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Overview/What is BRT?

Introduction

The worldwide recognition that Curitiba, Brazil has received for its innovative urban planning and related “Surface Metro” bus rapid transit system has induced many elected officials and urban transport planners in the United States to begin considering “BRT” (Bus or Rubber-Tired Rapid Transit) as a potential solution to their respective urban transportation problems.  The discussion below begins with a definition of BRT developed for the Transit Cooperative Research Project (A-23), BRT Implementation Guidelines. We then proceed with some basic information on BRT successes, costs and benefits.

What is BRT?

BRT is a flexible, rubber tired form of rapid transit that combines stations, vehicles, services, running way, and ITS (Intelligent Transportation Systems) elements into a permanently integrated system with a quality image and a unique identity.  BRT applications are designed to be appropriate to the market they serve and their physical surroundings and can be incrementally implemented in a variety of environments, from rights-of-way totally dedicated to transit (surface, elevated, underground) to mixed traffic on streets and highways.

Where has BRT been implemented? 

BRT has been implemented all over the world.  In North America, the best examples of BRT applications include: Boston (Silver Line), Pittsburgh (South, MLK/East and Airport/West Corridors), Miami (South Dade/US-1), Los Angeles (El Monte/I-10, various Metro Rapid Bus lines, Honolulu (City Express!), the San Fernando Valley Orange Line, Las Vegas (Las Vegas Blvd MAX.), Houston (Transitways), Ottawa, Ontario (OC The Transitway), the Vancouver (Line 98B) and York, Ontario (VIVA). The best examples of BRT outside the U.S. are in Curitiba and Sao Paulo Brazil, Quito, Ecuador, Leon, Mexico and Bogotá, Columbia, ; Sidney, Adelaide and Brisbane, Australia; Paris, Nancy and Rouen, , France and Amsterdam and Eindhoven, Holland.

Has it been successful? 

In virtually every fully integrated, full-feature BRT application to date, there has been the same customer, community and developer acceptance observed with the implementation of any high-quality rapid transit mode such as LRT.  Increases in ridership attributed to BRT have ranged as high as 100% or more over the initial application period. For example, transit ridership in Miami-Dade’s South US-1 Corridor has increased from approximately 7,000 daily trips in 1996 before the Miami South Dade Busway opened, to over 14,000 per day today. In Boston, ridership on the Silver Line Phase I corridor doubled to more than 15,000 trips per day in the first 2 years of operation, and many (over 30%) of the BRT riders were former Orange Line subway passengers.

Implementation of Metro Rapid Bus in L.A.’s Wilshire-Whittier and Ventura Blvd. Corridors has resulted in increases of, respectively, 44% and 87% in total corridor bus ridership.  Over one third of the new trips on the Metro Rapid Bus services were made by travelers that did not previously use transit at all before the lines opened.  In the Wilshire-Whittier Corridor, over 90,000 passengers per day are currently made on the Metro Rapid Bus. AC Transit (East Bay in San Francisco Bay Area) experienced a 35% increase in ridership on its San Pablo Blvd Rapid Bus line after one year of operation, and 12% of it riders were former BART passengers.

Benefits of BRT

BRT is the most flexible rapid transit mode.  BRT services can be precisely tailored so that BRT vehicles rather than BRT customers transfer.  BRT vehicles, can be steered or guided mechanically or electronically and can travel in general traffic on any street or highway.  They can also be operated at high speeds safely and reliably on their own dedicated transit ways, without interference from other vehicles.

To guarantee the minimum running way cross section, the highest safety and the best ride quality, BRT vehicles can also be guided mechanically like a rail transit vehicle, or electronically.  Mechanically guided BRT vehicles have been operating for almost twenty years in Essen Germany and Adelaide Australia, and electronically guided BRT operates in Las Vegas, Nevada, Rouen and Clermont-Ferrand, France and Eindhoven, Netherlands.   

BRT generally has modest implementation costs. Though desirable, it is not necessary to construct a fully dedicated transit over the entire distance of a busy corridor to guarantee a high level of speed, safety and reliability.  For example, West Busway BRT users in Pittsburgh enjoy a congestion-free ride at all times of day, over the full 20+ mile distance between the Airport and downtown Pittsburgh --- though only the first approximately eight miles from downtown Pittsburgh Westward are covered by the West or Airport Busway.  I-279 is almost always free flowing over the rest of the distance, meaning that airport passengers and workers have a reliably high speed ride of up to 20 miles long over a corridor that include only eight miles of exclusive rapid transit BRT running way.

