Why Buses Need To Be More Dangerous

HughPickens.com writes: Is there such a thing as being too safe? Jeff Kaufman writes that buses are much safer than cars, by about a factor of 67 but buses are not very popular and one of the main reasons is that if you look at situations where people who can afford private transit take mass transit instead, speed is the main factor. According to Kauffman, we should look at ways to make buses faster so more people will ride them, even if this means making them somewhat more dangerous. Kauffman presents some ideas, roughly in order from "we should definitely do this" to "this is crazy, but it would probably still reduce deaths overall when you take into account that more people would ride the bus": Suggestions include not to require buses to stop and open their doors at railroad crossings, allow the driver to start while someone is still at the front paying, allow buses to drive 25mph on the shoulder of the highway in traffic jams where the main lanes are averaging below 10mph, and leave (city) bus doors open, allowing people to get on and off any time at their own risk. "If we made buses more dangerous by the same percentage that motorcycles are more dangerous than cars," concludes Kauffman, "they would still be more than twice as safe as cars."

Comments

Re:Or...

[Salgak1]

Buses are far more flexible than rail, for the simple fact that you can re-allocate buses, and create new routes anywhere you have a road. Laying rail does not have that flexibility. And that doesn't even consider the capital costs of acquiring real estate and building the appropriate rail infrastructure on it. . .

Re:This is US

[Anonymous Coward]

Anyone that wants to see public transportation done right needs to visit Japan.

After coming back from Tokyo, I always sob quietly when I take my local transportation.

> allow buses to drive 25mph on the shoulder of the highway in traffic jams where the main lanes are averaging below 10mph

Where I live, every buss that did that would be followed by a convoy of assholes.

Re:Oh absolutely

[serviscope_minor]

Because this cannot go wrong, right? faster buses, people getting on and off whenever wherever...allow drivers to drive off before people are seated...

Spot Mr. Risk averse. It's funny that you prove the author's point. You're so petrified of risks you'd rather peolpe do someething more dangerous instead.

And er, since when do you need to remain seated on a bus?

To examine the ridiculousness of this I suggest that Kauffman get into his car;

FFS, cars aren't busses. Busses are much much safer. The two are not equivalent,

Even if he thinks this is a great idea and willing to do that with his kids how many of us will follow? -I sure aint.

Why wouldn't you? If it was safer than a car and all those things made it feasible to ride instead of a car, you're safer overall.

WHICH IS THE WHOLE POINT!

Nonsense. Make them go more often.

[Qbertino]

Nonsense.

The key issue with public transport is frequency, not speed. When I'm sitting on the bus, I don't want the driver to stop and go at breakneck pace - especially if I'm trying to drink my take-away latte or get some code done on my laptop. Or, perhaps even both at the same time. You have your head free and are not in racecar mode, that's a killer cirteria of PT.

Frequency is the actual issue with busses and other PT. It goes a long way that busses and taxis here in Germany often have their own lanes, but double the frequency and you'll reach a tipping point for PT. The streets here in Europe are clogged and cluttered to a max, stuffed with cars parking 97% of their lifetime. It's insane. Car love is basically modern days mass psychosis.

I hope that all changes when the self-driving cars come. That's actually the exact issue Sundar Pichai and the Google Car crew are aiming at.
Once we have robots driving busses, we can have them go more often and needn't train and pay busdrivers. I really hope to see that day soon.

Completely ridiculous...

[azcoyote]

I actually ride the bus every single day I come into work and this is so ridiculous it has to be a joke.

1. 1. Bus drivers already typically start driving while you are still putting in your money. You have to grab on so you don't go flying.
2. 2. Bus drivers already drive as boldly and crazily as they can get away with, and they typically do get away with a lot because their vehicle is bigger than most others around. Hence when they cut people off, people tend to just let them.
3. 3. Having to open doors at railroad crossings is weird, but it barely takes half a second out of our trip.
4. 4. Having the bus drive on the shoulder would be so stupid as to lead to murder; at some point someone will be on the shoulder and will get run over. Why not just use HOV lanes or reserved bus lanes? That makes a lot more sense.
5. 5. The #1 factor affecting bus speed is not how careful the drivers are, but how many stops they have to make on a single route. The reason my bus is so effective is because it is an express bus that has relatively few stops and uses the highway in-between. To improve bus usage there will simply have to be many more express routes, better advertizing, and a significant cultural changes.
6. 6. The reason there need to be cultural changes is because in the United States our first instinct (for most of us) is to drive, not even to look for a bus route. Most people simply assume that the bus is not workable until proven otherwise. Our basic affluence and the convenience of driving one's own car make it so that riding a bus seems like an odd, special occasion, especially for commuters who go a longer distance to work. In order to effect a cultural change it will take advertizing, spreading information, and willingness to contribute more tax money to public transportation so that new routes can be built up before enough riders can be easily recruited to make them self-sustaining.

Re:Stupid Idea

[arth1]

In addition the call to make them more dangerous is likely to have exactly the opposite effect. How long do you think you will be delayed if someone falls off the open door trying to get on or off the bus?

It doesn't seem to be a problem in e.g. London.

But I think the problem here in the US is that we have a sue-happy culture without socialized healtcare. Often, the only way for someone who has had a fall accident to avoid bancruptcy is to find someone with deeper pockets to sue. And there are plenty of lawyers willing to line their pockets by assisting in just that.
Make people responsible for their own accidents, but provide them with decent free health care and employment compensation, and reinstate the old ius commune rule that no one must benefit from a lawsuit, not even the wounded party, and we might get rid of some of the nanny mentality.