don't expect to get half the people out of their cars, but even if a small percentage do, it'll make a big difference," said Tina Slater, task force member and president of the Action Committee for Transit.

Francine Waters, representing Lerner Enterprises on the task force, talked about the development potential of RTV. Lines would connect research and development centers like the Great Seneca Science Corridor with the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda and the Food and Drug Administration in White Oak, creating a "science and health triangle."

Lerner is one of several developers is remaking White Flint as a new urban center. They hope to transform Rockville Pike into a grand boulevard, complete with special, protected lanes for buses. RTV is about "[providing] different levels of mobility," she said, making it easier for people to get around with or without a car.

Buses can carry the same number of people in far less space than cars. Image by carltonreid on Flickr.

Need for dedicated lanes

However, it's unclear whether the rest of the system will look like Rockville Pike. The Task Force chose not to look at where dedicated lanes would go, saying it required "block by block" solutions that were best considered during a future design phase. "The construction may be the simplest part," said Winston. "The sorting out of these issues will be extremely complicated."

Adding new lanes for transit could be prohibitively expensive, but county officials are reluctant to give existing lanes to buses. Parsons Brinckerhoff's study assumed that much of the system wouldn't have dedicated lanes at all.

"Some places you won't be able to take anything away," said Dan Wilhelm, task force representative from the Montgomery County Civic Federation.

As GGW's Dan Malouff wrote last month, that could be the undoing of Montgomery County's transit plans. A transit lane can carry more people than a normal car lane. According to Wilhelm, 3 car lanes can carry about 4,000 people per hour. Replace one of them with a dedicated bus lane, and capacity can increase to 10,000 people, depending on how frequent the buses are. With 3 car lanes and a bus lane, a street can carry as many as 18,000 people per hour.

This is especially relevant to the county's downtowns, like Bethesda and Silver Spring, where there's a lot of congestion that can slow buses down but no room to widen streets. Taking away lanes from cars in these areas will be politically unpopular, but giving them to buses is the only way to ensure that the rapid transit system is fast and reliable. Otherwise, riders will be reluctant to use the system, making it less effective while traffic gets worse.

Residents and businesses within a half-mile of RTV routes could see higher property taxes.

Questions about funding scheme

The task force estimates that the RTV system could cost $1.8 billion to build and $1.1 million each year to operate. They've proposed dividing it into 3 phases to be built over 20 years. Funding would likely come from a combination of state and local sources.

The county could borrow money to build the system and and use the proceeds from a special taxing district along with some state funds to pay it off over time, in an arrangement similar to the 30/10 initiative being used by Los Angeles to pay for a massive transit expansion.

"This will last a long time and can be paid for over a long time," said Winston.

Some audience members were skeptical about that arrangement, which would tax residents and businesses within a half-mile of the proposed routes. Jim Zepp, Silver Spring resident and member of the Montgomery County Civic Federation, asked whether the system benefitted long-distance commuters from Frederick and Howard counties at the expense of those who lived next to a RTV line. "It's not Smart Growth," he said.

Winston suggested residents shouldn't "take a narrow view" of who will benefit from the service. "Even if I don't live near the service, I still benefit in a variety of direct and indirect ways," he said.

The task force warned that not improving the county's transportation system wasn't an option. Montgomery County already loses money to congestion, Wilhelm noted, due to wasted fuel and higher labor costs, which result in a higher cost for doing business here. Meanwhile, the county is losing jobs while surrounding areas continue to add them. There's room for over 160,000 new jobs in Montgomery County under current plans, but even without them, turnover from retirements and an influx of new workers means traffic will still be an issue.

"Burying our heads in the sand about creating additional transportation assets is not the solution," said Winston. "We need to do this even if we don't create all these new jobs, and especially if we do."

Next up, the Planning Department will take a look at the rapid transit proposal and make further refinements. County planners have already made changes to the system outlined by the Task Force, removing lines that were unlikely to get a lot of riders while extending others that might be more popular. According to planner Larry Cole, they may have a report of their own by October.

1. Make both lanes of I-66 free for buses and HOV-3 at all times, and toll single-passenger vehicles (SOV) and HOV-2 at all times.
   
2. Add a 3rd lane to I-66. Make all 3 free for buses and HOV-3, tolled for SOV and HOV-2 at all times.
   
3. Add a 3rd lane to I-66 to be HOV-2 in the reverse peak. In the peak direction (eastbound mornings, westbound evenings), keep all lanes HOV-3. Off-peak, leave all lanes open to anyone (as they are today).
   
4. Make the shoulder of US-50 into a bus lane. Add express bus service to downtown DC from places along the I-66 and Dulles corridors.

All of these assume that Virginia has finished all of the projects in the existing Constrained Long-Range Plan (CLRP). That includes the so-called "spot improvements" that widen I-66 in select places, and also converting I-66 to HOV-3.

