The future of Ottawa's Transit

[c_speed3108]

Originally Posted by J.OT13

Apparently the double deckers aren't too hot either; one flipped over today.

I have been 40 footers tip in ditches too. Fact of life with tall vehicles.



As for running a reduced service, that likely would not help. You are better to have more equipment on the road in the snow as inevitably you "lose" buses (stuck, ditched, tipped over etc) If you only started with a reduced number you would get into trouble as things get late and whatever.

Scheduling would also be an issue.

The big thing is that roads the buses (particularly the artics) use are keeps well plowed and salt the heck out of them. Also keep all buses out of bus-bays (stop short of the stop) and turn lanes and avoid pulling into the curb if there is a snow bank there.

[eternallyme]

Originally Posted by Capital Shaun

A Saturday service? That's next to useless for a regular workday. Not everyone can stay home. A reduced weekday service would make more sense.

Only realistic way for such a service reduction to happen is if the biggest employers (the Feds in our case) closed up shop during a storm. The last time the Feds were on skeleton staff due to bad weather was during the ice storm of '98.

Removing the artics completely (at a minimum) would eliminate 359 buses - about one-third of the fleet - from service. Considering that some normally are out of service for repair or maintenance anyway, that would mean about 320 buses are removed from potential service. I'm not sure how many buses are used on a reduced weekday level (i.e. equivalent to weekdays during Christmas holidays) but I am sure it is at least somewhat higher. If schools were closed and the 600s could be stopped, it might free up some more.

There would surely still be breakdowns with 40-footers and some still get stuck on occasion, but artics historically have been practically useless.

[Capital Shaun]

Originally Posted by eternallyme

Removing the artics completely (at a minimum) would eliminate 359 buses - about one-third of the fleet - from service. Considering that some normally are out of service for repair or maintenance anyway, that would mean about 320 buses are removed from potential service. I'm not sure how many buses are used on a reduced weekday level (i.e. equivalent to weekdays during Christmas holidays) but I am sure it is at least somewhat higher. If schools were closed and the 600s could be stopped, it might free up some more.

There would surely still be breakdowns with 40-footers and some still get stuck on occasion, but artics historically have been practically useless.

So instead of better plowing of the roads the artics use, we reduce the bus service by a third just in case a few of them might get stuck? That makes no sense to me.

[eternallyme]

Originally Posted by Capital Shaun

So instead of better plowing of the roads the artics use, we reduce the bus service by a third just in case a few of them might get stuck? That makes no sense to me.

They did that in 2007-08, although that was on the weekends.

[Capital Shaun]

Originally Posted by eternallyme

They did that in 2007-08, although that was on the weekends.

OCTranspo cannot afford to reduce its service by that much on a weekday.

It would have to be a significant weather event to the point of causing government & businesses to shutdown to warrant such a service reduction.

Otherwise I agree with c_speed3108, every piece of equipment (plows & buses) should be on the road or on standby.

[eternallyme]

Originally Posted by Capital Shaun

OCTranspo cannot afford to reduce its service by that much on a weekday.

It would have to be a significant weather event to the point of causing government & businesses to shutdown to warrant such a service reduction.

Otherwise I agree with c_speed3108, every piece of equipment (plows & buses) should be on the road or on standby.

One possible solution might be very careful and strict assignments of buses, restricting the artics to certain routes and putting plows constantly on them, diverting from most residential streets. A possible prioritization in severe storms that might work (instead of removing buses, it would require local streets being inaccessible):

*Transitways and major arterials: Plow and salt/sand constantly to attempt to keep clear. Such also applies near key activity centres and important facilities like hospitals. That way, routes like the 95 and 97 would be able to safely operate full service.

*Collectors and other bus routes: Plow and salt/sand so that it is operable with buses and emergency vehicles. Use only 40-foot buses on these routes (including expresses and locals). During off-peak periods, time the runs so they are just before a schedule bus run, especially if the route is every hour or less. Consider detours on hills and bypassing narrow streets that are pre-set in advance if a better route is available. An example of a possible detour is Route 12 with Jasmine Crescent, such should be bypassed.

*Other residential streets: Delay all operations until after the storm. Perhaps plow sidewalks to allow walking movements. Such practically forces people to take the bus or stay home. If an emergency vehicle needs access, a plow on standby would run ahead of it in consultation with the emergency operations.

[Capital Shaun]

Originally Posted by eternallyme

*Other residential streets: Delay all operations until after the storm. Perhaps plow sidewalks to allow walking movements. Such practically forces people to take the bus or stay home. If an emergency vehicle needs access, a plow on standby would run ahead of it in consultation with the emergency operations.

