
Utah expands public transportation with rapid bus transit, free until 2021 - ngngngng
http://rideuta.com/news/2018/08/UVX-Service-Starts-August-13
======
Mbioguy
A deeply red/Republican and relatively low-density state might seem like a
strange place to find a functional public transit system. Utah is an
interesting place. The geography of the Wasatch Front lends itself to public
transit in ways that less geographically-constrained places do not. The region
is mostly a north-south corridor, with occasional off-shoots to the side,
which is how the transit network has developed. There is a significant tech
culture, from 'little silicon slopes' in Lehi to the significant student
population. The valley has seasonal pollution problems caused by mountains to
the east and west. This is made worse by the lake effect, which means energy
solutions helpful elsewhere are less effective, like natural gas plants. What
would otherwise be transient pollutants instead react with ammonia from the
lake and persist in the atmosphere, further trapped by the mountains. Utah has
a significant need for public transit, and getting students connected and
using it is a great way for generational change to occur. Car culture still
rules, and will for a long time, but this is a good thing to hear. Hopefully a
Trax expansion or equivalent in Utah county will happen eventually. Until
then, this seems the next best policy.

~~~
hueving
>A deeply red/Republican and relatively low-density state might seem like a
strange place to find a functional public transit system.

Only if you buy the strawmen of politics in the US of there being two 'sides'
with everyone neatly falling into place on a pathetic line.

The further you get away from the shithole that is the US federal government,
the more this becomes apparent. The things each 'side' is supposed to support
completely changes at the state levels and varies from state to state.

The best thing you can do is dispose of the notion of a single political
spectrum and you will be a lot less shocked when you encounter something
contrary to the propaganda designed to divide people.

~~~
dgzl
I'm under the impression that the federal government knows this and actively
tries to keep the population ignorant if their individual personalities. In
America's violent culture, people see a massive red vs. blue battle and can't
help but take a side.

~~~
swebs
I'd say it's more due to human nature to break complicated issues down to one
dimension. Cameras have megapixels, computers have Flops, countries have some
sort of "index" depending on what facet you're looking at, and politics has a
single left/right value. Of course it's not very accurate, but that's the idea
that's easiest to consume, and thus the one that propagates the most.

The 2-dimensional Political Compass is a huge improvement, but still isn't
perfect. Reality is more complex and would require an N-dimensional political
matrix.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_compass](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_compass)

~~~
justdeleteKanab
[http://birdsbeforethestorm.net/2016/10/lower-leftism-
expandi...](http://birdsbeforethestorm.net/2016/10/lower-leftism-expanding-
upon-the-political-map/)

^-- the most intriguing take on the political compass I've ever seen, albeit
one with its own biases and issues (I'd replace feudalism with 'early human or
tribal societies'). The main point was that it expanded beyond a strictly US
view and I found the additional concept lines useful (Democracy line,
inequality line, market line). It still runs into the same trouble trying to
compress everything down into two dimensions does. Ideologies can end up next
to each other that aren't very similar, which the end of the blog post
acknowledged.

------
conroy
As usual, this looks like a half-baked implementation of BRT. They get many
things right, including articulated buses, off-vehicle ticket purchase, and
raised platforms. However, like most BRT systems in the US, it fails on the
most important metric: dedicated lanes. Only half of the route is in exclusive
lanes, which means the half the time buses will be fighting traffic.

Instead, we should be aiming to build more BRT like the Orange Line in Los
Angeles[0], which operates completely in dedicated lanes.

[0] [https://www.metro.net/riding/paid_parking/orange-
line/](https://www.metro.net/riding/paid_parking/orange-line/)

~~~
reaperducer
Pittsburgh has this, too. A dedicated transitway from downtown to the airport.
It was a pretty efficient ride when I used it about ten years ago. But at the
same time it seemed kind of wasteful.

~~~
bobthepanda
A good functioning bus lane will feel very wasteful only if it's working as
intended and the buses are free-flowing. The entire point is that the buses
flow quickly past traffic; you could open up the lane to HOV or cars, but then
traffic times would just degrade.

