[sustran] Re: Article in Guardian Newspaper

Alan Patrick Howes APHOWES at dm.gov.ae
Tue Apr 1 15:24:51 JST 2003


>From Jack Mally's website http://www.urbantransport.org/ - 
> "The bottom line is obvious: If we really want to avoid far longer 
> commuting times, average freeway speeds less than 20 mph, increased 
> pollution and the endless urban sprawl generated by the 
> escapees from such 
> mass immobility; we can and we must build adequate new and 
> expanded roads 
> and freeways. There simply is no rational alternative."

Well for starters, here in Dubai we already have 25% of the urban space devoted to roads, thus creating the very sprawl JM apparently wishes to avoid. (I'm with him on that one.) And we still have increasing congestion, and however many roads we build they just fill up with cars. Even here, where gasoline is cheaper than water, the realisation is slowly dawning that the conclusion above is just about as wrong as it can be.


-- 
Alan P Howes, Special Transport Advisor, 
     Dubai Municipality Public Transport Department
aphowes at dm.gov.ae
http://www.dubaipublictransport.ae/
Tel:    +971 4 286 1616 ext 214
Mobile: +971 50 5989661


> -----Original Message-----
> From: Robert Murray-Leach [mailto:smogs at ccsa.asn.au]
> Sent: Tue, 01 April, 2003 06:30
> To: sustran-discuss at jca.ax.apc.org
> Subject: [sustran] Re: Article in Guardian Newspaper
> 
> 
> Hi Jack,
> 
> while I wouldn't fault your figures on current bus-occupancy 
> in the US, 
> isn't the point that if you achieved a modal shift from cars 
> to buses that 
> the occupancy rate of the buses would be much higher than the 
> 11 per bus? 
> If you have a rate of 2550 people per hour along a road, and 
> they all chose 
> to use buses, then you could expect occupancy rates of 20 per 
> bus, and 
> would only need 128 buses per hour. Rather than comparing apples with 
> apples (ie. a system where car is the predominant mode of 
> transport vs. a 
> system where buses are the predominant mode of transport) 
> you're comparing 
> a car-predominant system with a bus-predominant system where 
> user behavior 
> is still defined as in a car-predominant system.
> 
> In relation to your web-site, I was interested to note in the paper 
> entitled "the only solution to congestion"that while there 
> were some facts 
> about situations in which light rail was not suitable, there 
> was no mention 
> of any of the potential negative impacts of cars, and no 
> attempt to balance 
> the cost-benefits of mass transit vs. cars. The concluding statement 
> therefore seemed largely unqualified, and also neglected to note that 
> increased congestion actually lowered several emission types, 
> such as NOX.
> "The bottom line is obvious: If we really want to avoid far longer 
> commuting times, average freeway speeds less than 20 mph, increased 
> pollution and the endless urban sprawl generated by the 
> escapees from such 
> mass immobility; we can and we must build adequate new and 
> expanded roads 
> and freeways. There simply is no rational alternative."
> 
> Rob Murray-Leach
> 
> 
> 
> At 09:15 AM 29/03/03 -0800, you wrote:
> >At 05:47 AM 3/29/03, Debi Goenka wrote:
> >
> >>
> >>We are trying to get some buslanes in Mumbai, and I would 
> like to get 
> >>some answers. The standard response to bus lanes in Mumbai 
> is that the 
> >>existing roads are not wide enough - my answer is that in 
> such cases, 
> >>perhaps such roads should be reserved exclusively for buses!
> >
> >JM: Well, maybe so, maybe not, but that should be based on 
> comparison of 
> >how many persons per day the bus system would carry vs for the 
> >corresponding roadway. And that is exactly the same kind of 
> calculation I 
> >was illustrating for light rail.
> >
> >To compare bus vs automobile in the same way compute
> >PPHbus = BPD x BAVO
> >PPHauto = APD x AAVO
> >where BPH = buses per hour past an average point along the busway
> >       APH = Autos per hour past an average point along the road
> >       BAVO = Average Vehicle Occupancy of a bus, persons/bus
> >       AAVO = Average Vehicle Occupancy of an auto,persons/auto.
> >The mode providing the higher PPH count is more productive.
> >
> >For example, using typical US numbers, if the roadway lane 
> were to carry 
> >1700 vehicle/hour at an average vehicle occupancy of 1.5 
> persons/vehicle, 
> >the roadway would be carrying 2550 persons/hour. In the 
> alternative, if 
> >the average bus occupancy were 11 persons/bus, you would 
> have to run 231 
> >buses per hour, or one every 15 seconds to provide 
> equivalent transport 
> >volume, 2550 persons/hour.
> >
> >All the above numbers are typical for US, except for the 231 
> buses per 
> >hour which is very high. You should make this calculation 
> for your own 
> >numbers for Mumbai. But for typical US numbers, it seems 
> very unlikely 
> >that a lane could be more productively used as a busway than 
> as a regular 
> >freeway or expressway lane.
> >
> >Jack
> ><http://www.urbantransport.org/>www.urbantransport.org
> >
> 
> Robert Murray-Leach
> Green Transport Officer
> The Conservation Council of South Australia
> 120 Wakefield St
> Adelaide SA 5000
> Tel.  (08) 8223 5155
> Fax. (08) 8232 4782
> E-mail. smogs at ccsa.asn.au
> 
> 



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