A commuter rail line for the Sea to Sky Corridor seems like a no-brainer.
It would be quick and get cars off the road, right?
We used to have a ‘Budd’ rail car in this region, after all. Why not again?
This paper has likely even written opinion columns in support of light rail in the past.
But it turns out, though a sexier option, light or even high-speed rail may not be all it is cracked up to be.
Taking a deeper look, those who study such things and how they work worldwide have found buses are often the better way to go.
Say what now?
Harvard University professor Jose (Tony) Gomez-Ibanez, who is the author of The Dark Side of Light Rail says Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) can be more efficient.
When they compare buses and trains, most folks think of how buses have to operate while stuck in traffic. That seems inefficient.
But if buses are given their own lane, for example, like trains are given a rail line, they can thrive as people-movers.
“If you allow them to operate on a protected right of way with stops that are not really stops, but more like stations where you can pay your fare in advance, and there’s high platform boarding that’s fast and debarking that’s fast, when you compare those kinds of systems with rail systems, the quality of the bus service is at least as good if not better,” Gomez-Ibanez said in a Harvard video for the course, "CitiesX: The Past, Present and Future of Urban Life."
The idea originally was tested in South America in the city of Coritiba. They created a bus system that mimicked the surface characteristics of a train.
More than 100 cities in developing countries have BRT systems now.
Similar systems also exist in several Canadian cities, too.
“The reality is that you have to spend a lot of labour in maintaining the track, the power distribution, the signal system and the rest with rail. And if you’re operating the buses on exclusive right of way so that they can run rapidly, the productivity of the bus drivers is increased,” Gomez-Ibanez said, in the video.
Given our highway, there would be logistics to work out — it would not be a totally dedicated bus lane from start to finish.
And perhaps the buses could be articulated buses or double-deckers that could carry quite a few people.
Ultimately, we are likely headed to driverless buses.
(Singapore has been experimenting with this.)
Professor Ed Glaeser said in the same Harvard course video about transit: “There’s a joke that graduate students tell, which is that 40 years of transportation economics at Harvard…can be boiled down to four words, ‘bus good, train bad.’”
Glaeser notes that one of the other advantages of a BRT system is “the flexibility of buses” relative to rail. Rail is a long commitment. Once it goes in, it is static for a century. Bus routes can adapt and be more nimble.
They can also be electric, eventually.
Light rail seems like a great idea, but perhaps the humble bus should be where locals are putting their rallying cry for a long-term solution.
This doesn’t mean light rail is totally taboo. It has a place, especially in major metropolitan cities.
Just not the Sea to Sky. At least not yet.
**Please note, this story was updated after it was first posted to include the course the video was in. — CitiesX: The Past, Present and Future of Urban Life
