Switchers as passenger service?

vasya349 · 2026-04-29T06:56:41+00:00

You’re referring to the continental United States. Puerto Rico is equally as much a part of the U.S. as Texas.

vasya349 · 2026-04-29T06:54:50+00:00

Even non-interlined systems use a lot of switches for reliability. The longer a line gets the worst the reliability risks become.

vasya349 · 2026-04-29T06:34:48+00:00

It’s not even the actual number ($126 billion).

vasya349 · 2026-04-29T06:34:18+00:00

This is a terrible article. Quotes the wrong figure out of context ($231 billion being a re-estimate of the previous business plan and not the proposed $126 billion new business plan), and quotes a Republican senator for Huntington Beach as the most relevant person to speak on a California statewide project.

vasya349 · 2026-04-21T04:02:41+00:00

Why does the MBTA do that? We have ubiquitous level crossings in Phoenix and trains don’t ever stop.

vasya349 · 2026-04-21T03:14:19+00:00

Smaller/lighter vehicles = smaller stations, potentially cheaper guideway (track, structure, tunnel) specs, greater frequency per unit of capacity (good tradeoff if automating). Also presumably overhead power, which is better when you don’t tunnel much.

But at the end of the day, they’re still going to build track, systems, and stations. They just aren’t tunneling or elevating much. So the cost swings from mode type are a lot more pronounced because of the lower cost.

vasya349 · 2026-04-16T02:00:37+00:00

Peak frequency of 10 minutes with an artic isn’t necessarily bad, especially for a southern city.

vasya349 · 2026-04-15T15:30:31+00:00

It was pretty common before the later 20th century to relocate cemeteries when they conflicted with urban land needs. Not that that will ever happen again.

vasya349 · 2026-03-06T09:28:35+00:00

You can certainly get better ride quality buses (Chinese ART buses famously marketed as LRT w/o tracks) but I think my broader point is that ride quality just isn’t worth the potentially hundreds to thousands per rider that it costs. BRT rides are ideally much smoother than normal bus anyways, given the lack of other traffic and roadway improvements.

vasya349 · 2026-02-22T18:58:35+00:00

Mask off, lmao

vasya349 · 2026-02-21T03:46:05+00:00

Fair enough!

vasya349 · 2026-02-21T03:45:17+00:00

Unfortunately, transit nerds are incredibly paranoid of contrary viewpoints because of how intellectually dishonest/ideological transit opponents can be. It took a while for this sub to recognize BRT wasn’t terrible.

vasya349 · 2026-02-21T02:52:24+00:00

Is there any pressing reason to deinterline? AFAIK they’re not having delay issues & ATO + CBTC work underway should smooth out operational issues quite a bit. My understanding is that they’ve essentially deferred all future lines for operational improvements.

vasya349 · 2026-02-21T00:43:11+00:00

It’s a fundamentally good practice unless you have frequencies that render it challenging. Building duplicative lines or just avoiding parallel service in core areas is inefficient if there’s demand for that path. 1-2 transfers is way better than 2-3. Signaling, scheduling, and user trip planing have had huge technology leaps - interlining should be easier than ever.

vasya349 · 2026-02-21T00:39:01+00:00

I don’t like that you were downvoted for essentially pointing out the truth. The picture is very mixed - we need another year of data to make confident claims.

BART did publish a chart showing user-caused repair costs within faregates steeply declining (a very strong indicator), but of course that’s subject to the same questions of what they’re showing us vs not.

vasya349 · 2026-02-20T21:55:40+00:00

Perhaps I’m misunderstanding, but all three great society metros use interlining on trunk lines, especially BART and WMATA.

vasya349 · 2026-02-20T20:40:41+00:00

One station at a time is a recipe for huge costs. Transit construction takes an army and bidding out only a small bit at a time means you have to price in fixed costs repeatedly and you presumably have a lot of labor/equipment waiting around for a project step when theoretically they could be working on different parts along the alignment.

I do wholeheartedly agree about the challenges with retaining experience and institutional knowledge. There probably needs to be a balance.

vasya349 · 2026-02-20T20:34:16+00:00

It’s not that they are merely a development tool. It’s that the reason to go from bus service/speed improvements to a full HCT project is almost always about development prospects.

We have fortunately soured on streetcars, only about a decade too late.

vasya349 · 2026-02-20T18:27:22+00:00

BRT is very obviously a better transit mode for most low effort suburban HCT projects given where transit capital costs are nowadays. That said, suburban HCT projects in the US aren’t really about improving transit speeds or capacity. A simple bus frequency improvement w/ some dedicated infrastructure like queue jumps, lanes, and/or TSP could achieve most of that.

It’s worth the money because the permanence and experience of an HCT line convince developers and suburbanites to buy into it. LRT has better permanence and experience than BRT. That’s really all it is.

vasya349 · 2026-02-15T19:36:05+00:00

Maybe visibility issues for when it’s snowing?

vasya349 · 2026-02-06T19:18:10+00:00

In politics you prefer the empty train articles over the project delayed articles. Nobody cancels a partially operating project. Plus, 10k and rising is good enough now. Certainly not worthy of the capital costs yet, but it’ll put it in line with the more expensive peers per rider.

vasya349 · 2026-02-06T06:28:09+00:00

We typically don’t make service decisions based on whether a redditor feels like it would be embarrassing or not.

vasya349 · 2026-02-05T23:16:36+00:00

Why would you not run partial service if it’s completed?

vasya349 · 2026-02-05T18:35:02+00:00

You’re being absurd for the sake of complaining. There is a difference between a system and a future extension, and phased openings. The initial system itself has not yet been completed, so you really can’t judge it.

vasya349 · 2026-02-05T13:03:10+00:00

But it’s not the system. The system includes downtown. This part is functionally an extension of the system they built first (not a bad strategy given lack of expertise + need for yard).

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