Friday, January 06, 2006
Winged's Guide to Public Transportation
Okay, so there's a bunch of sites out there that tell you the ideal world, and the ideal times that public transportation things get where they're supposed to go. However, we don't live in an ideal world, and this is going to be evident the first time you get onto a public bus/train/subway/cablecar. In keeping with this spirit, I present here a couple of tips -- the things that they DON'T say in the timetables and books.
1) Relax. This is, by far, the most difficult -- and the most useful -- of the tips presented here. Where everyone in the Eastern US is used to the trains (and buses) running on time, the longer distances covered in the Western US make it much more difficult to create and maintain an accurate timetable. What this means, in turn, is that users of public transportation are going to need to relax a bit more and stop worrying about the precise times they get where they're going.
(Yes, I know that everyone in Chicago is going "WHAT?! Longer distances, are you NUTS?!" at this point. As are the people in New York and Philadelphia. I'll address your concerns in a moment.)
2) Read the timetable carefully. For timepoints (i.e., the intersections shown on the timetable as 'when the public transportation vehicle will be there'), most states have rules that state that, unless otherwise noted, the vehicle cannot depart that timepoint before that time. For interstate carriers (such as Greyhound[TM], Peter Pan[TM] and Amtrak[TM]), there are federal laws that make it a crime for a driver to depart a scheduled timepoint before the time listed. However, these are the absolute earliest times that they are permitted to depart, and in the interests of keeping the schedule accurate (and minimizing unproductive usage of driver time -- these are commercial driver's license holders, subject to federal Department of Transportation standards as regard their working day), it is in the interests of the company to print appropriate times that assume that the vehicle departs the previous timepoint AT THAT TIME. For that reason, we get to:
3) Get to the bus stop at least 5 minutes before you have to be there. The scheduled times give the driver (and other passengers) an average amount of time to comply with Americans with Disability Act requirements, and collect themselves -- but this means that, between timepoints, there's no guarantee that your bus will pass by at the same time every day. (Buses can arrive at timepoints later than they're supposed to, if there are more passengers or wheelchairs that need to get on or off than usual -- or even if traffic's particularly bad on any given day. This also, however, means that they can go past earlier than usual.)
4) Make sure you have exact fare -- there's no change machines on the bus, and most buses have an "exact fare" policy. (This means that you must pay at least exactly the fare -- if you don't have it, or put in even a penny less, they won't let you ride.) If you have an ADA or transit discount card, make sure you have that ready to show the driver, as well. If you have a bus pass, have THAT out. Having your fare ready minimizes the amount of time that the driver has to be stopped -- drivers are prohibited from operating the vehicle when anyone is in a restricted area, such as in front of the white line that separates the driving area from the passenger area. The longer you wait there, the more frustrated you get when you don't get where you're going on time, and the more frustrated the other passengers get, and the more frustrated the drivers get, and the more frustrated the transit administration gets.
5) If you have the opportunity to get a transit map and/or book, GET A COPY. These books have such things as: fare requirements for the route you're taking, how much a transfer costs (and what services it covers), whether you can purchase a pass that's good for an unlimited number of rides on the purchase day (a 'day pass'), and any miscellaneous information that I'm forgetting to put in here.
6) Remember: If the amount you pay is more than your fare, that goes into the transit operating fund. This means that, for example, when fuel prices are high, if you voluntarily pay more than you have to when you have the ability to do so, that means that the fare doesn't necessarily have to go up with the rising fuel costs for everyone.
7) Scale. I'm going to take an example from Tucson's transit system (SunTran), Fall '05/Winter '06 to make a point:
Route 16 (12 Ave & Oracle) starts at the Laos Transit Center at 5:07am. It makes it to its last stop -- SW corner of Oracle and Ina Rd -- at 6am. From there, it heads back to the Tohono Tadai transit center for a 6:05 departure, making it back down to the Laos Transit Center at 6:54. This means that it takes approximately 2 hours for this round-trip. Between those times, there are 6 more buses leaving the Laos Transit Center. This doesn't even begin to cover the 'peak times' of the day when buses run every 15 minutes. That's a lot of buses in use -- and that's just on Route 16. There are 36 routes that SunTran operates. Even at a conservative estimate, 36 routes times 6 buses in use on any given route, that's 216 buses theoretically on the road at any given time. Add in extra time for driver breaks and lunches (15 minute and 30 minute, respectively), and you run into a logistics nightmare.
Buses break down, just like any automobile. Drivers get sick, just like any other people. The bus system is logistics at its finest -- and it's amazing that it works at all, given the sheer complexity of it. Buses running on time is even more amazing. But, you can't rely on the buses running on time all the time... so just relax, and allow for a bit of slop in your schedule.
So, here's my advice: Use the extra time in your schedule to learn to knit or crochet, read a book, or even just sit and reflect -- in our busy lives, we never really learn to enjoy a moment, we are always looking forward to what we have yet to do or back at what we have already done. So, take a moment to sit down, feel your breath as you breathe, feel your heart beat, feel the breeze against your face, feel the chair you're sitting on, see the color of the bus stop post... just become aware of your surroundings. And then become aware of how you feel. :)
Okay, so there's a bunch of sites out there that tell you the ideal world, and the ideal times that public transportation things get where they're supposed to go. However, we don't live in an ideal world, and this is going to be evident the first time you get onto a public bus/train/subway/cablecar. In keeping with this spirit, I present here a couple of tips -- the things that they DON'T say in the timetables and books.
