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Analysis of distances between London's bus stops

michalpaszkiewicz.co.uk

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Re: Analysis of distances between London's bus stops

#41

Post by sum1ren »

IIAOPSW wrote: post #38
TheHumanist wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's funny because I believe if a person was to study my gameplay in Cities XL and then also watch me function throughout a day, they would find very clear similarities in my frantic disorganization in general. I believe, probably, it is mostly a 'me' problem. Maybe not, though. I just find it incredibly overwhelming when you get to the point where your citizens are demanding bus stops everywhere. There is already su…

What you need to do is get over the intuition that a transit network is supposed to be random access and point to point. Its not. Some places are more important and more likely than others. Don't fall for the trap of compulsively filling in lines until there's spaghetti everywhere and everything that could meet at the ends does. Have core structures, basic sorts of routes. Be neither radial nor mesh, but rather feder…

> Think of it as a plumbing problem. Your primary people flow is between cheap rent and good jobs.

That's an interesting idea. Just thinking out loud, I wonder how one affects the other. I.e cheap rent -> create better transport links -> increased rent -> etc etc.

I know this is true with tube stations raising the cost of certain areas in London.

Re: Analysis of distances between London's bus stops

#42

Post by switch007 »

GloucesterBoy wrote: post #10
capableweb wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's also a problem of people not wanting to be "in the way". Even if services are available on-demand, some older folks get the opinion that they don't want to explicitly request help as they'll add additional work for others, which they don't want to do. If the service is available anyways, they don't feel bad using it.

I've met some elderly people who weren't happy they received free senior passes for travel and wanted to pay like everyone else

What happened when they contacted the council to offer to pay? Or returned their travel pass?

Re: Analysis of distances between London's bus stops

#43

Post by sum1ren »

TheHumanist wrote: post #30
sum1ren wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Makes me all the more in awe of London's bus network despite the occasional tardiness. I've not played Cities, but interested to know the usual stumbling blocks to build such a system. Too large a city to cover, and too expensive to cover extensively?

It's funny because I believe if a person was to study my gameplay in Cities XL and then also watch me function throughout a day, they would find very clear similarities in my frantic disorganization in general. I believe, probably, it is mostly a 'me' problem. Maybe not, though. I just find it incredibly overwhelming when you get to the point where your citizens are demanding bus stops everywhere. There is already su…

Thanks for the insight, it's definitely pique my interest, going to check the game out.

Re: Analysis of distances between London's bus stops

#44

Post by llimos »

> Some buses in London also have "Hail and Ride" zones, where a bus can be stopped with a wave on the hand at any point on the route.

Including the H2, which came top of the list for "shortest average distances between stops for routes without complex branches".

How is this accounted for in the data?

Re: Analysis of distances between London's bus stops

#45

Post by switch007 »

transportguy wrote: post #5
GloucesterBoy wrote: post #2

There has recently been a big problem in London for the elderly - many bus stops have been removed and replaced with bicycle lanes, meaning the elderly have to move a considerable distance to their nearest bus stop. There was also an issue that TfL was removing seats from bus stops to stop 'yobbery', but leaving the elderly without a place to sit while waiting: https://www.standard.co.uk/hp/front/elderly-forced-to-st…

London has Dial-a-ride for people with impairments which provides a door-to-door journey https://tfl.gov.uk/modes/dial-a-ride/ But of course, a lot of people don't qualify, and others don't want to use a different service to others.

TIL, thank you! Might be very useful for some of my family

There’s Taxicard too https://www.londoncouncils.gov.uk/services/taxicard/apply-ta...

