More News about Trams vs. Buses

Writing my previous post caused wordpress to amusingly automatically create a link to a pro-tram blog in Edinburgh (a very nice city that I have visited – I went to the Haymarket train depot of First Scotrail).

This link caused me to discover that similar discussions have been held in Edinburgh and West London precisely about this topic. They write about it far more elegantly than I ever could! The result – Trams are what are needed.
To be fair here is the other side of the discussion: Pro-Trolley bus

I have to say that the picture in the pro-trolley bus is more like a rubber-tired tram. These have been tried in a few French towns Clermont-Ferrand (home of Michlenin), Nancy (disaster of a project), and Caen with not very much success.  In fact these trams-on-wheels are no cheaper than a real tram.

Nobody is saying that trams should be everywhere in the city. They are desperately needed on the routes such as Cote-des-neiges, Parc, Pie IX, Notre Dame, Cote-Vertu/Henri Bourassa where buses cannot provide a quality service even though there is (at peak times) a bus every five minutes.
The problem in many cities is the “metro or bust” phenomenon.  Metro’s are only needed on routes where really high capacity is needed.  Anything else is served by buses.  Pushing metro extensions and nothing else generally ensures that the project doesn’t happen because the projected ridership is simply not there to make the project viable.  In the mean time, car use and urban sprawl continue to rise.

What is needed is a medium capacity service (at medium cost). That is where the tram comes in!

Trolley Buses aren’t the solution to Montreal’s transit needs

There has been lots of talk about using trolley buses instead of trams for Montreal’s plan de transport.  I’m not one of them.   Trolley buses have fewer advantages than people expect. On a one-to-one replacement basis, they are just buses that don’t emit CO2.

Being simply buses that run on electricity, they have the same disadvantages as diesel buses.

Trolleys buses are no faster than regular diesel buses. Therefore will be no more likely to convince people to change their travel habits.

Trolley buses require two contact wires above the bus resulting in complicated and ugly wiring. Trams, since they use a pantograph with current return in the rails, only need a single wire resulting in a much more harmonious integration with the city.

In terms of greenhouse gas emissions, regular diesel buses have considerable advantages over cars already. For an urban environment these are the estimated energy consumption and emissions:

Transport Type	kJ/pass*km	gCO2/pass*km
Car (single occupant)	2100	143
Diesel Bus (full)	567	40
Diesel-Electric Hybrid Bus (full):	567	24
Electric Bus(full)	567	0
Tram (full)	300	0

Sources:
Hydro Quebec and STM

From a greenhouse gas reduction point of view, we need to get people out of their cars. Simply replacing diesel buses with electric (or even hybrid) ones will do very little to convince people to leave their cars at home.

As shown in the table above, Trams also use roughly half as much energy as a bus of any type. Last year, the STM spent 40 million dollars in fuel but only 23 million in electricity for the metro.

Labour costs are a very considerable factor in the operating costs of the STM. According to their 2009 budget, salaries account for 63.7% of the operating costs. Trams are one way of improving the passenger to driver ratio and reducing labour costs since they can transport more people and can even be coupled together to form a double length train but still operated by just one person. Of course, I would want to see those drivers assigned to other routes to improve the overall level of service.

Trams are matched only by metros in the speed in which people can get on and off:

• A 30m tram will typically have 6 wide doors for entry/exit.
• Regular Buses have 1 exit and 1 entrance/exit
• The articulated Buses have 2 exits and 1 entrance/exit

This is another of the reasons why Trams can travel faster – they spend less time stopped picking up passengers.

Trams are definitely the way to go. Lets stop talking about it and just do it!

STM gives an early Christmas present to Families

Note: No, I haven’t disappeared or died.  I’ve been busy working on this.

Starting on December 6th, up to 5 children will be able to travel for free on the STM network during weekends and holidays if they are accompanied by an adult.

This type of program was requested several months ago by a municipal politician (sorry can’t find a reference) and it seems that it worked.

I will definitely take advantage of this program as I like to bring my children downtown on the weekend.   But when I travel with my wife we often take the car because it is cheaper.

My situation:

2 parents (1 with a CAM) + 1 child (7 years old) + 1 child (4 years old)

• Round trip cost before: 6.16 $
• Round trip cost now: 4 $

With just me (with a CAM) & my children

• Round trip cost before: 2.16 $
• Round trip cost now: FREE

I’m sure lots of other parents will come to the same conclusion!

