CityHallNews.com

Elswhere: Los Angeles, California
Bus Rapid Transit Program on a Roll in Tinsel Town
By Sal Gentile

The advent of Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) in New York City has been anything but fast. Since its initial planning phase in Sept. 2004, the Metropolitan Transit Authority (MTA) study of the potential for Bus Rapid Transit in New York City has inched along, and is just this summer paring down the number of test routes it will establish as part of a pilot program in 2008.

In different places, BRT means different things, but certain elements are constant: designated bus lanes, traffic signal priority and expedited boarding at curbside “stations.”

In New York, BRT has long been discussed as an important transit solution.

“New York City is notorious for having very slow bus speeds,” said William Vincent, director of the Bus Rapid Transit Policy Center at Breakthrough Technologies Institute, an independent think tank in Washington, D.C.

But while New York’s BRT program is still riding the local lane to its eventual implementation, other major cities and metropolitan areas nationwide have had successful BRT programs for years.

Spurred by mounting public pressure against funding a citywide rail system and a reputation as one of the most gridlocked cities in the country, Los Angeles began probing the idea of a Bus Rapid Transit system in the late 1990s.

In June 2000, after just 18 months of initial planning and study, Los Angeles implemented its first BRT routes in what eventually became the Metro Rapid transit system. In the years since, the city has designated over 200 miles of Metro Rapid service, and will fully complete the 450-mile system in 2008, the same year New York City will begin laying down its first five test corridors.

The plans currently under consideration in New York City are similar in many ways to the Metro Rapid system, such as having BRT-designated buses receive priority at traffic signals. The proposed New York system would also operate at fewer stops than even the limited express lines already existing, and would help passengers board and disembark more efficiently.

“The Metro Rapid system has been very well received by the public,” said Martha Butler of the Los Angeles MTA, citing a 40 percent increase in ridership on the system’s original two test routes. About a third of that increase, she said, comes from new riders who had never before used public transit.

“Los Angeles has been extraordinarily successful,” agreed Vincent, whose job is to study national bus policy. He added that the Metro Rapid system has “provided phenomenal results for very little money,” attracting new riders who previously drove cars and out-performing the city’s light rail system.

According to Vincent, the biggest hurdle in getting a program underway is gathering the political momentum. Los Angeles is unique in that respect, he said, in that both lawsuits and public referendums hastened its movement toward a BRT system. It also lacks an extensive public rail system, a feature much more popular in New York.

New York is now in the process of picking one route per borough to test out the program, and the MTA intends to have buses in those lanes within two years. No timetable has been set for the implementation of a full system.