Transit Service Discussion (Articulated/Conventional/Shuttle/Skytrain/Seabus)

[Phillip]

10 hours ago, Express691 said:

Until further notice:

22nd St Station:

410 and the 418 to Bay 4 (they formerly used Bay 8).
340 and the 388 to Bay 7 (they formerly used Bay 4).
128 and the 155 to Bay 8 (they formerly used Bay 7).

The stop assignment change is because of concerns about space restrictions of the double decker buses using bay 4.

[Umm_FLIP]

why do some SB 22s start service on 41st EB and turn right onto knight?

[Transit Guy]

51 minutes ago, Umm_FLIP said:

why do some SB 22s start service on 41st EB and turn right onto knight?

I don’t know if any peak trips start at 41st, but early morning start trips go down 41st because the Knight St Bridge underpass is only accessible in the SB direction. (why not 49th? Who knows)

[captaintrolley]

36 minutes ago, Transit Guy said:

I don’t know if any peak trips start at 41st, but early morning start trips go down 41st because the Knight St Bridge underpass is only accessible in the SB direction. (why not 49th? Who knows)

Probably 41st from when this route may have operated out of Oakridge. (just guessing here).

[dover5949]

51 minutes ago, Transit Guy said:

I don’t know if any peak trips start at 41st, but early morning start trips go down 41st because the Knight St Bridge underpass is only accessible in the SB direction. (why not 49th? Who knows)

It's to provide additional service between 41st & Marine at Knight. 

The first 2 trips on Sundays & Holidays start NB at 41st & Knight at 614am & 632am

[Transit Guy]

On 4/2/2024 at 11:02 AM, Transit Guy said:

According to alerts, Phibbs Exchange is expected to fully open on April 11th.  

Bay Assignments: 

Bay 3 - 214 Blueridge

Bay 4 - 209/210 Upper Lynn Valley

Bay 5 - 211 Seymour/212 Deep Cove

Bay 6 - R2

Bay 7 - 209/210/211/214 Burrard Stn

Bay 8 - 245

Bay 9 - 28

Bay 10 - 130/222

Bay 11 - 232

Bay 12 - 215

Bay 13 - 227

Also, service changes are posted. 23 conventional overload trips are mentioned.

Now the alerts page is saying that Phibbs is opening late April, no specific date yet.

[Express691]

UBC - Block Party requires two specials from VTC and two more from BTC 2000-2400. Operate on supervisor's instruction.

[TransitCurling]

As a follow-up to my comments on the T-Comm sightings (as this belongs here rather than there), if the 8100s at PTC are going to BTC then what is changing in terms of route assignments?  I've added up all the changes I knew of that have been posted somewhere on here and something is still missing because there doesn't seem to be the right number of net gains/losses at each depot (I am of the understanding that each depot is "full").

• 25 - ~20 artics out of VTC (assuming not all of the currently 30+ runs are being converted, plus service levels are dropping)
• 44 - 3-4 artics out of VTC, rest BTC
• 143/145 - 8-10 artics out of BTC
• 134/136 - ~6 non-artics out of BTC
• 155 - 1-2 non-artics out of PTC

Therefore, there is a net loss of ~30 non-artics at VTC, a net gain of ~24 artics at VTC, a net gain of ~5 artics and ~6 non-artics at BTC, a net loss of ~8 non-artics at HTC, a net loss of 8-10 artics at PTC, and a net gain of 1-2 non-artics at PTC.  This just doesn't seem sustainable to me, especially the BTC gains.  This also means that many more than just the D40LFs will have to move out of VTC, so I presume a number of the 18300s will go (which no one seems to have mentioned here, I've only seen mention of the D40LFs).

Hopefully someone can please post (with a confirmed source) what they know about the upcoming route depot changes as it doesn't make sense to me right now.

Observation from my first few months posting on here: A lot of people seem to post inside knowledge without posting the source (like the post immediately above this one).  Suggestion: If you are posting inside knowledge, please indicate that it is from "so-and-so" source .

[buizelbus]

4 hours ago, TransitCurling said:

Observation from my first few months posting on here: A lot of people seem to post inside knowledge without posting the source (like the post immediately above this one).  Suggestion: If you are posting inside knowledge, please indicate that it is from "so-and-so" source .