We're the capital of a northern country that gets 3-4 months of winter conditions every year. We should be able to plan and continue to operate our services. We rarely should have to reduce services or delay plowing due to a snow storm. And 20cm of snow in a day isn't unheard of for Ottawa.

[Dado]

Originally Posted by eternallyme

One possible solution might be very careful and strict assignments of buses, restricting the artics to certain routes and putting plows constantly on them, diverting from most residential streets. A possible prioritization in severe storms that might work (instead of removing buses, it would require local streets being inaccessible):

*Transitways and major arterials: Plow and salt/sand constantly to attempt to keep clear. Such also applies near key activity centres and important facilities like hospitals. That way, routes like the 95 and 97 would be able to safely operate full service.

*Collectors and other bus routes: Plow and salt/sand so that it is operable with buses and emergency vehicles. Use only 40-foot buses on these routes (including expresses and locals). During off-peak periods, time the runs so they are just before a schedule bus run, especially if the route is every hour or less. Consider detours on hills and bypassing narrow streets that are pre-set in advance if a better route is available. An example of a possible detour is Route 12 with Jasmine Crescent, such should be bypassed.

*Other residential streets: Delay all operations until after the storm. Perhaps plow sidewalks to allow walking movements. Such practically forces people to take the bus or stay home. If an emergency vehicle needs access, a plow on standby would run ahead of it in consultation with the emergency operations.

At the risk of sounding a bit rude, but do you actually live in Ottawa?

I ask because the major points of what you've suggested above is actual City of Ottawa snow clearing policy. If there's one thing the City of Ottawa does pretty well, it's keeping bus routes clear. The Transitway is salted, sanded and plowed like crazy. So much salty water gets thrown up against the rock walls of the Scott St trench that it is prematurely eroding. Sidewalks you're on your own - but bus routes, they'll be clear.

I saw that in action today. All bus routes, even on relatively minor streets, were kept clear. Residential streets only started being cleared this evening, and they probably want to get those done before the temperature drops too much and freezes everything into an icy mess.


Most of Ottawa's problems with snow and transit can be traced back to the decision to operate a BRT system rather than an LRT system, and the consequent requirement for higher capacity buses in the guise of articulated and more recently double-decker buses. Articulated buses are going to be at risk of suffering jackknifing problems where they have to turn. To some extent the number of turns can be minimized, but never completely eliminated, especially if "flexibility" is a "feature" of the BRT system. Double deckers are apparently vulnerable to wind gusts and hydroplaning. By contrast, the O-Train just keeps happily running back and forth along its track in the foulest weather. The service is frequent enough that the trains keep their own tracks clear and similarly the switches, which are also equipped with heaters.

[lrt's friend]

Realistically, service reduction during bad weather is counterproductive. To maintain a normal level of service requires even more vehicles because of traffic and road conditions. Perhaps, some people will stay home, but that will be unpredictable. Some people actually switch to transit during bad weather. People will get very angry if delays they experience are caused by a planned weather related service reduction.

In addition, ad-hoc detours have no regard to customers. How is somebody to know that a bus is not travelling on Jasmine Crescent if you live there? It is difficult enough to inform the public of planned detours or to deal with detours caused by accidents.

Regarding the reliability of rail versus buses, I expect we will see a different set of circumstances that will stop rail service and when it does happen, it will have a much greater impact than when a few articulated buses stop operating. It would have been interesting to see how LRT would have performed during the 1998 ice storm. Would heavy icing of the wires and rails stopped service? The 1998 ice storm did not stop the buses except where there were wires or trees blocking the way. The whole Ottawa streetcar system shut down for days during one World War II storm due to heavy icing so it is not unprecedented. Inevitably, another ice storm will strike. Ottawa has a history of major ice storms that are most devastating in late December and early January when sunlight intensity is at its lowest. We better hope that LRT will end up being more reliable in difficult weather conditions.

[Uhuniau]

Originally Posted by eternallyme

If I were planning the schedule, I would have run a Saturday service today (with some exceptions) - entirely with 40-foot buses - and set detours. There would be no express service, although the 600-series school routes would run (unless schools were closed) and a limited number of peak runs where no other service exists. The remaining buses would sit on standby for extra crowds and gaps.

And if you'd done that today, people would be calling for your head. There is no way that such a reduction in service and capacity would have been able to handle the demand that was out there.

[Uhuniau]

Originally Posted by Dado

All bus routes, even on relatively minor streets, were kept clear.

Umm, no. I was on two such routes today that had to deviate because they weren't kept clear, and weren't cleared at all until noon or after.

To some extent the number of turns can be minimized, but never completely eliminated, especially if "flexibility" is a "feature" of the BRT system.