Here are the announcements:

STM (French)
STM (English)
Le Devoir

New and Improved Highway Notre-Dame?

The MTQ has announced improvements to their Notre-Dame Highway plan which are just a grab-bag of things that will happen anyway or things that don’t cost much to do.  The fundamental existence of the highway is not questioned at all.

To me, it further demonstrates how cynical the MTQ is in selling this project to the population.

Here is the list of improvements in all their glory with my thoughts about each one:

Extra High Occupancy Lane in each direction

• Now there will be a dedicated taxi/HOV lane in addition to the dedicated bus lane in each direction
• The HOV lane will only require 2 people per car to qualify – Nothing special here. Many cities require 3 occupants.
• How many of the cars travelling on the highway would have had 2 occupants anyway?  The Montreal Board of Trade in their December 2004 report used the rate of 1.26 occupants/car. 
• This means that 25% of the cars will have 33% percent of the lanes the day after the highway opens – not much to brag since people are already car pooling even without the incentive. 
• This will improve travel time for a car-pooler in the short term – until drivers re-adjust.

The Notre-Dame Highway will be integrated with the Pie-IX bus corridor Project

• The MTQ is now taking credit for the STM/AMT Pie-IX SRB project!!
• Even if Notre-Dame Highway doesn’t happen, the SRB would still use Notre-Dame to get to the city centre. 
• This is really stretching the truth to imagine that the SRB is even related to the highway.

Pilot Project for Photo radar on Notre-Dame

• This has nothing to do with the highway at all!
• This will only be a mobile installation that can easily be moved to another location.

Traffic Calming Measures in Hochelaga-Maisonneuve

• Here the City is repeating its commitment to spend 150M$ to calm the traffic on the neighboring streets.
• This is not new money – just a re-announcement of old money.

Improvements in frequency for the 22, 34, and 150 bus lines.

• There is no reason to get excited about this since it has nothing to do with the highway either!  The last STM meeting also announced improvements to the 515, 470, 194, 268, and 220. 
• Are these also because the MTQ increased funding for the STM?  Who’s to say that the funding might disappear in the future once the project has started?  
• The STM will increase service where it is needed and decrease service where it is not.  If the 22, 34 and 150 need extra buses it is because the ridership is calling for it.

Larger Parks

• The concrete slab over the highway will be slightly bigger than before to improve access to Bellerive and Morgan/Champetre.
• I live near the Decarie Highway and I can assure you that nobody will want to play in a park next to a 8 lane highway except undesirable elements.

A Steering Committee will be formed

• Is there a project that costs 750$M that doesn’t have a steering committee?  This is approaching contortionism.

These announcements are nothing more than very minor cosmetic changes or completely unassociated announcements.   This project has to be stopped!

 

STM Hybrid Buses on the Road!

The STM hybrid buses operating out of the Lasalle garage have been seen around NDG for the past week or so and I got to ride on one of them this afternoon.

You can identify them by the big hybrid sticker on the side that looks like an electricity plug (no they are not plug-in hybrids though) and by the much bigger bump on the roof. According to the STM, there are 8 buses being used for a trial (bus numbers 28-701 to 28-708)

Here is the STM announcement.

As we were driving along, I asked the driver what they were like and he seemed to be pretty impressed by the performance.

• 40% cut in fuel consumption (50L/100km compared to 80L of a typical bus).
• Very quiet operation.  Up to about 30km/h the bus is entirely electric.
• The transmission blends the two power sources depending on the speed and acceleration required
• Regenerative braking recharges the batteries when slowing down (trains can have this feature too)
• The ride seemed very smooth and I could barely hear the diesel engine cutting in when it reached 30km/h (I was in the front however).
• A great benefit for pedestrians nearby: No great cloud of diesel fumes when the bus leaves the stop!

The technical details can be found here.

I hope the STM buys more!

Cote Vertu bus terminal

Is it just me or does anyone else think that the new arrangement of the bus terminal at Cote Vertu is very poorly organized?

 Of the 7 doors available most of the passengers going to/from the buses and the metro use only 1.

It seems to me that most terminating buses use the two “descente seulement” stops on Gothier.  Passengers then walk beside Blvd Cote Vertu to get into the station.  Only a few buses stop at the stop next to the double doors in the new section of the station that was built for the bus terminal.

What gives?