1) Relax. This is, by far, the most difficult -- and the most useful -- of the tips presented here. Where everyone in the Eastern US is used to the trains (and buses) running on time, the longer distances covered in the Western US make it much more difficult to create and maintain an accurate timetable. What this means, in turn, is that users of public transportation are going to need to relax a bit more and stop worrying about the precise times they get where they're going.
(Yes, I know that everyone in Chicago is going "WHAT?! Longer distances, are you NUTS?!" at this point. As are the people in New York and Philadelphia. I'll address your concerns in a moment.)
2) Read the timetable carefully. For timepoints (i.e., the intersections shown on the timetable as 'when the public transportation vehicle will be there'), most states have rules that state that, unless otherwise noted, the vehicle cannot depart that timepoint before that time. For interstate carriers (such as Greyhound[TM], Peter Pan[TM] and Amtrak[TM]), there are federal laws that make it a crime for a driver to depart a scheduled timepoint before the time listed. However, these are the absolute earliest times that they are permitted to depart, and in the interests of keeping the schedule accurate (and minimizing unproductive usage of driver time -- these are commercial driver's license holders, subject to federal Department of Transportation standards as regard their working day), it is in the interests of the company to print appropriate times that assume that the vehicle departs the previous timepoint AT THAT TIME. For that reason, we get to:
3) Get to the bus stop at least 5 minutes before you have to be there. The scheduled times give the driver (and other passengers) an average amount of time to comply with Americans with Disability Act requirements, and collect themselves -- but this means that, between timepoints, there's no guarantee that your bus will pass by at the same time every day. (Buses can arrive at timepoints later than they're supposed to, if there are more passengers or wheelchairs that need to get on or off than usual -- or even if traffic's particularly bad on any given day. This also, however, means that they can go past earlier than usual.)
4) Make sure you have exact fare -- there's no change machines on the bus, and most buses have an "exact fare" policy. (This means that you must pay at least exactly the fare -- if you don't have it, or put in even a penny less, they won't let you ride.) If you have an ADA or transit discount card, make sure you have that ready to show the driver, as well. If you have a bus pass, have THAT out. Having your fare ready minimizes the amount of time that the driver has to be stopped -- drivers are prohibited from operating the vehicle when anyone is in a restricted area, such as in front of the white line that separates the driving area from the passenger area. The longer you wait there, the more frustrated you get when you don't get where you're going on time, and the more frustrated the other passengers get, and the more frustrated the drivers get, and the more frustrated the transit administration gets.
5) If you have the opportunity to get a transit map and/or book, GET A COPY. These books have such things as: fare requirements for the route you're taking, how much a transfer costs (and what services it covers), whether you can purchase a pass that's good for an unlimited number of rides on the purchase day (a 'day pass'), and any miscellaneous information that I'm forgetting to put in here.
6) Remember: If the amount you pay is more than your fare, that goes into the transit operating fund. This means that, for example, when fuel prices are high, if you voluntarily pay more than you have to when you have the ability to do so, that means that the fare doesn't necessarily have to go up with the rising fuel costs for everyone.
7) Scale. I'm going to take an example from Tucson's transit system (SunTran), Fall '05/Winter '06 to make a point:
Route 16 (12 Ave & Oracle) starts at the Laos Transit Center at 5:07am. It makes it to its last stop -- SW corner of Oracle and Ina Rd -- at 6am. From there, it heads back to the Tohono Tadai transit center for a 6:05 departure, making it back down to the Laos Transit Center at 6:54. This means that it takes approximately 2 hours for this round-trip. Between those times, there are 6 more buses leaving the Laos Transit Center. This doesn't even begin to cover the 'peak times' of the day when buses run every 15 minutes. That's a lot of buses in use -- and that's just on Route 16. There are 36 routes that SunTran operates. Even at a conservative estimate, 36 routes times 6 buses in use on any given route, that's 216 buses theoretically on the road at any given time. Add in extra time for driver breaks and lunches (15 minute and 30 minute, respectively), and you run into a logistics nightmare.
Buses break down, just like any automobile. Drivers get sick, just like any other people. The bus system is logistics at its finest -- and it's amazing that it works at all, given the sheer complexity of it. Buses running on time is even more amazing. But, you can't rely on the buses running on time all the time... so just relax, and allow for a bit of slop in your schedule.
So, here's my advice: Use the extra time in your schedule to learn to knit or crochet, read a book, or even just sit and reflect -- in our busy lives, we never really learn to enjoy a moment, we are always looking forward to what we have yet to do or back at what we have already done. So, take a moment to sit down, feel your breath as you breathe, feel your heart beat, feel the breeze against your face, feel the chair you're sitting on, see the color of the bus stop post... just become aware of your surroundings. And then become aware of how you feel. :)
