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To put some of the weekend scheduling into perspective, here are the round-trip times for the 1 and MP:

Weekend

1: 150 minutes all day

MP: 75 minutes all day

Weekday

1: 180-192 minutes peak, 171 minutes midday, 150 minutes evening

MP: 84 minutes peak, 80 minutes midday, 75 minutes evening

Both routes are essentially running on their weekday evening schedules even during the busiest parts of the day on weekends. If you factor in heavier weekend traffic, events in downtown and construction, it's not surprising to see both routes struggle during the afternoons on weekends. Although MP schedule is also bit tight, it pales in comparison to the 1 where there is a difference of 21 minutes between weekday and weekend round-trip times.

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On 8/24/2019 at 1:01 AM, downbeat said:

In case anyone ever asks why a grid system is good. ?

 

 

Clearly, they got the wheel spoke system going across the city, but usually wheels have reinforcement across the spokes, not a bunch of useless loops and figure eights...

Totally agree with her. I understand Calgary is suburban and all built on hills with no straight cross-sections anywhere... but they could at least try routing base routes in the cross-sections that exist, and THEN fill in the rest with suburban feeders and circle routes. 

I see they're attempting that with MAX and the 301/302, but overall it would be alot more simplified and easier, if they just had longer suburban loops but more direct connections.

Example from back home, attached. Also note: if anyone was wonder what I was referring to about "branching" routes like Route 1/MP, this is what I meant.

Apologize for the color coding. Winnipeg Transit maps are pretty crude to understand, especially when they're rarely ever updated. ? Route 11 and 66 are baseline routes, 21/22/24/25/65/67 all weekday Express routes, and the rest are all feeders.

Screenshot_20190825-155342_Drive.jpg

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Struggling to find positives in the schedule change coming on Sept. 2, apart from peak service improvements on some routes. I've come up with two so far.

  • Route 3 and the Blue Line should have consistent transfers for most of the day, barring delays, as both routes have a frequency of 16 minutes until evening.
  • Route 5 adds a departure in the early morning on Sundays. Where there is now a 60 minute headway southbound from 78 Ave to the city centre, first thing in the morning, the new schedule cuts the wait time in half.
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The block explorer on Transit55 is now displaying data from the Sept. 2 schedule change.

Looking as some of the scheduling patterns, I believe there is a possibility for fewer articulated buses running weekday evenings on Routes 1, 3, 301 and 302 in the new schedule.

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9 hours ago, downbeat said:

The block explorer on Transit55 is now displaying data from the Sept. 2 schedule change.

Looking as some of the scheduling patterns, I believe there is a possibility for fewer articulated buses running weekday evenings on Routes 1, 3, 301 and 302 in the new schedule.

Some school runs are still not displaying data. Such runs include the 717 and 834 for example.

9 hours ago, downbeat said:

The block explorer on Transit55 is now displaying data from the Sept. 2 schedule change.

Looking as some of the scheduling patterns, I believe there is a possibility for fewer articulated buses running weekday evenings on Routes 1, 3, 301 and 302 in the new schedule.

From the looks of it, there will be some 40 footers running on the 3 during weekday evenings and some peak/off peak trips on the 301.

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5 hours ago, R. Meu said:

Some school runs are still not displaying data. Such runs include the 717 and 834 for example.

If i recall, there are a number of school routes that have been cut for various reasons, including school areas being shuffled. I believe 8 new ones in and 8 out.

 

Given the opening of the high school in Seton last year, now that most students have transitioned, etc, if i recall, a bunch of the Beaverbrook to SE routes, including 717 are no more.

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Also a few observations:

98/453/156 is shuttle midday.  Quite a disappointing move by CT, as on Fridays, they will find the need to have to implement school special trips on the 98 to be able to load kids from Ernest Manning and Western for their early releases.

93/111 have reverted back to shittle midday.

167/168 still are big bus during peak hours.

408 from the looks of it has gone back to big bus except for evenings.

Route 9 now seems to have 1 artic trip in the afternoon from UofC.

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41 minutes ago, TechSpotlight said:

Quite a disappointing move by CT, as on Fridays, they will find the need to have to implement school special trips on the 98 to be able to load kids from Ernest Manning and Western for their early releases.

For what it is worth, there are quite a few regular routes big bus and shuttle where they put in an extra bus out there for a friday early dismissal or any random day early dismissal to accommodate potential student loads.

I remember driving a 3 from wise wood on a special 1130 dismissal and i did a trip between 2 regular keys from sb elbow at 50th (last time point before heritage) to elbow and canyon meadows (back in the day) and back to the garage. Ive been signed on a friday only trip on the route 4 to accommodate diefenbaker. A friday only trip on a 23 to accommodate pearson. Its nothing new regularless of what type bus is out there.

We gotta remember, they had a week and a half to make the hard decisions. If someone said no, you better bet someone had a reason why and an alternative ready to go because they had no time to waste to get the signup changed in 1/10 the time it normally takes to prep a regular signup.

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7 hours ago, downbeat said:

Another random observation:

MAX Orange has reverted to a 16 minute headway during peak hours. It had been tweaked to 15 minutes for the summer.

