Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability (2020) / Chapter Skim
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-1 Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-2 1.0 Introduction 1.1 Purpose of Survey As part of the initial data collection phase of the TCRP A-42 research, the research team surveyed fixed-route bus operators in the U.S. and Canada, as well as a handful of agencies in the United Kingdom (U.K.)
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-3 2.0 Survey Methodology This chapter summarizes the TCRP A-42 Agency Survey design process, methodology and administration. The survey effort consisted of the development of a list of agency contacts from whom to solicit survey responses, the development and administration of an electronic survey form, and the analysis of survey responses.
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-4 3.0 Survey Responses 3.1 Responding Agencies Respondents to the survey represented various transit agency sizes and geographies. A total of 86 agencies (from three countries)
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-5 For the purposes of further analysis going forward, all responding agencies were classified as "Small" if they reported operation of fewer than 50 fixed bus routes, "Medium" if they reported operation between 51 and 100 fixed bus routes, and "Large" if they reported operation of more than 101 fixed bus routes, shown in Figure 3.3 below. Three agencies were identified as potentially misrepresented when comparing their fixed bus routes (as reported in their survey response)
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-6 3.2 Reliability Measurement 3.2.1 Definition of Reliability When asked how their agencies define "fixed-route bus service reliability," the majority of agencies replied that "on-time performance" was used, with varying targets identified. Other lessused methods included stop/scheduled time points to define on-time performance, or the use of "missed trips." Table 3.1 shows the most common definitions stated by survey respondents.
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-7 Figure 3.5 - Reliability Measures at System Level At the route level, 12 agencies indicated that they do not measure reliability performance. If an agency responded that it only uses one performance measure, it was either "on-time performance" or "missed trips." Two agencies, CTA and TransLink, indicated that they use the majority (8 out of 11)
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-8 At the trip level, 22 agencies indicated that they do not measure reliability performance. If an agency responded that it only used one performance measure, it was either "on-time performance" or "missed trips." One agency, TransLink, indicated that they use the majority (8 out of 11)
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-9 3.2.3 On-Time Performance Since "on-time performance" was the most common way that transit agencies measure reliability, respondents were asked to indicate how many minutes before and after scheduled time their agency classifies as "on-time," or the "window in which a bus is neither early nor late." The majority of respondents (78 percent) indicated that their agency uses zero-to-one minute before the scheduled time and 67 percent use five minutes after the scheduled time to define "ontime performance." There was little variation by agency size.
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-10 3.2.4 Utilizing Reliability Data There are a variety of tools and techniques available for agencies to collect reliability data, as shown in Figure 3.11. Over 80 percent of respondents' agencies use "Automatic Vehicle Location (AVL)
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-11 3.3 Reliability Improvement Strategies One of the primary purposes of the survey was to determine common obstacles to improving system reliability and strategies used to overcome these obstacles. To this end, survey respondents were asked a series of questions aimed at assessing the implementation rate and success of a number of reliability improvement strategies.
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-12 Figure 3.13 - Application of Schedule Changes In Figure 3.14 and Table 3.3, respondents were asked if they had successfully implemented each of the 17 operational strategies posed earlier. While some of the most commonly adopted operational strategies had the greatest agency adoption, success in implementation was not always guaranteed.
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-13 Table 3.3 - Success of Operational Strategies Operational Strategy Overall Adoption Successful Implementation Mixed Results Unsuccessful Implementation 1. Schedule Changes 92% 65% 30% 2% 2.
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-14 3.3.2 Transit Priority Treatments Transit priority treatments denote physical actions and infrastructure improvements to reduce bus travel time and improve reliability. Actions include the provision of transit signal priority, queue jump lanes and signals, exclusive lanes or semi-exclusive lanes, and curb extensions (e.g.
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-15 Figure 3.17 - Application of Transit Signal Priority In Figure 3.18 and Table 3.4, respondents were asked if they had successfully implemented each of the 13 transit priority treatments posed earlier. While some of the most commonly adopted transit priority strategies (stop relocation, transit signal priority, and parking restrictions)
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-16 Table 3.4 - Success of Transit Priority Treatments Transit Priority Treatment Overall Adoption Successful Implementation Mixed Results Unsuccessful Implementation 1. Exclusive Bus Lanes 20% 73% 27% 7% "Concurrent Bus Lanes" 71% 60% 40% 0% "Contraflow Bus Lanes" 21% 100% 0% 0% "Bi-Directional Bus Lanes" 3% 100% 0% 0% 2.
