General BRT discussion

[downbeat]

I really do hope no one tries to park there. For one, there is no longer any indication of a ParkPlus zone number anywhere near the 1/307 and 10/13/90/411 bus stops.

As for the Brookfield Place plaza being used as a waiting area, it's not bad when the weather is nice, what with the stone benches @Transit Fan mentioned, and the tables and chairs that also dot the space. (EDIT: Oops, it looks like the tables and chairs are gone for the winter.) There is a noticeable wind tunnel effect in the area, so the coldest days of wintertime are always … interesting, haha, if last winter was anything to go by.

There's also a (small) shelter set up for the mid-block stop, which could be used for EB 1/307 riders in a pinch.

[Transit Fan]

Woo, first commute on the MP on #6038. The 7:13 trip from East Hills was pretty busy.

It could just be due to day 1 slowdowns but the MP may have schedule adherence issues. Mine was slightly late arriving at Brookfield this morning. Transit55 shows a few behind schedule as well. Those crazy layovers at the two ends doesn't seem so crazy anymore. 60 minute round trips during weekends and weekday off-peak may be tight if there's any congestion at all in downtown and/or Inglewood. I guess that's why they went with 66 minute roundtrips at 22 minute headways for weekday mid-day trips.

Not surprisingly:

• there was a bit of confusion at WB 52nd St since the 1 doesn't stop at the MAX station
• a truck was parked right at the MP stop at Brookfield

 

[downbeat]

There appear to have been some problems with MAX Purple and Route 1 this afternoon. 

I used Route 1 today before all the issues … A+ for the transitway bridge between Inglewood and Forest Lawn.

[yvarushin]

Every launch should have its set of bugs. 

I'm really looking forward to trying out MAX Purple.

[Transit Fan]

Kept an eye on Transit55 all day and both routes have really been struggling to maintain their schedule even during mid-day. The all-day MP keys were already 10-50 minutes late going into rush hour at around 3pm.

The ride home was a complete disaster. Waited at 1 St SW at 4:40pm and neither 1 nor MP showed up until around 5, and it was only a 40 foot MP which was quickly filled up. On the actual ride back, I started to see why, we must've hit every red light along the transitway. The bus signal priority at 19 St, 26 St and 28 St didn't seem to be working as we needed to wait a full light cycle for nearly all of them. The lights on 17th Ave weren't so great either since you have to wait for left-turn and u-turn traffic to go first if waiting at a red light.

I got off at 44th Street and there was a convoy of multiple 60 foot 1's and other MP's behind us.

Hopefully they get the signal issues worked out. Even then, i'm worried that they might've made the schedules a little too tight.

[dre]

Will the buses rolling on Max routes will these buses have a different colors livery on buses  on these routes

[Gsgeek540]

6 minutes ago, dre said:

Will the buses rolling on Max routes will these buses have a different colors livery on buses  on these routes

Aside from the 3 buses that were wrapped to promote the launch of MAX, no.

[dre]

wow they spend 304 million and they pretty up some buses so these buses stand out

[yvarushin]

7 minutes ago, dre said:

wow they spend 304 million and they pretty up some buses so these buses stand out

Yeah, that's what they did 

[downbeat]

I was able to use Max Orange today, westbound from Rundle to Brentwood, during the p.m. rush hour. The trip took about 45 minutes.

Given the time of day, the traffic wasn't bad at all, but the bus felt like it was crawling along 16th Avenue west of Deerfoot till about North Hill. We were going maybe 30 km/hr,  40 km/hr at most. I understand not wanting to speed when approaching a red light but this was happening even when we were coming up on a some green signals. Cars were passing us all the way along that part of the trip. We also stopped at Centre Street for a few minutes because it's a time point.

Rundle to Renfrew (Russet Road) was super quick, easily the zippiest part of the trip.

[downbeat]

So from Transit55, it looks like MAX Purple and Route 1 have yet to fully recover from whatever ailed them today. Does Transit have any leeway to call on a spare or something like that, when buses are hopelessly behind and there is a significant gap in service?