[https://la.streetsblog.org/2014/07/08/balancing-cars-cash-
an...](https://la.streetsblog.org/2014/07/08/balancing-cars-cash-and-
congestion-metro-silver-line-brt-in-the-express-lanes/)

> In May 2014, Streetsblog L.A. began to receive tips that Silver Line BRT
> service along the 110 Freeway was experiencing some problems. So many
> drivers were taking the toll lanes to the point where the mix of buses,
> carpools and paying drivers resulted in congestion.

> In some cases, traffic in the express lanes was moving slower than the rest
> of the 10 Freeway. This congestion impacts all the busway users including
> buses, carpools, and toll-paying drivers.

~~~
xeromal
The tolls should be raised until a lower amount of cars are around

~~~
mikeyouse
Which is an efficient economic solution that basically ignores that we have a
terrible public transit system and pervasive inequality which would result in
the tolls being primarily on the backs of the poorest among us who travel the
furthest to work in City centers to be paid the least.

~~~
bobthepanda
If you read the article I linked, they raised the tolls and used the money to
pay for more frequent bus services, and those bus services also ran faster due
to the tolls decreasing congestion. So in the end it was pretty equitable
given that higher tolls directly funded public transit improvements.

------
gumby
I don't understand why road taxes aren't used to pay for free public
transport. The more people on public transport the more room for cars.

~~~
bobthepanda
Free public transport is a can of worms; in general, free tends to attract
walkers and bikers but not drivers, since price is not really how a car
competes with public transport. And attracting walkers and bikers would
probably be a negative. There's also a negative cycle where some walkers and
bikers will switch because the free service is good enough, so the services
become overcrowded, so more service is provided and the increased frequencies
make public transit even more attractive to walkers and bikers. So you end up
increasing costs quite a bit with no increase in "revenue".

There's also the fact that in even moderately busy systems, the amount of
fares collected is not insignificant. As an example, New York's MTA:
[http://interactive.nydailynews.com/project/mta-
funding/](http://interactive.nydailynews.com/project/mta-funding/)

$6B out of $15B is quite a lot of money. Raising taxes to cover $6B in lost
revenue would be quite the feat. And why wouldn't that $6B be better put
towards housing, or hospitals, or schools, or even better public transport
services? It's generally better to make services more useful, than to just
make existing subpar service free.

~~~
st26
"Free" is really handy for keeping the service fast & on time though. Not
required to be sure, but each rider digging for change takes time. My local
bus rapid transit is nominally not-free, but tickets are not checked. It's
impressive how fast it is, and that is part of why.

~~~
bobthepanda
You can effectively achieve most of that with just tap cards and all-door
boarding.

------
omot
Just thought to leave an aside for anyone considering working in Utah.

I Lived in Orem, Utah for a long-time super interesting state. Everyone is
super conservative, no doubt, but they are the nicest people I've ever met.
They can be "accidentally" racist and bigoted but I attribute that for their
ignorance as opposed to hate.

The church itself governs and operates like a socialist country. Every church
member in the world pays 10% of their income to the church, and that money in
turn goes towards financing all three Brigham Young Universities - one in
Provo Utah, one in Hawaii, and one in Idaho. So a student could get a private-
school education for only $2000-5000 a year. The money also goes towards
construction projects to build new temples and new churches. It goes towards
relief for families that are struggling financially.

The state also has some the best national parks in the countries, and probably
the best slopes to ski on.

I think people mentioned this but there is a pretty significant tech presence
there as well.

Some downsides, everyone is Mormon is not a lot of stuff is open on Sundays,
and even if you're a devout atheist, you'll probably go to church a couple
times, because everyone around you goes and you have nothing better to do.
Very little diversity, racially, ethnically, politically, religiously, it's
almost like living in Japan, where everyone is nice to you but you'll always
be considered an outsider.

~~~
pyromine
This is pretty spot on, moved from the Northeast to Utah for school, now done
with school and I'm enjoying my time here because I'm in love with the
mountains but I'm planning how to move out of the state because I know that I
will never feel culturally secure here. Being part of the outdoor community I
never find myself struggling to find like minded people, but I do feel like an
outsider to society as a whole.