Re: Analysis of distances between London's bus stops

#46

Post by dontlaugh »

eptcyka wrote: post #15
smcl wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm having trouble making sense of this. It sounds like you want to say you won't take the bus for a journey under 200 metres - which is fine. But the meaning of your sentence is something like: if you want to travel 2 km and the bus stops every 200 metres means you won't take the bus because it would cost too much? How come? And how did you arrive at that 200 metre threshold? edit: I completely failed to appreciate…

If the bus stops every 200 meters, it has a chance of stopping 10 times, which takes a lot of time. If the weather isn't prohibitively horrible, I have to wait for the bus to arrive and if there's traffic, chances are I'll be able to reach my destination on foot faster than by bus. It's fine by me, but it seems that I'm just not the target audience for busses.

Stops are quick and busses are (at least for now) frequent. It’s rarely faster to walk and never faster to drive in the areas where busses stop that frequently.

Re: Analysis of distances between London's bus stops

#47

Post by eptcyka »

realjhol wrote: post #21
eptcyka wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the bus stops every 200 meters, it has a chance of stopping 10 times, which takes a lot of time. If the weather isn't prohibitively horrible, I have to wait for the bus to arrive and if there's traffic, chances are I'll be able to reach my destination on foot faster than by bus. It's fine by me, but it seems that I'm just not the target audience for busses.

It doesn't usually stop that often because half the time people aren't pushing the button every stop. In central areas where demand is high, busses usually come every ~5-minutes. Even further out in the suburbs, the wait times are 8-10 minutes. Bus rides are £1.75. You can take as many busses in a day, and it automatically caps at £5.25. You don't need coins, you pay using contactless credit card, or oyster card prep…

My experience in London is rather limited, but it seems it's very similar to Edinburgh. As a student in Edinburgh, waiting for a bus to ride 4 stops for some money or walking 2km for free was a no-brainer. Waiting 40 minutes to get into the city from the suburbs via the bus when there is no traffic is really insane when the same trip could be done in a car in 15 minutes, or 25 minutes on a bicycle - in these cases I much prefer the drive, cycling or the walk. Even if walking ends up being 5 minutes slower, I'd still choose walking as I normally need to walk more rather than less, and I get to save a quarter of a pints-worth of money.

Re: Analysis of distances between London's bus stops

#48

Post by LatteLazy »

incone123 wrote: post #31
LatteLazy wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait, since when are TFL removing stops for Cycle lanes? Wouldn't they need to re-engineer the whole road as that would mean moving the pavement as well?

They are indeed reengineering. Have a look at Westminster Bridge Road south end at the entrance to St Thomas's Hospital. It's on Google Street view.

It still has a bus stop though, the cycle path goes around it...

https://goo.gl/maps/t3kXprqhmxVqWKrd8

Re: Analysis of distances between London's bus stops

#49

Post by IIAOPSW »

sum1ren wrote: post #41
IIAOPSW wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you need to do is get over the intuition that a transit network is supposed to be random access and point to point. Its not. Some places are more important and more likely than others. Don't fall for the trap of compulsively filling in lines until there's spaghetti everywhere and everything that could meet at the ends does. Have core structures, basic sorts of routes. Be neither radial nor mesh, but rather feder…

> Think of it as a plumbing problem. Your primary people flow is between cheap rent and good jobs. That's an interesting idea. Just thinking out loud, I wonder how one affects the other. I.e cheap rent -> create better transport links -> increased rent -> etc etc. I know this is true with tube stations raising the cost of certain areas in London.

There probably is a first principles model for urban planning, don't be like me and get sucked into it.

Re: Analysis of distances between London's bus stops

#50

Post by a_c »

evrimoztamur wrote: post #28

"Some buses in London also have "Hail and Ride" zones, where a bus can be stopped with a wave on the hand at any point on the route.—It certainly wouldn't be practical in urban areas where the bus could be stopped every few meters." Funny the author writes that but these sorts buses do exist in certain cities like İstanbul. A special class of privately operated 'mini-buses' run along a predefined and long route, pick…

This is also how the Hong Kong privately owned minibus [1] is run. Not only is it hail and ride, you are also expected to shout your destination to the driver shortly before arriving. It is not for the faint of heart, both tourists and socially awkward locals. Highly recommend a try.

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_light_bus#Red_minibuses

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