[1604]

I rode the first MAX Purple into downtown this morning. It took about 6 minutes longer to make it through the transitway than the schedule indicates - and that was with generally fast station stops and not having to stop at one of the stations. Lots of red lights, including a couple where it was a pretty lengthy wait (26 St SE and 19 St SE). Glad they're aware of the issues and are working on getting them fixed.

That said, it was still a fun ride. I love the stations and ROW along 17th, and getting to fly over Deerfoot at 80km/h was great. A+ indeed!

 

This evening I rode MAX Orange from 31 Street to Saddletowne. It felt like a pretty quick ride, despite a 6 minute wait at Rundle - I love how direct it is. I can see how it would feel painfully slow if you're always under the speed limit though.

 

I also rode a U2 with an entire bank of ads promoting MAX Purple - great to see marketing for the service.

[Transit Fan]

Took an earlier 87 to try out a different Max. A few people got off at WB 61 St. Then at WB 52nd St, half the people that got off stayed curbside to wait for a 1, the other half went for the Max. A 1 showed up first and was waiting at the red light on SB 52nd which prompted a few people to dart across the intersection to catch it. A minute later, while people were getting onto the 1, two Max Purple's arrived (one was about 12 minutes late). There ended up being three buses running bumper to bumper. Lights still don't seem to be giving much priority at 19th and 26th as of this morning which is frustrating when you see all the regular east-west traffic zipping right along.

For some good news, overheard some folks talking and reception to the new stations and service seems positive. Pretty much everyone is perplexed at how much time is spent at red lights however. Also recognized a few people who used to take the 125 that got off a NB 23 at 17th Ave to catch the Max so travel patterns are slowly changing.

[downbeat]

To avoid the problem of MAX Purple vs. Route 1 coming first, perhaps Calgary Transit should actively encourage people to transfer at 44th St. rather than 52nd St. … if there are any Transit folks visiting here, steal my idea! 

As for the transitway, buses should not be running slower than they would in mixed traffic. Period. We didn't spend millions of dollars on a reserved lane so buses would operate less reliably. Also, were the lights working properly while drivers were being trained on the transitway? I'm starting to wonder if the system should have been launched on the Saturday of a three-day weekend, instead of a regular Monday … they would have been able to iron out the kinks, as they put it, while minimizing the impact of paying customers.

P.S. Looks like half the buses on Route 1 are either somewhat/very late at this hour. With that, plus longer midday headways now, looks like I should plan on leaving even earlier than I had wanted in hopes of catching a bus …

P.P.S. There is a bus-bunching problem with MAX Purple, too. Transit 55 show one of the three buses on the series is operating 24 minutes late — essentially the length of a one-way trip — right next to a bus that's on time. I really do hope those kinks get worked out. This is getting silly.

[Transit Fan]

Encouraging people to walk 8 blocks west as a workaround isn't really the right solution. The original design of the transitway was never intended to accommodate any buses entering/leaving in the middle of transitway. One idea I had was, if the stop line for the eastbound Max was painted further back, would that be enough space for a #1 to turn into the WB station from SB 52nd or would that be a tight squeeze still?

Regarding the signals, when the one at 19th St was first installed. Regular traffic from NB 19th merging onto EB 17th Ave (as well as EB 17th to SB 19th) had a very long red. With no right on red's allowed, it was really backed up. However, the good thing was that the transit light was green the entire time. In an attempt to fix that, they recently gave that movement a lot more green time. The downside is that transit is stuck waiting for a green now. I was under the impression that there were going to be sensors that detected when a bus was arriving and let the bus through relatively quick without needing to go through multiple regular light cycles. Either that system isn't working properly yet or it was never intended to work like that.

[Gsgeek540]

Signals engineers have been on scene the last 2 days working with transit engineers and transit technology staff working on signal timings etc. They will work directly and collaboratively with each other over the next couple weeks to diagnose and correct the timing issues that exist.

[downbeat]

46 minutes ago, Transit Fan said:

Encouraging people to walk 8 blocks west as a workaround isn't really the right solution. 

Sorry, I was not clear about my suggestion. I was trying to say people transferring from the 87 could perhaps stay on the bus until 44th St. S.E. before transferring to a transitway service. 

[Vancouver]

On 11/19/2018 at 9:53 PM, downbeat said:

So from Transit55, it looks like MAX Purple and Route 1 have yet to fully recover from whatever ailed them today. Does Transit have any leeway to call on a spare or something like that, when buses are hopelessly behind and there is a significant gap in service?