I guess they're expecting busier traffic volumes on 16th Ave (among the other major roads as well) once the school year starts up and need the extra few minutes of slack time.

That's a shame considering 15 minutes actually allows for consistent transfers from many feeder routes.

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7 hours ago, Gsgeek540 said:

We gotta remember, they had a week and a half to make the hard decisions. If someone said no, you better bet someone had a reason why and an alternative ready to go because they had no time to waste to get the signup changed in 1/10 the time it normally takes to prep a regular signup.

And this is why I’ve been reminding people here to blame the politicians if any of the decisions Transit made wasn’t the correct/suitable one or if there are out and out mistakes or things overlooked. I really, really hope things get finessed/optimized in time for the November/December schedule change, perhaps Transit will have the chance to juggle some things around and restore a few service hours here and there.

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40 minutes ago, yvarushin said:

The "what we heard" report is now available for the upcoming SW MAX changes.

 

https://www.calgary.ca/engage/Documents/Transit-Review/2019-08-19_2019TSR_WWH_FINAL.pdf

Shame how little respondents there are for many of the smaller routes. When you have less than 10 responses for a proposed route change, it really is quite hard to accurately judge how well that route will be received outside of implementing it and seeing how good or poor the ridership is.

Even from last year's network changes, there's still obvious flaws with certain routes and I suspect we won't be seeing any big changes until a few more signups have passed so they can better gauge the ridership patterns. Last year was kind of weird since the changes happened partway through the school year with hiccups for many routes that weren't fixed until the spring signup.

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7 hours ago, Transit Fan said:

Shame how little respondents there are for many of the smaller routes. When you have less than 10 responses for a proposed route change, it really is quite hard to accurately judge how well that route will be received outside of implementing it and seeing how good or poor the ridership is.

Even from last year's network changes, there's still obvious flaws with certain routes and I suspect we won't be seeing any big changes until a few more signups have passed so they can better gauge the ridership patterns. Last year was kind of weird since the changes happened partway through the school year with hiccups for many routes that weren't fixed until the spring signup.

They should send these surveys to local businesses and major employers/retail destinations. Especially because if Cadillac Fairview (Market & Chinook) has so many stores and employment/sales generated, the stores in the mall, their employees and others would directly benefit from Calgary Transit planning and routing. That and the responses might be much higher, and of a higher quality. If workers can't get to work, especially because Calgary is so reliant on cars, then its quite the issue for unemployment.

As for the routes in general - my transit focus now is in my new place near Seton, but it wouldn't hurt to have more crosstown routes. Particularly ones that go from A to B. Maybe with Max Yellow, they can try to connect MYellow, the South LRT, MTeal, and dare I say direct NE LRT/MP connections - with a distinct crosstown express MAX line?

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59 minutes ago, armorand said:

They should send these surveys to local businesses and major employers/retail destinations. Especially because if Cadillac Fairview (Market & Chinook) has so many stores and employment/sales generated, the stores in the mall, their employees and others would directly benefit from Calgary Transit planning and routing. That and the responses might be much higher, and of a higher quality. If workers can't get to work, especially because Calgary is so reliant on cars, then its quite the issue for unemployment

I whole heartedly agree and respect your advocacy for your fellow riders.

 

With that being said, for what, if anything, its worth, i used to run a store in chinook and Cadillac Fairview has strict, near nazi, policies regarding such...campaigning...ugh i cant think of the right word... We had some sort of neighbourhood survey our campaign once in my restaurant career. We had issues with it because of the extra work it made for me having to explain it but how if we misrepresent the information, we are evil. And we were accused of misrepresenting the information by answering a question about something that had nothing to do with our restaurant that was being advertised that the customer needed the answer to before giving input.

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Here's an idea, have some engagement opportunities on affected buses or at relevant LRT stations.

Changing the SW feeder buses? Would've been nice to spend a day at Southland station with some displays and surveys available.

Changing the 411? Maybe spend a day on that bus and talk to the affected passengers. You'll surely get more than a handful of responses. 

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On 8/26/2019 at 10:36 AM, downbeat said:

The block explorer on Transit55 is now displaying data from the Sept. 2 schedule change.

Looking as some of the scheduling patterns, I believe there is a possibility for fewer articulated buses running weekday evenings on Routes 1, 3, 301 and 302 in the new schedule.

So it turns out …

Route 1: same number of 40-foot buses as before but they are running one key later. (Last two westbound buses from Forest Lawn, including the half-trip ending downtown, as opposed to the second- and third-last departures under previous schedules.) The change could be helpful, as the 23:45 WB timed departure from city centre is sometimes busier than one would guess at that hour. That run used to be done by a 40 foot bus but appears to be served by a 60-foot bus now.

Route 3: two 40-foot buses operating until end of service

Route 301: one 40-foot bus operating until end of service 

Route 302: All shuttles in the evening

Info from Transit55

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Some things are different that I noticed from before June:

Route 3 now has two after-PM-peak 40 footer keys

Route 12 is back to big bus all night

Route 36 is now shuttle evenings and all day Sunday

Route 57 is now shuttle later in the evening and on weekends

Route 153 is now shuttle later in the evening

Route 301 now has one key that is a Spring Gardens bus that comes off route 20 after 8:30pm

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