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-17 3.3.3 Physical Improvements Physical improvements denote improvements to increase capacity at bus stops and terminals to reduce ingress and egress travel time and provide adequate layover space, to improve reliability. The survey posed four physical improvements to respondents, and respondents were asked which of the physical improvements they had applied to improve reliability in their agency (Figure 3.19 and 3.20)
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-18 3.3.4 Improving Perception of Reliability The perception by transit riders of the reliability of a fixed-route bus service is affected by actions to provide information on the arrival times of buses, undertaking public outreach, and publication of reliability reports and scorecards. The survey posed four strategies to respondents that could increase perception of reliability, and respondents were asked which of the strategies they had applied to improve the perception of reliability in their agency (Figure 3.21 and 3.22)
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-19 3.3.5 Changing the Definition of Reliability Survey respondents were asked if they changed the definition of reliability to improve the reported reliability of their fixed-route bus service. This includes options such as changing the definition of "on-time", relaxing "on-time" limits, changing or adding measures, and lowering goals during special event conditions.
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-20 3.4 Reliability Costs and Benefits 3.4.1 Before-and-After Studies Fifteen agencies have undertaken before-and-after studies to assess the impact of fixed-route bus service reliability improvement. Larger agencies who had indicated that they use AVL and APC data were more likely to have undertaken before-and-after studies.
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-21 Table 3.8 - Benefits from Before-and-After Studies Benefits % Comments Improved On-Time Performance 10% Approximately 10 percent, of the before-after study undertakers, indicated improved on-time performance ranging from 5-10 percent improvement to 60-80 percent. Of those that commented on the degree of success, responders' comments varied from "looks promising" or they reported significant, good, and even excellent performance improvements.
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-22 3.6 Participation in Demonstration Studies Survey participants were asked if their respective agency would be interested in participating in a demonstration study of one or more fixed-route bus service reliability improvement strategies surfacing from this research. Approximately 39 percent responded "Yes"; 10 percent responded "No"; and 51 percent responded "Maybe".
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-23 3.7 International Perspective Responses to the survey from international agencies were predominantly requested from native English-speaking countries and locations where English is the de facto second language. Nevertheless, differences in the contractual and organizational structures of bus transit delivery, together with differences in terminology, mean that international responses were always likely to be harder to obtain than for North America.
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-24 4.0 Summary A comprehensive survey of fixed-route transit agencies was conducted as part of the TCRP A-42 survey. Eighty-six (86)
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-25 Appendix B-1 – List of Responding Agencies
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-26 Airdrie Transit (Airdrie, Alberta) METRO Regional Transit Authority (Akron, OH)
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-27 North Central Regional Transit District (Espanola, NM) Norwalk Transit District (Norwalk, CT)
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-28 Appendix B-2 - Survey Form
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-58 Appendix B-3 - Open-Ended Survey Responses
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-59 How does your agency define fixed-route bus service reliability? "100% of scheduled service will be provided 100% of the time.
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-60 On-time performance and canceled runs. No definition.
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-61 A variety of measures including OTP, vehicle reliability, and customer satisfaction. Monitor bus pull-out records closely, plus other performance measures including on-time performance and vehicle breakdown.
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-62 Service reliability is defined internally as the degree to which service is operated and provided to customers in a manner that is consistent with the service schedule and service level expectations. TransLink is in the process of updating our Transit Service Guidelines in order to provide customers and our local government partners about our definition and expectations for bus service reliability.
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-63 of the class. Bus operators alert us to a poorly placed or difficult-to-serve bus stop location - and to traffic signals needing timing adjustment or a left turn signal.
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-64 more realistic, it was poorly perceived. Finally, [Transit Agency A]
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Developing a Guide to Bus Transit Service Reliability Appendix B – Transit Agency Survey Report B-65 Looks promising Up to 10% improvement in OTP Yes Please specify and provide a copy of the agreement if possible to the email address indicated at the end of the survey. VDOT permission was required for the queue-jump.
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