A lot of these inside sources are off the record or for internal consumption only. So it's not really possible to post the source. 

Other times it's just a operator posting directly. This is a forum, not a news article or encyclopaedia, there's not really any need for a confirmed source in most cases.

[9924]

I heard it from an "internal source" 

[TransitCurling]

As a follow-up to a comment in the Garage Transfers thread (think this belongs here more-so than there at this point), someone noted that "any bus is better than no bus".  Is it?  Have any data analyses been done to this regard?  I'm not necessarily disputing this, but my main interest is this logistical stuff in transit, and I would prefer to see a paper where such studies were done (if they exist).  (I will try to do some research, unless anyone knows of papers off-hand.)

I have done analyses with data in a wood products factory (ages ago) and it was by far better, for example, to have one machine completely offline than to have one half-sized one working overtime.  The example I'll give (I'm aware that it's not an apples-to-apples comparison by any means - just an illustration of "not all is what it seems"), is an analysis I did ages ago during my grad studies.  The factory had four machines that ran consecutively (one after the other, cutting slightly more each time), but each could have been interchangeable with one another (i.e., one could have been "missing" and the next one could have picked up the slack by cutting a bit more, but would then run slower).  The business question involved a model and scenario analysis to check if they should do maintenance with one machine completely offline, or use the "backup" machine that could be activated in the place of any of the other machines, but only produced half the output in the same period (was considerably slower to perform the same task).  They, of course, assumed it was better to do that (as did I), but never saw that in practice, hence why we did an analysis.  It was found that the scenario where only three of the machines were running (specifically, IIRC, the 1st, 2nd and 3rd or 2nd, 3rd and 4th - basically meaning consecutive ones) was considerably better for the throughput than adding the backup machine in any position.  Further analysis determined that each of them would ultimately pick up the slack as the operators on each would be able to do a bit more.  But if the "backup" machine was in place, it only had so much ability and would ultimately slow all the others down because they were less efficient.  The scenarios where there were 3 machines running, but with a gap (i.e. 1st, 3rd and 4th, etc.), were not good either, but were still slightly better than adding the backup machine.  Of course, the "best" was the base case with all 4 machines running, by far.  The results surprised all of us initially, but it made more sense as we thought about it.

Therefore, what this would tell me from a "transit" perspective, is that it "could" be a better solution to have the bus ahead run slightly late, and the bus behind run slightly early to even-out the gap, instead of filling in with a more "inferior" (lower capacity) bus.  Then the one ahead would only have to do a little bit more, and the one behind a little bit more - with a smaller bus, it could fill up faster, and result in the back bus needing to do "a lot more" instead of just a little bit.  Again, this is not necessarily apples-to-apples, I'm very aware, and I'd love to be proven wrong here (because the data doesn't lie - if such studies have been done, I'd love to read them).  To me, it just feels like the bus assignments are done "on a whim" without any data backing them up for such situations.  In fact, I seem to recall a sort-of-similar situation when the 49 first started using artics - it was better to have all artics or all short buses, than a mix.  Hence the change to all artics.  That was just something I remember a driver telling me, so could be a bunch of rubbish, but it follows a similar concept.

I never published the study above, it was kept within the organization we worked with and was a small section of my thesis, so unfortunately I can't publish the source (sorry, especially considering my rant the other day).

Please comment!  I love this kind of data and logistical stuff!

On 4/13/2024 at 3:04 AM, 9924 said:

I heard it from an "internal source" 

Are you an operator?  If so, that's a legitimate source, but not all of us know who the operators are around here, hehehe.

[ZümmyZüm]

In theory the idea of staggering service to match headway is ideal but if there is a posted schedule and the public relies on said posted schedule than you're causing a negative effect. 

Sure if Translink said this route operates every 15 min and no posted schedule is given then that works. But in your scenario having a leader leave late and follower leave early you've now caused... (I'll use 14:00-14:30 as an example)

Leader at 14:00 to leave at 14:05 will pick up all 14:00 riders as well as 14:15 passengers who were at the stop earlier causing the 14:00 trip to run significantly late to end point from heavier loads. 

