Metro Vancouver Transit Discussion

[cganuelas1995]

I lived/worked in Sydney for a few months last year and really liked the tiered distance based system.

[Migrant_Coconut]

Originally Posted by Metro-One

I don't like the variation in time, especially the hourly one.

No kidding; peak hours are peak hours for a reason. People shouldn't be punished for their jobs/classes starting and ending at the same time as everybody else's.

[Bdawe]

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

No kidding; peak hours are peak hours for a reason. People shouldn't be punished for their jobs/classes starting and ending at the same time as everybody else's.

'Punish' is such a point-missing word. Peak service is also some of the most expensive to provide, since it requires all the additional capacity that doesn't see use the rest of the day.

[nname]

Originally Posted by nname

2015 Boardings:

Conventional Bus: 235,615,200 ** (+3.0%)
Community Shuttle: 5,366,400 (-4.7%)
SeaBus: 6,091,800 (+2.1%)
Expo/Millennium Line: 77,592,600 (+0.1%)
Canada Line: 40,972,300 ** (+1.8%)
West Coast Express: 2,648,800 (+0.9%)

Overall: 362,920,800 ** (+2.1%)

** = highest ridership ever recorded for the mode

Seems like a huge boost in ridership for Q4, as the Q3 data still showed negative growth or flat for pretty much all modes.

2016 Boardings:

Bus+Shuttle: 239.54M (-0.6%)
SeaBus: 5.45M (-10.5%)
Expo/Millennium Line: 93.86M ** (+21.0%)
Canada Line: 43.52M ** (+6.2%)
West Coast Express: 2.45M (-7.5%)

Overall: 384.82M ** (+6.0%)

Bus ridership was on track of smashing the all time record until December...

Note that ridership estimate was based on fare revenue on or before 2015. Compass data will be used on and after 2016. This may be the cause for some of the big increase/decrease this year.

[aberdeen5698]

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

People shouldn't be punished for their jobs/classes starting and ending at the same time as everybody else's.

You're not punishing people for traveling during peak hours, you're rewarding people for traveling outside peak hours. It's a carrot, not a stick.

[Migrant_Coconut]

Originally Posted by aberdeen5698

You're not punishing people for traveling during peak hours, you're rewarding people for traveling outside peak hours. It's a carrot, not a stick.

Not quite - that's the "Off-Peak Discount" option, which sounds like a good idea. "Hourly Variation" is both a carrot and stick - discounts for off-peak hours, AND higher peak hour fares.

I mean, really? Peak hour exists mostly because (almost) all jobs end at roughly the same time - so, riders are basically getting dinged extra for having the wrong job or the wrong shift.
Are they supposed to wait around the workplace for several hours until the off-peak? Because if so, they're probably going to drive home. And that's bad.

[ilikeredheads]

imo, there shouldn't be different fares for peak and non peak hours. Fares should be the same regardless the time of the day so it's simple and straightforward. There would no need to for "carrot and stick" debate

[Aroundtheworld]

Originally Posted by ilikeredheads

imo, there shouldn't be different fares for peak and non peak hours. Fares should be the same regardless the time of the day so it's simple and straightforward. There would no need to for "carrot and stick" debate

Except there is. If you have everybody going at the same time, you need to provide extra vehicles that you wouldn't need if the demand was more spread out over the day. It also reduces overcrowding.

This is pure supply and demand. When there is high demand, the price should be higher, when it's lower, the price should be lower.

[Migrant_Coconut]

Originally Posted by Aroundtheworld

Except there is. If you have everybody going at the same time, you need to provide extra vehicles that you wouldn't need if the demand was more spread out over the day. It also reduces overcrowding.

This is pure supply and demand. When there is high demand, the price should be higher, when it's lower, the price should be lower.

If Hourly ends up being the final pick, I'd suggest 15-25 cents extra during peak hours: enough to make casual riders rethink, but not enough to hurt frequent riders or commuters.

[aberdeen5698]

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

Peak hour exists mostly because (almost) all jobs end at roughly the same time - so, riders are basically getting dinged extra for having the wrong job or the wrong shift.

Yeah life's a bitch.

If you provide incentive to travel during off-peak hours, then some proportion of people will shift times if they can and there will be some pressure on employers to allow flexible hours so that people can travel at off peak times.

Way back when transit was cheaper at off peak times in Vancouver I was fortunate enough to work in the IT industry and my employer allowed me to start and leave early. So I was able to avoid peak times.

Sure, it seems unfair if you're not in a position to have that flexibility. But if you can shift 5 or 10% of people then it saves the transit system some money because they can avoid paying for extra vehicles and operators, and those savings can either lower fares (or at least avoid hikes) or go towards more service elsewhere which benefits everyone.

[GlassCity]

I'm still very skeptical that our current peak hour ridership is at all affected by the off-peak fares after 6:30. First, people don't have that much flexibility. And second, those with standard 9-5 jobs taking transit probably have monthly passes that avoid this. Charging separate rates depending on the time only hurts spur-of-the-moment transit trips.

[cganuelas1995]

I'm wondering if we should set up a dedicated thread/poll for the whole fare structure debacle.

[Migrant_Coconut]

Might be a good idea.

[cganuelas1995]

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

Might be a good idea.

The polling options would be numerous though. Wondering if there is an option to select multiple options.