Running ways are also invariably cheaper to construct from scratch than rail based modes per unit length because they are simpler.  Their construction can be competitively procured from a much larger number of local firms than other forms of rapid transit.  BRT also does not require elaborate purpose-built signal or power supply systems, and implementation of BRT rarely means construction of totally new, expensive operating and maintenance yards and shops.  Even sophisticated, electronically guided BRT vehicles can be maintained and stored off-line where convenient, e.g., at an existing bus operating and maintenance facility.

BRT vehicles can be conventional, low floor, low noise and low emission buses with a variety of propulsion systems, including conventional clean diesel, CNG spark ignition, hybrid clean diesel, CNG or gasoline or electric trolley. With seating and door configurations optimally suited to the nature of the given market, they can be painted in special livery with special graphics to provide a system identity consistent with the rest of the given line’s stations, running ways, etc.  At the other end of the spectrum, manufacturers around the world are producing special rubber tired, steered or guided rapid transit vehicles.

Irrespective of whether they are conventional buses or purpose built BRT vehicles like NABI’s MetroBus, or New Flyer’s Irisbus’s Civis vehicles or Bombardier’s GLT, BRT vehicles are Invero, specialized BRT vehicles are usually significantly less expensive than other rapid transit vehicles, even adjusted for capacity and service life, for a variety of factors, including component economies of scale, competition, and lower structural strength requirements.   

Only after an application specific analysis that covers the entire transit system, including rapid transit and feeders, can the determination of which rapid transit alternative is the least expensive to implement be made.

At the demand volumes found in most U.S. corridors, BRT can be the least expensive rapid transit mode to operate and maintain.  In the demand volumes found in most US corridor applications, the major operating and cost difference between any form of rapid transit and local bus service is operating speed, not the size of the basic service unit. For example, all things being equal, local buses going 12 miles per hour in mixed traffic, stopping at every street corner, are one half as productive as BRT vehicles or LRT trains making limited stops on a dedicated transit guideway where they might average 24 miles per hour.

The basic unit of capacity for BRT, an individual vehicle of 40 to 82 feet long, is smaller than for many LRT consists. This means that the number of BRT consists and drivers required to carry a given number of passengers past a point can be higher than with rail rapid transit, all thing being equal; however, BRT line-haul services can be integrated with collection/distribution, meaning that the additional “overhead” costs of having separate rapid transit, feeder and circulator services can be eliminated.  Also, the marginal costs of maintenance of way, signals and power for BRT are either non-existent or low. BRT vehicle maintenance costs are also relatively low (adjusted for capacity), and implementation of BRT usually does not mean manning a wholly new maintenance and operations base.  BRT vehicle operations and maintenance can usually be competitively procured from any number of local transit providers.

All things (e.g., fare collection, degree of ROW dedication, number of stops) being equal, LRT will only have lower operating and maintenance costs than BRT per unit ridership if transit volumes are high enough so that savings in line haul vehicle operating personnel (i.e., drivers) offset LRT’s higher fixed maintenance and operating costs.

As is the case for all planning parameters, only after an application specific analysis that covers the entire transit system, including rapid transit and feeders, can a determination be made as to which rapid transit alternative is least expensive to operate (on a per passenger mile (Km) or passenger trip basis) be made. 

BRT has been very successful in attracting new ridership to public transportation.  In virtually every fully integrated, full-feature BRT application to date, there has been the same customer, community and developer acceptance observed with the implementation of any high-quality rapid transit mode such as LRT.  Increases in ridership attributed to BRT have ranged as high as 100% or more over periods as short as one year. For example, transit ridership in Miami-Dade’s South US-1 Corridor has increased from approx. 7,000 daily trips in 1996 before the Miami South Dade Busway opened, to over 15,000 per day today.

Conclusion

BRT has tremendous potential for incremental development, getting rapid transit operating as rapidlyas possible with the least amount of funds while preserving options for latter expansion and upgrading. BRT’s flexibility gives it a unique ability to be implemented incrementally.  Where a particular application would be in the continuum for each BRT element illustrated in the table below is dependant on the parameters of the application environment in terms of: 1) the nature of current and future land use and demographic (population, employment, densities) characteristics; 2) current and expected future transit markets, such as origin to destination patterns, expected rapid transit ridership, both total and maximum load point volumes; 3) right of way (stations and running way) availability and characteristics (e.g., width, length, number and types of intersections, traffic volumes and ownership); and 4) availability of capital, operating and maintenance funds.

Table I: Bus Rapid Transit Element Continuum

Author: Sam Zimmerman