Coast Mountain buses passed by stops more than 200,000 times in 2010

The following story, “Coast Mountain buses passed by stops more than 200,000 times in 2010“, is one of bad management rather than anything else. What we see is TransLink’s policy of “to hell with the customer“.

What is sad is that there areAi??many politically inspired bus routes, designed specifically to placate civic politicians in the region, that carry very few customers a day and one would question why they are being operated at all.

In South Delta, the 609, C-84Ai??& C-89 buses, which operate an hourly service or better seven days a week, barely altogether carry 20 customers a day! The 620, Bridgeport station to Tsawwassen Ferry terminal, via Ladner exchange, operates almostAi??empty articulated buses, during the slack weekdays, where standard buses should be used instead, freeing up the artics. for more congested routes in Vancouver. If South Delta isAi??indicative of marginal bus operation, then marginal bus operationAi??elsewhere in the region must be rampant.Ai??If we had competent management thenAi??there should be ampleAi??transit resources to eliminate passenger congestion and pass-ups elsewhere on the transit system.

The question is: “Is TransLink and West coast Mountain Bus competently managed?”

Zweisytem is a perfect example on how bad bus service drives customers back to the car.Ai??’Zwei’ used to commute every day from South Delta to downtown Vancouver, but the reliability of the bus service, plus constant pass-ups was such that IAi??began takingAi??the car. What I found was that I was spending about 20% more, byAi??commuting byAi??car, with the commute time being shortened by almost 30 to 45 minutes a day, plusAi??I had the ability to alter my commute to shop or meet the wife.

What this all means is that West Coast Mountain Bus and TransLink do not give a damn about the transit customer and the public without aAi??vehicle to compel TransLink to provide a better transit service, the TransLink’s ossified central bureaucracy will not lift a finger to improve bus services on over crowded routes.

Documents reveal Coast Mountain buses passed by stops more than 200,000 times in 2010

Company says thereai??i??s little they can do to help frustrated riders

By CHAD SKELTON, Vancouver Sun – May 14, 2011

If you want to get Rob Planckeai??i??s blood boiling, just ask him about the #49 bus.

ai???Iai??i??ve run out of adjectives for how bad it is,ai??? he said. ai???Iai??i??m ready to rip up my bus pass.ai???

The 49 has been part of Planckeai??i??s daily commute since he moved to south Vancouver from Kelowna in 2008.

He takes the bus down 49th Avenue to the Canada Line, the Canada Line down to Broadway, and then the 99 B-Line to his job repairing computers in Kitsilano.

When everything runs smoothly, said Plancke, the trip only takes about half an hour.

Unfortunately, things often donai??i??t run smoothly.

Plancke has lost count of the number of times the 49, chock full of passengers, has passed right by his bus stop at Elgin and 49th. He gets passed up at least once a week, he said, and sometimes has bus after bus run right by him.

ai???One day I was standing there for an hour and watched five buses go by,ai??? he said. ai???It became so bad I was getting reprimanded at work for being late three or four times a week.ai???

Unfortunately, Plancke isnai??i??t alone.

Data obtained by The Vancouver Sun reveals the 49 is the worst route in Metro Vancouver for pass-ups, with bus drivers leaving passengers stranded at stops along the route more than 16,000 times last year alone.

And thatai??i??s just a fraction of the more than 200,000 pass-ups that occurred across the region in 2010.

Officials with Coast Mountain Bus Co. say theyai??i??re aware of the pass-up problem and realize the inconvenience it causes customers.

But they also say a combination of factors ai??i?? from financial pressures to route layouts ai??i?? means thereai??i??s very little they can do about it.

ai???For all intents and purposes, we canai??i??t address pass-ups,ai??? said Tom Fink, director of transit service design for Coast Mountain. ai???We would love for everyone who gets to a bus stop to get on a bus. But thatai??i??s just not going to happen.ai???Until recently, the true scale of the pass-up problem in Metro Vancouver was something of a mystery. Bus drivers would occasionally radio in that they were leaving passengers behind, but a precise tally of pass-ups didnai??i??t exist.

Then, in 2008, Coast Mountain began outfitting each of its nearly 1,500 buses with GPS technology.

In addition to keeping track of all the buses in its fleet, and whether theyai??i??re on schedule, the new technology also allowed the company to begin collecting detailed pass-up data for the first time.

A touch-screen device at the front of each bus shows a red ai???Pass Upai??? button that drivers are instructed to press whenever they are full and leave passengers behind at a stop.

Each time the button is pressed, the pass-up is recorded in Coast Mountainai??i??s central computers, detailing the exact time and location it occurred. At the request of The Sun, Coast Mountain released its data for all pass-ups in 2010.

Using that data, The Sun created a series of interactive graphics ai??i?? available at vancouversun.com/passup ai??i?? that illustrates which routes and stops have the biggest problems with pass-ups.

Not surprisingly, the data shows pass-ups are primarily a rush-hour issue. And they are most severe during the height of the morning rush between 8 and 9 a.m., what Coast Mountain calls the ai???peak of the peak.ai???

Another smaller spike occurs during the afternoon rush between 3 and 6 p.m.

September, when students are still figuring out their schedules, is the busiest month of the year for pass-ups. December is the quietest.

Pass-ups are also concentrated among a surprisingly small number of routes. Fully one-quarter of all pass-ups on the entire bus system occur on just four routes: the 49, 99 B-Line, 22 (Knight-MacDonald) and 25 (Brentwood Station-UBC).

Why those four?

You might think routes with the most pass-ups would also be those with the most passengers. But of the four worst pass-up routes, only one ai??i?? the 99 ai??i?? is among Coast Mountainai??i??s five busiest routes.