Packages 1 and 2, the HOT lane options, both would help SOV and HOV-2 drivers and hurt HOV-3 drivers, compared to the default of having I-66 be HOV-3 only. But there's not a whole lot of difference between the two. According to the model, having the extra lane would slightly harm transit and speed drivers by about 2%, at a cost of $310-685 million.

Package 1 (convert existing lanes to HOT lanes):

Package 2 (add 3rd lane, convert all to HOT lanes):

Package 3 induces more driving but doesn't do much to change travel times for anyone. Package 4, the US-50 bus lanes, would improve travel times on transit by 7%, and drivers benefit by a very small amount. The presentation says that a number of people switch from rail to bus because the buses improve, which should also help with crowding on Metro.

Package 3 (add HOV lane):

Package 4 (bus lane on US-50):

The packages also factor in projects like better bicycle and pedestrian facilities, TDM programs, Integrated Corridor Management (ICM) like digital signs and ramp meters, added bus service and more.

These graphs are all a tiny bit confusing because VDOT assumed as the "baseline" that I-66 has changed from the current HOV-2 to HOV-3, and that they've already widened in some places with "spot improvements."

It would have been more helpful for laypeople if we could also compare each alternative to what would happen if VDOT didn't build the "spot improvements" and didn't change to HOV-3. In fact, an initial impetus for this study was to find out whether the spot improvements are a good idea in the first place, or whether other options would work better.

VDOT will release the study, including more details and its recommendations, in June. It seems unlikely that they would recommend widening I-66 given these results. A combination of options 1 and 4 seems like it could deliver real improvements to both drivers and transit riders without spending a lot of money on complex, unpopular, and minimally helpful highway widening projects.

Residents can provide comments to VDOT by emailing info@i66multimodalstudy.com.

Update: The original version of this post showed incorrect graphs for packages 2 and 3. The graphs have been corrected to match those from the VDOT presentation.

They analyzed a number of options and condensed them down to 3 bicycle and pedestrian options, 4 roadway options, and 6 Transportation Demand Management options. This post looks at the roadway and TDM alternatives; the next one will delve into the bicycle and pedestrian options.

Vehicular options

One of the most significant conclusions from the draft EIS is what it chose not to recommend: More single-passenger vehicle capacity. The team looked at adding new general-purpose lanes (which, on a freeway-type bridge, aren't as much "general purpose" as "motor vehicle only") or HOT lanes. Once Virginia decided not to run HOT lanes through Arlington, the HOT lane options became moot, and adding new auto capacity generally did not reduce congestion.

There are 5 remaining proposals that would affect motor vehicles:

Add a bus lane. A lot of commuter buses drive to the Pentagon and then over the 14th Street bridge to DC, and many local buses also cross in this area. This alternative would use the existing shoulder of the Rochambeau bridge (the center of the 3 road bridges, which carries the express lanes in both directions) for a bus lane, and convert one lane on 14th Street to a bus lane.

The heavy volume of buses moves a great many people in this corridor. Helping buses bypass congestion and give riders a quicker ride would further improve the value of taking transit from many parts of Virginia.

Ban left turns at 14th and C (at a cost of about $203,000). C Street SW ends at 14th, in the last intersection with a traffic signal before the bridge. The study says that giving time for vehicles to turn left from southbound 14th onto C, or left from C onto southbound 14th, creates significant delay, and this option would forbid these turns. Drivers would only be able to turn right in or out of C.

Click to enlarge (PDF).

On its own, this sounds like a bad idea because it would move further away from a functional grid in this area, and make 14th more like a freeway. It could, however, be a reasonable way to reduce some of the extra delay that comes from the bus lane option, making that a little more palatable.

The most important question, which the report does not specify, is how this would affect pedestrians. People cross on foot to get to and from the Holocaust Museum, for instance, and already the signal here forces them to wait long periods of time for the various movements. Removing the left turns could allow more pedestrian crossing time, or it could make things worse, depending on the final signal timings.

DC should also add a marked crosswalk along the south side of this intersection, where there is none today. Every side of every intersection ought to have a marked crosswalk, regardless of its effect on traffic, but an animation of the proposal makes it appear that there would be no traffic effect with left turns prohibited, anyway.

For the final EIS, the team should investigate pedestrian crossings and suggest timings that help them cross more safely and with a shorter wait.

Restripe around Maine Avenue, 7th and 9th Streets ($185,000). There are a lot of ramps on and off in this area, creating a lot of merging and weaving. This option would narrow the on-ramp at Maine Avenue to 1 lane instead of 2, reducing the amount of merging on the freeway itself.

Also, it would add a solid white line between some of the freeway's lanes east of 9th Street. Drivers getting on at 7th Street would only be able to then continue to the 3rd Street tunnel (the one that goes under the Mall to New York Avenue, also signed as I-395), and drivers getting on from 9th Street would have to continue onto the Southeast Freeway (now signed as 695) instead. Drivers might ignore this line, but FHWA hopes it will decrease weaving.

Click to enlarge (PDF).