~~~
therealdrag0
Heard good things about Seattle or Boise and Colorado for outdoor culture.

------
mbillie1
For what it's worth, living in Salt Lake City: this is one single bus route
among dozens. It's nice that there won't be a cost for this route, but this
could be expanded to all of our bus routes and still more would need to be
done for local air quality.

------
danschumann
They should make a bus system that can change any light to green when the bus
shows up, and control the grid in other ways to truly expedite public transit.

~~~
pmorici
That technology already exists for emergency vehicles.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traffic_signal_preemption](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traffic_signal_preemption)

~~~
jrockway
Plenty of cities have traffic light preemption for buses. Portland does it for
the MAX (not a bus, I know), and Chicago tried it when I lived there, etc.
(The problem then becomes, what happens when an emergency vehicle AND a bus
both preempt the traffic light? In Portland anyway, MAX wins. That doesn't
always mean the emergency vehicle stops, though, with predictable results.)

I rode the bus route daily when they tried it in Chicago and it didn't speed
things up much. One at a time, slowly, slowly, people climbed on board, paid
their fare, couldn't move into the bus because it was crowded, and then the
next person in line blocked the doors until someone moved enough for them to
get on... five minutes, the bus was on its way through a fresh green traffic
signal. Great.

(Continuing the rant, what about paying the fare off the bus? I've tried this
in NYC, and every time I've used SBS, fare collectors have stopped the bus,
slowly checked everyone's tickets with the bus stopped, and then gotten off.
Waiting at a red light or two is nothing compared to that. I'm sure by the
time you include the fare inspectors' salaries, some supervisors to fire them
when they do the collection with the bus stopped, and recruiters for new fare
inspectors... it's a mega money losing operation. But oh no, we could never
make it free, only Communists would want free bus service!)

~~~
bobthepanda
NYC's implementation is terrible because no other place with proof of payment
stops the entire vehicle to check fares.

The issue with free is that free transit tends to create a negative spiral
where some walkers and bikers will switch to transit because it's free, so
services have to be improved to deal with the crowding, which makes transit
more appealing to bikers and walkers, which increases overcrowding, and so on.
None of the cities and towns that have free transit in the world are very big.

~~~
michaelt

      The issue with free is that free transit tends to create a
      negative spiral where some walkers and bikers will switch
      to transit because it's free, so services have to be
      improved to deal with the crowding, which makes transit
      more appealing to bikers and walkers
    

Woudn't the same thing apply to drivers?

~~~
bobthepanda
It does, which is why highway expansions generally fill up a few years after
opening. [http://cityobservatory.org/reducing-congestion-katy-
didnt/](http://cityobservatory.org/reducing-congestion-katy-didnt/)

------
tntn
I used to ride the bus all the time in Utah valley. Then they tore up all the
roads to build lanes for this project, and all the bus schedules went to pot.
That's when I stopped riding the bus as often.

I'm not sure whether tearing up all the roads for 3+ years to have a bus that
connects two places already connected by a new train is that awesome. Just
make that stretch of Frontrunner free.

~~~
epage
Its not the endpoints that are a big deal but everything in between plus
easier access to those end points.

------
rblion
Considering moving to SLC, it's the perfect hub for all the stuff I like to do
and has lots of nice people and food. Airport is not crowded either.

I love how mountains are visible from most places as well. Within a few hours
I can be at the Grand Canyon or at Yellowston or in Denver or in Las Vegas.

~~~
xeromal
I've lived in Chicago, Atlanta, Los Angeles and SLC and SLC is easily my
favorite of the bunch. LA has more amenities, but SLC balances that with
WAYYYY more accessible outdoor activities, a proper winter, cheap housing, and
nicer people.