I'm surprised they still haven't figured out the traffic light timings on 17th Ave SE. It's midday 3 days in and looking at T55, there's still Max Purples and Route 1s that are over 15 to 20 minutes late. Not a great first impression to riders if you are consistently late on a BRT service that is supposed to be faster to bring people out of their cars.

[Transit Fan]

I checked last night before bed and the 1's and Max Purple's were still running late, at 11pm!

The lights on 17th Ave actually aren't too terrible since traffic along 17th gets a pretty lengthy green time for the most part. Although, it can be kind of rough if you end up hitting multiple red's in a row. The biggest offenders are easily the lights at 19th, 26th and 28th Streets. From the last 3 days, i'd estimate that a good 5 minutes have been spent waiting at those 3 lights combined which effectively negates any time savings you'd gain from using the transitway, especially if traffic in the regular lanes isn't that busy to being with.

The other thing is that buses aren't able to pass each other. When there's a group of buses bunched up, if one bus in front is taking the brunt of picking up and dropping off passengers, all those empty buses behind are kind of stuck until they all leave the transitway section.

Some good news, it looks like they're converting the right-hand EB lane at 9th Ave and 15 St SE into a right-turn only + bus-only straight-thru lane. Previously, during afternoon peak hours, the bus-only lane ended before that intersection and cars were allowed to use that lane to proceed straight through.

[lucx]

There are some interesting tid bits from the mayor's speech at the grand opening.

• SW BRT may be called Max Brown, though I think Yellow or Gold would be better primary options before resorting to tertiary colours.
• The idea was briefly floated to name the lines after fruit: Max Grape, Max Lime and Max Tangerine.
• The Green line is looking for $3 Billion to complete the route to NorthPointe and Seton (23:55 in the video).

 

[downbeat]

I check Transit55 religiously ... this may be some of the worst schedule adherence for Route 1 outside of a snow storm or some other emergency — every bus except one is late. And Max Purple is having a rough time this afternoon, too. (These screenshots from a few minutes ago.)

Does any one know if Transit is able to deploy floaters to offer supplemental service?

[Transit Fan]

Suppose they get the signalling issues fixed and we're still having trouble with keeping on schedule, have they ever patched a schedule prior to the following signup before?

I'm not talking shifting a few times here and there, but a near re-write of the schedule to allow for extra slack time.

[Gsgeek540]

29 minutes ago, Transit Fan said:

Suppose they get the signalling issues fixed and we're still having trouble with keeping on schedule, have they ever patched a schedule prior to the following signup before?

I'm not talking shifting a few times here and there, but a near re-write of the schedule to allow for extra slack time.

Many times... Several on the 145/445 as the route got extended. When the route 59 came into play, the 85/59 got completely rewritten 2 weeks into the winter signup in 2016 and they did add any additional time despite the extra route. When the route 6 was shortended to westbrook when west lrt opened, they rewrote the entire schedule about a month in due to schedule adherence issues. They rewrote 21/55/71/95 schedules mid day mid signup in 2016 to allow a 5th bus to give a little leeway to the schedule for the 4 others. Etc etc etc.

 

As manager of planning stated in Calgary Sun article today, this is nothing new. It’s growing pains with changing a significant percentage of service. Like any responsible business would do in such a change as we have seen, they have front line and behind the scenes staff monitoring every little detail of the changes and making changes to make more efficient in the coming days and weeks.

[Transit Fan]

5 minutes ago, Gsgeek540 said:

Many times... Several on the 145/445 as the route got extended. When the route 59 came into play, the 85/59 got completely rewritten 2 weeks into the winter signup in 2016 and they did add any additional time despite the extra route. When the route 6 was shortended to westbrook when west lrt opened, they rewrote the entire schedule about a month in due to schedule adherence issues. Etc etc etc.

Thanks! Glad to hear they do it if and when the need arises.

[BCT-3122-D800-10240]

A few photos of 6067 and 6093 on the MAX PURPLE from earlier today although not a single photo I took showed "MAX PURPLE" on the signs aside from "MP" on the rear sign......