And route 20 (Victoria-Downtown), the second-busiest route on the whole system after the 99, doesnai??i??t even crack the Top 10 for pass-ups.

Rather than sheer passenger volume, transit officials say what causes pass-ups is actually uneven demand: huge spikes in traffic either at particular times of day or in particular locations.

Katherine McCune, manager of service planning for Coast Mountain, said routes that serve post-secondary institutions are a particular challenge. Thatai??i??s because students who need to get to campus for the start of class all pile on buses within the same half-hour window and then cram on again when the last class ends for the day.

Other routes are busy in certain sections but not others, making it difficult for Coast Mountain to determine how many buses to put on the route. For example, the data shows that while the 49 is extremely crowded between Victoria and Cambie, it experiences virtually no pass-ups west of Cambie on its way to the Dunbar Loop and the University of B.C.

Ray Hamilton, supervisor of service analysis for Coast Mountain, said another problem is bus routes that serve rapid-transit stations.

Because so many passengers get on and off at such stops, drivers often have to wait several minutes to ensure everyone has a chance to get off and on. That can cause the next bus in line to catch up.

This bunching of buses can throw the routeai??i??s schedule badly out of whack, create large gaps between buses, and make the problem of pass-ups even worse.

Hamilton said Coast Mountain is working with bus drivers to address the issue, encouraging them to maintain consistent spacing along their route.

Coast Mountain says pass-ups affect only a tiny fraction of the hundreds of thousands of people who use its buses every day. And it notes pass-ups are most common on routes in Vancouver, where the next bus is usually no more than five or 10 minutes away.

However, Plancke, who usually commutes in the late morning, said it doesnai??i??t take many pass-ups to play havoc with a commuterai??i??s life.

ai???When I get passed up, thereai??i??s 10 minutes out of my day,ai??? he said. ai???If I get passed up by another [bus], Iai??i??ll get to work by the skin of my teeth. I have to double my trip time just to make sure Iai??i??m not late.ai???

Don MacLeod, president of the bus driverai??i??s union, said his members tell him the problem of pass-ups and overcrowding has been getting worse each year.

And itai??i??s making driversai??i?? jobs increasingly unpleasant, as they bear the brunt of passenger complaints.

He also suspects Coast Mountainai??i??s figures likely understate the problem, since many drivers he knows have simply given up recording pass-ups.

ai???A lot of drivers donai??i??t use that button because, month after month … nothing changes,ai??? he said.Solving the problem of pass-ups would seem to be relatively straightforward: add more buses.

But Coast Mountain insists itai??i??s not that simple.

The companyai??i??s budget is dictated by TransLink, which funds a set number of ai???service hoursai??? each year.

Those hours went up about 20 per cent between 2005 and 2009, but havenai??i??t risen since.

That means bus service in Metro is essentially a zero-sum game.

ai???Weai??i??re not holding anything back,ai??? said McCune. ai???If weai??i??re putting more service out, there will be less scheduled service [somewhere else], because the pot stays fixed.ai???

And even if TransLink increased its bus budget tomorrow, Coast Mountain says, there are a series of infrastructure issues that make a quick fix for the problem almost impossible.

For example, one of the easiest ways to increase capacity on a bus route without hiring more drivers is to buy long, articulated buses that can hold many more passengers than a standard bus.

Unfortunately, the approach to many bus stops is too short to handle such buses without sticking out into the road and blocking traffic. And many routes, designed decades ago, have bus loops so tight the long buses canai??i??t make it through.

Coast Mountain said its bus depots are also nearly full, meaning thereai??i??s literally nowhere to park more buses, even if they could afford them.

Given those infrastructure challenges, said Fink, addressing the pass-up problem would require major investments right across the system ai??i?? like building brand-new bus depots ai??i?? and take anywhere from two to five years to roll out.

ai???I donai??i??t think weai??i??ll ever fix routes like the 49 and 99,ai??? he said. ai???Itai??i??s physically impossible. And if it was physically possible it would be hugely expensive.ai???

One glimmer of hope on the horizon is TransLinkai??i??s new Compass smart card, launching in 2013.

The card will make it possible to vary fares throughout the day, such as offering discounts for people who commute in the late morning, after the worst of the rush hour is over.

If those incentives encourage some passengers to leave for work a little bit later, or a little bit earlier, that could help smooth out the peaks in demand on the bus system, thereby reducing pass-ups.

ai???The great thing about the new system is that it provides much greater flexibility for us to make these kinds of changes,ai??? Mike Madill, TransLinkai??i??s vice-president in charge of Compass, explained in an email.

In the meantime, Coast Mountain says itai??i??s doing what it can to address pass-ups.

It has a tiny contingent of reserve buses, called ai???trippers,ai??? that it can deploy in extreme circumstances, such as when an unexpectedly large group of foot passengers arrives at the Tsawwassen ferry terminal.

The company is engaged in a long-term ai???service optimizationai??? program designed to, over time, shift buses from low-performing routes to more popular ones.

And, occasionally, it finds a few extra buses to spare.

After the Olympics, Coast Mountain had 20 surplus articulated buses left over from when the Canada Line replaced the 98 B-Line.

Last fall, it put those buses on routes where it thought theyai??i??d do the most good, said Fink, including eight on the 49, ai???the sorest point of the system.ai???

Plancke said the new buses have made a noticeable difference to his daily commute.

As has his decision to walk an extra few blocks to Knight Street, where, since so many people get on and off, buses donai??i??t seem to pass by quite as often.

ai???Itai??i??s still a crush load. Iai??i??m right in everyoneai??i??s face when I get on that bus,ai??? said Plancke. ai???But I havenai??i??t been late to work in almost a month now.ai???