[Geof]

Originally Posted by GlassCity

I'm still very skeptical that our current peak hour ridership is at all affected by the off-peak fares after 6:30. First, people don't have that much flexibility. And second, those with standard 9-5 jobs taking transit probably have monthly passes that avoid this. Charging separate rates depending on the time only hurts spur-of-the-moment transit trips.

I wonder the same thing. Lacking empirical evidence, I don't feel comfortable guessing about the impact (or not) of off-peak discounts.

I do agree about the impact on unplanned trips. Forcing travellers to make decisions about how they will travel is a huge disincentive to taking transit. You might say that people won't stop to think: but incentives only produce efficiencies if they do. Once they do, they may choose not take transit at all. The burden of comparing alternatives can be disincentive enough.

Cars benefit from thoughtless travel. There's gas in the tank, so you just go, without thinking about the costs. When drivers do think about costs, they over-compensate by doing perverse things like spending more on gas to avoid bridge tolls.

For me, the biggest benefit of Compass is that it is like gas in the tank. There's no need to count change or even think about money. Introduce differential pricing and suddenly there's no gas in the tank: there's a price to be paid, a bit of money to be carefully weighed against the convenience of travel.

If we want people to take transit, we want them to focus on where they want to go, not how. We just want them to tap, and go. People say they want computers to Do What I Mean. What they want of transit is to Just Get Me There. They don't want to be bothered about the details. It should be thoughtless, automatic, a habit.

I understand the economic arguments about pricing to allocate a resource efficiently. But I am not at all convinced there's a benefit here. Price fairly by distance, like gas (because otherwise you discourage short trips), and no-one will blink. They will just tap, and go.

[GlassCity]

Originally Posted by Geof

I wonder the same thing. Lacking empirical evidence, I don't feel comfortable guessing about the impact (or not) of off-peak discounts.

I do agree about the impact on unplanned trips. Forcing travellers to make decisions about how they will travel is a huge disincentive to taking transit. You might say that people won't stop to think: but incentives only produce efficiencies if they do. Once they do, they may choose not take transit at all. The burden of comparing alternatives can be disincentive enough.

Cars benefit from thoughtless travel. There's gas in the tank, so you just go, without thinking about the costs. When drivers do think about costs, they over-compensate by doing perverse things like spending more on gas to avoid bridge tolls.

For me, the biggest benefit of Compass is that it is like gas in the tank. There's no need to count change or even think about money. Introduce differential pricing and suddenly there's no gas in the tank: there's a price to be paid, a bit of money to be carefully weighed against the convenience of travel.

If we want people to take transit, we want them to focus on where they want to go, not how. We just want them to tap, and go. People say they want computers to Do What I Mean. What they want of transit is to Just Get Me There. They don't want to be bothered about the details. It should be thoughtless, automatic, a habit.

I understand the economic arguments about pricing to allocate a resource efficiently. But I am not at all convinced there's a benefit here. Price fairly by distance, like gas (because otherwise you discourage short trips), and no-one will blink. They will just tap, and go.

This is a very eloquent way of putting what I've been trying to say. Cars provide freedom, even if it comes with hidden costs. You get in, and you go. Transit should try and replicate this as much as possible. Forcing people to start calculating times, buses vs. trains and zone considerations just puts a burden on this freedom that drivers don't have to deal with.

[ilikeredheads]

yeah I don't agree with varying fares base on time, especially if they want to go distance-based for skytrain. It's making the fare system unnecessarily convoluted.

Fares should be simple and easy to understand. If I want to travel from Station A to Station B, I shouldn't have to worry about the time I travel might affect me having to pay more or less.

[Aroundtheworld]

Originally Posted by GlassCity

This is a very eloquent way of putting what I've been trying to say. Cars provide freedom, even if it comes with hidden costs. You get in, and you go. Transit should try and replicate this as much as possible. Forcing people to start calculating times, buses vs. trains and zone considerations just puts a burden on this freedom that drivers don't have to deal with.

You use the analogy of cars as an argument against the variation in fares. However, look at the ever-popular Uber which has many different options and surge pricing.

I think varying fares can work well as long as you have a good transit app or Google Maps integration so that cost is very clear as well as a breakdown if people want more detail.

[cganuelas1995]

When I lived and worked in Sydney earlier in 2016, I found it really easy to understand how the fare system worked. The further you travel, the more you pay. I'm pretty sure someone using transit for the first time can figure that out. Someone taking the Canada Line from Bridgeport to Marine Drive SHOULD NOT have to pay for 2 zones when they were going 2 stations. If they're going to have fares be peak or off-peak dependent, they should also have lower early-morning/late-night fares too.

Also, they should implement a discount after x amount of journeys.

[CanSpice]

Originally Posted by GlassCity

This is a very eloquent way of putting what I've been trying to say. Cars provide freedom, even if it comes with hidden costs. You get in, and you go. Transit should try and replicate this as much as possible. Forcing people to start calculating times, buses vs. trains and zone considerations just puts a burden on this freedom that drivers don't have to deal with.

Drivers do, they just use a different currency: time. Nearly everybody out there knows that if they leave their house at the wrong time in the morning to get to work they'll get stuck in rush hour traffic. If they leave half an hour earlier or later they'll spend less time in traffic. Extremely few drivers equate time to money though.