~~~
AnimalMuppet
Some of us consider outdoor activities and nice people to be "amenities"...

~~~
xeromal
I agree with you on that, but LA still has more for sure. Mountains are an
hour and a half away, but they are there. LA has more diversity in food and
people so you can find your niche. Do you want Paleo vegan oatmeal cheesecake?
Then there's an entire store dedicated to that. The scale LA runs at enables
all these niche things.

I still love SLC more though.

------
mholt
So, I live in a BRT neighborhood in Provo, and it's really weird. It's more
inconvenient for motorists, the bike routes are awkward (there are new signs
for bikes to yield to vehicles -- at an intersection that has a median through
it and is solely for the benefit of bicyclists), and pedestrians have to go
into the middle of the street to get on the bus. And BRT still takes 1.5x-2x
the time to get to main destinations than direct car routes do.

Not to mention that one of the residential BRT streets north of me has been
under construction for more time than it took NASA to get to the moon in the
'60s.

But it's cool that we get free service, I guess. BYU and UVU students get free
UTA transportation (more than just BRT) with their ID cards.

------
modells
It often takes 2 hours to get by bus or light-rail from one end of Santa Clara
county to the other, while driving typically takes an average of 20-25
minutes. Also, VTA is expensive for low-income folks with a minimum of $2 for
a single ride, and it takes up to 4-5 rides to get somewhere _each way_ , and
so the daily passes are $7.. Which is also a lot. Yearly passes for kids and
disabled are $330, $880 for adults and twice that $1760 for express buses.

[http://www.vta.org/getting-around/fares](http://www.vta.org/getting-
around/fares)

~~~
kennydude
Sounds like they need a "hopper" system like London has. London, weirdly, has
the cheapest bus system in the UK.

------
prh8
With how bad the air quality is, I'd be really curious about what would happen
if all of the region's public transit was made free. TRAX can be packed quite
often, but there's still so much more capacity available in the system.

Traffic is so bad, pretty much all the time, so it would have to help that as
well.

But then there is the matter of money has to come from somewhere, although
Utah has one of the richer state governments to begin with.

~~~
Shivetya
free transit has been tried, the findings were that it got mostly new riders
from those who walked or rode bicycles because they didn't want to pay for
transit but converted very few drivers. [1]

it really comes down to, a transit system cannot be everything for everyone so
its best to make it good for a segment of the population. if we want to
improve transit issues the primary method is to overhaul the power of zoning
boards and reduce the ability of groups to sue to prevent housing to be built
closer in if not inside cities.

one recent tactic has been for politically connected groups to sue and make
ridiculous changing demands so that to the point it becomes unaffordable to
build and force the developer to sell to the group connected to the
politicians. then everyone loses. [2].

[1] [https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/01/why-
can...](https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/01/why-cant-public-
transit-be-free/384929/)

[2] [https://missionlocal.org/2018/07/axis-developerment-
abruptly...](https://missionlocal.org/2018/07/axis-developerment-abruptly-
abandons-proposed-117-unit-folsom-street-project/)

~~~
prh8
I understand free transit does not generally work. However, the Salt Lake
region is rather unique in the first place, so I'm curious the effects it
would have there. It may still fail but I suspect it would be different than
previous studies on free transit.

------
rabboRubble
Public transit fangirl here... Salt Lake City's transit system is awesome.
Clean, runs timely, and runs in sensible paths through population areas. The
bus system off the train service is a bit less useful, but I've found with
Lyft / Uber augments, I can get just about anywhere I want to without a car.

------
jparise
AC Transit is building out a BRT line in the East Bay between Oakland and San
Leandro.

[http://www.actransit.org/brt/](http://www.actransit.org/brt/)

------
zacharytelschow
Heavily subsidized transportation that hemorrhages money doesn't work.

------
ProfBernardo
Better public transportation means more bodies in the seats at church.

~~~
AnimalMuppet
The LDS church has a church in every neighborhood out here. People don't take
public transportation to get to them. They're literally as close as the bus
stop for many people.