Middle bus at 14:15 canceled. 

Follower at 14:30 to leave at 14:25 then misses everyone at first stop who isn't 6 min early, likely only pick up half of what the 1415 canceled trips would have (because 1400 picked up rest by running late) and because it's now running hot with light loads it can catch up to the 1400 trip likely behind 15 min schedule. 

This then causes a significant tumble effect. The reasoning behind any bus is better than none is simply to mitigate any disruptions to other trips. One may suffer with a cutaway and 'maybe' leave people behind, but that's a far better risk than a canceled trip. Human behavior is wildly unpredictable, so better control the narrative themselves 

 

[Express691]

On 4/17/2024 at 10:20 PM, TransitCurling said:

If so, that's a legitimate source

Respectfully, no - not really

[9924]

On 4/17/2024 at 10:20 PM, TransitCurling said:

If so, that's a legitimate source

They are by far one of the worst sources of information.

[Express691]

155 receiving additional late trips per TL alerts.

This will be really interesting. Shuttles will be used.

[Transit Guy]

On 4/10/2024 at 11:13 AM, Transit Guy said:

Now the alerts page is saying that Phibbs is opening late April, no specific date yet.

Alerts have been updated again, now Phibbs isn’t expected to open until mid to late May:

“Newly renovated Phibbs Exchange is expected to be fully open mid to late May. On the day of opening, there will be new bay assignments for some routes.“

[Express691]

The last SkyTrains will have serviced King George Station until mid-June at the time of posting. 

CMBC wasn't specific on the routing of the outbound 345/394/395 south of 100 Ave at King George since their orientation is incorrect from where they're supposed to continue (the three routes face northbound from king george). They will serve King George bay 5 and then continue on regular route (394) or proceed to EB Fraser, regular route (345/395).

Of course this little detail is only posted at King George and not on the alerts or anywhere on the TL website. smh

[Busmanic92]

If your reading transit app notifications.

Translink says to plan for "extra 15". Okee I'll plan for an extra 15 seconds, extra 15 minutes, extra 15 hours, extra 15 days, extra 15 months....

If you see my screenshot, it says that at the bottom. That's a good way to confuse the crowd LOL

[9924]

1 hour ago, Busmanic92 said:

If your reading transit app notifications.

Translink says to plan for "extra 15". Okee I'll plan for an extra 15 seconds, extra 15 minutes, extra 15 hours, extra 15 days, extra 15 months....

If you see my screenshot, it says that at the bottom. That's a good way to confuse the crowd LOL

You're giving people way too much credit by assuming they'll actually read something longer than a dozen words.  Nah, people today have too much brain rot that they wouldn't even make it to that part of the alert before being triggered and curling up into a safe space to watch their TikTok's.

What an utterly useless generation ...

[Express691]

TSPR is out. Yearly ridership numbers have been released.

Of note is the 323 which is now ranked 12th in annual boardings. 
 

This is a JUMP of over 1.2 million annual boardings from 2.94 to 4.17 million from 2022-2023.

I have yet to analyze the 2, 335, and 502+503.

mmmmm I have yet to find out how the 502/503 combined has performed. 
https://public.tableau.com/app/profile/translink/viz/2023TSPR-BusSeaBusSummaries/TheWorkbook

[Phillip]

It's probably a bit early to post this, but for the September sheet, the PCT R1s are moving to HTC. Also, the 101, 110, and 128 are moving to PCT.

[dre]

if this true of r1 moving to htc the r6 and r1 can just interline at newton exchange

[Express691]

39 minutes ago, dre said:

if this true of r1 moving to htc the r6 and r1 can just interline at newton exchange

not how this works at all, but would be surprising if this is actually the case.

by this logic, you suggest the 25/44/84 should be interlined (there's a reason why they aren't)

[Untitled Transit]

1 hour ago, Express691 said:

not how this works at all, but would be surprising if this is actually the case.

by this logic, you suggest the 25/44/84 should be interlined (there's a reason why they aren't)

I was told you cannot interline something that has less than 10 min frequency. 

[dre]