Remove some ramps on the Virginia side ($2.7 million). There are 10 ramps on and off 395 right around the Pentagon, also creating a lot of merging and weaving. This alternative suggests removing the ramps from 395 northbound to the GW parkway northbound, and the matching ramp from the GW Parkway southbound to 395 southbound. Drivers can still get where they need to go by taking Washington Boulevard (Route 27) instead, which is actually shorter, anyway.

In addition, this alternative would change around the ramps at Boundary Channel Drive, the access road to the Pentagon north parking lots. Now, there are cloverleaf-style ramps on and off of 395 southbound, so that cars coming from or going to each direction of Boundary Channel have their own ramps.

Instead, the ramps in the southwest quadrant would go away, and the northwest quadrant ramps changed so that cars can turn in either direction on and off of Boundary Channel.

Ramps in gray would be removed. Click to enlarge (PDF).

Arlington has proposed another option to add roundabouts instead of traffic signals at the ends of the ramps.

Potential roundabouts on each side of 395. Click to enlarge (PDF).

Transportation Demand Management options

Reconfiguring roadways is not the only way to reduce congestion. Transportation Demand Management is the field concerned with helping people better understand their travel options besides solo driving. Maps, real-time information, and public service ad campaigns can help people choose transit. Employers can provide incentives or assistance for people to carpool, telecommute, or commute outside peak hours.

The TDM options that the DEIS proposed to carry forward to the final version include:

• Expand incentives for telecommuting
  
• Expand flexible work hours
  
• Increase prices for parking and/or decrease supply
  
• Better coordinate among agencies along the corridor (Federal, District, state, and local) to share information and respond to crashes or other incidents
  
• Create a program to educate drivers in the corridor in "[crash] avoidance maneuvers and defensive driving skills"
  
• Make signs better and more consistent across the corridor

The study team is accepting comments on the draft EIS until March 15th. They will then begin work on the final EIS. I will send them all comments made on this post through at least the end of Wednesday, March 14. If you want to send them your own, more detailed comments, you can do so through this form.

The bicycle and pedestrian proposals, meanwhile, are worth a whole discussion on their own. Part 2 will examine these in detail.

BRT could move far more people more quickly using the existing roadway space. The simple fact is that a bus-only lane can carry far more people than a general traffic lane, as long as bus service on that lane is fairly frequent. In the built-up business and residential districts along the county's busiest bus corridors, the only way to make room for BRT is to convert existing travel lanes into bus-only lanes.

Elsewhere, BRT will stop along major 6-lane arterials, at intersections which often have multiple turn lanes. There too, it's best to put the busway on existing lanes. Widening these roadways to add new lanes could defeat the intent of the transit plan to create walkable spaces, since 10-lane suburban highways are rarely welcoming to people on foot.

Converting lanes will not be easy. Traffic planners will need to use some trial and error to find the best configuration. If there is to be any hope of meeting the ambitious schedule that BRT proponents have laid out, the county needs to start quickly.

The learning process can start now. Montgomery can benefit now by designating a few short sections of bus lane right away. Even if full BRT is not running yet, there are many existing buses, often running at high frequency. WMATA's Priority Corridor Network Plan has already identified some good locations.

The County Council recognizes this need. Last April, then-Council President Valerie Ervin and all three Transportation and Environment Committee members (Roger Berliner, Hans Riemer, and Nancy Floreen) asked for immediate action to give buses higher priority at intersections. They also requested—"separately," they emphasized—a longer-range study of passenger throughput on the roads.

Unfortunately, MCDOT, which trumpets its support for BRT sometime in the future, expressed no interest in doing anything now. In an August reply, MCDOT Director Art Holmes said that nothing could be done to speed up buses until the passenger throughput study was complete. Nine months after the County Council letter, that study still has yet to begin.

While MCDOT stonewalled, the county Planning Board began its own work on the BRT plan. Staffer Larry Cole looked at the throughput issue and found that converting a car lane to BRT adds almost as much passenger capacity as building expensive new lanes.

MCDOT planning chief Edgar Gonzalez then emailed Cole insisting that he redo the calculation with the assumption that each car carries 4 people. Cole found, of course, that roads would carry a lot more people if each car had a driver and three passengers.

Four people per private car is clearly an absurd assumption. If the county could impose an HOV-4 rule on all its highways, there would be no need for BRT nor any other road project because traffic congestion would disappear instantly.

This is not an isolated incident. Gonzalez has a long and disappointing track record on transit matters. He tried to pass off a highway interchange as a pedestrian underpass. His consultants claimed that it will take 7 years to design a new Metro entrance in Bethesda. His department asserted that adding bus lanes and bike lanes would make Rockville Pike less friendly to pedestrians than it is now.

These current and past actions from MCDOT officials make it hard to avoid the conclusion that MCDOT is interested in moving cars, not people. While DC and Arlington have taken significant steps to treat pedestrians, cyclists, and transit riders more equally, MCDOT zealously hews to a cars-only mindset for its roads.

It's long past time for the department to change its approach to issues and follow the examples of sound transportation planning set by its counterparts in the District and Arlington.