You've probably heard that Cherriots and their consultant is writing a new long range plan. They have a new open house and survey.
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| Existing Conditions, December 2021 |
One of the primary questions is whether area residents prioritize frequency or coverage. Frequency is more buses with shorter wait times essentially on the existing network; coverage is expanding the network for more or longer routes extending farther into neighborhoods.
It is interesting that the question is not regarded as settled. In two previous surveys, both presented to the Board this week, one survey of the general public and one of actual riders, frequency was the highest priority.
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| Frequency is the top priority |
People who ride transit now aren't asking so much for lower fares or fareless transit. They want shorter wait times and more frequent buses. Nor are they asking for more or longer routes for greater coverage.
- For a primer on the fundamental tradeoffs, see "The Transit Ridership Recipe" at a former (and possibly again) consultant's blog, Human Transit.
It will be interesting to see if the latest round of surveying turns up anything different.
As with parking, a lot of calls for free bus service come from people who can afford the fares, but who find them annoying. They sometimes scrub their annoyance by washing it as an issue of progressiveness. But poor people don't have cars, and don't benefit from free parking; as the rider survey suggests, they would find greater frequency more useful than fareless rides. The parallel is not exact, but the way middle-class annoyance at fees is scrubbed as concern for poor people is very similar between them.
After all, a "free" bus that comes once an hour is much less useful than a bus with a fare that comes every 10 minutes. Even better would be a frequent bus that has signal priority and dedicated lanes, so it is faster than drive-alone trips. Frequency and trip time is worth something!
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| Add GHG emissions to this? |
The long-range planning might also benefit from a greenhouse gas analysis. How do the scenarios alter driving and emissions in Salem and the region? While Cherriots is working hard on electrifying their bus fleet, and on internal improvements for climate, they aren't really looking at city-wide or district-wide effects. What about the drive not taken because of bus improvements? The Open House is silent on emissions, unfortunately. That is a meaningful next stage for analysis.
Hopefully the long range plan will also dovetail with zoning and Our Salem as well as the new Climate Friendly and Equitable Community rules.
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2 comments:
The fact that current riders aren't after wider coverage doesn't really tell us anything - asking a wider population should help suss that out. A person with no car and not within reasonable waling/biking distance of the current transit routes has no use for either free parking or more frequent bus service.
Here's a Bloomberg summary of a national survey on transit that also finds frequency more important than coverage. That's a wider population for sure, and echoes the more narrow finding here.
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