It would help if the city would stop allowing stupid curvilinear street layouts in new residential and commercial areas, but, nope. They never learn. This would not only obviate snow-related transit problems, but also make service more comfortable year-round (less turning and swerving) and more intuitive (more routes that run on more or less straight lines.)

There are all kinds of reasons to stop building suburban crap, but Ottawa is hopelessly addicted to suburban crap. Economically and politically addicted to it. So more suburban crap it is.

[eternallyme]

Originally Posted by Uhuniau

Umm, no. I was on two such routes today that had to deviate because they weren't kept clear, and weren't cleared at all until noon or after.



It would help if the city would stop allowing stupid curvilinear street layouts in new residential and commercial areas, but, nope. They never learn. This would not only obviate snow-related transit problems, but also make service more comfortable year-round (less turning and swerving) and more intuitive (more routes that run on more or less straight lines.)

There are all kinds of reasons to stop building suburban crap, but Ottawa is hopelessly addicted to suburban crap. Economically and politically addicted to it. So more suburban crap it is.

You do have a good point there, it is a lot easier to plow grid-line streets and store the snow and protect them for bus routes. The most problematic streets typically are the hilliest, and careful planning should be used on bus assignments - it may be passable for 40 foot buses but not artics. It seems that high winds brought down the double-decker more than anything, which is a totally different problem.

By the way, there was officially 35 cm at the airport, with more falling (so likely 40 to 50 cm in Ottawa, at least large parts of it).

The O-Train had no issues though, correct? I never was by the train line today so I wouldn't know. I would think wind would be a much bigger problem for the train than snow, since the train running on the tracks acts like a plow. That should bode well for the LRT line, as long as it is overhead powered and not third rail powered (outdoor third rails are useless in an Ottawa winter).

As for comparisons to other cities, most other cities would have suspended service completely in that kind of weather. The only cases I can see Ottawa totally shutting down transit is if it is snowing so hard that plows have to be pulled (like 5 cm an hour for several hours, which has never happened that I know of), or if extreme winds make operations unsafe (probably sustained 70-80 km/h or gusts to 120 km/h for an extended period, which is also very unlikely and would be record-breaking for Ottawa - the only gusts to 120+ have been in thunderstorms)

[Dado]

Originally Posted by Uhuniau

It would help if the city would stop allowing stupid curvilinear street layouts in new residential and commercial areas, but, nope. They never learn. This would not only obviate snow-related transit problems, but also make service more comfortable year-round (less turning and swerving) and more intuitive (more routes that run on more or less straight lines.)

The problems that articulated buses face in the snow do not arise from curvilinear street layouts, as annoying as these are for other reasons. Articulated buses get stuck in the snow mainly when trying to make right angle turns or when trying to pull out into the next lane from a bus stop, whether it be because of the bus stop being in a bus bay or another bus being ahead of it.

Artics on Slater and Albert are particularly vulnerable to this problem. All it takes is one bus getting stopped or stuck for any reason - it could well be a regular bus having something like a jammed door - and any artics following up behind have to change lanes to go around it. Chances are that sooner or later one of them will jackknife.

Exactly something like that recently happened in Calgary on their 7th Ave transit mall, quite possibly with former OC Transpo artics:

• Video Link

Here we have one artic getting stuck (unknown reasons) while the one behind tries to turn out and jackknifes, gets stuck and blocks the track.

I know that the LRT folks in Calgary absolutely do not like having to share 7th Ave with buses, and this is one of the reasons why. This is also exactly the kind of thing that would have happened on a regular basis had the N-S LRT with its downtown shared BRT+LRT lanes gone ahead because the curb lane was going to alternate between being an LRT platform (i.e. the current BRT platforms) and a BRT stopping lane (i.e. the current parking/loading areas). The operating plan was to replace all standard buses with artics, and all these artics would constantly be pulling in and out of the BRT stopping zones, leading to incidents like this one.

[eternallyme]

Originally Posted by Dado

The problems that articulated buses face in the snow do not arise from curvilinear street layouts, as annoying as these are for other reasons. Articulated buses get stuck in the snow mainly when trying to make right angle turns or when trying to pull out into the next lane from a bus stop, whether it be because of the bus stop being in a bus bay or another bus being ahead of it.

Artics on Slater and Albert are particularly vulnerable to this problem. All it takes is one bus getting stopped or stuck for any reason - it could well be a regular bus having something like a jammed door - and any artics following up behind have to change lanes to go around it. Chances are that sooner or later one of them will jackknife.

Exactly something like that recently happened in Calgary on their 7th Ave transit mall, quite possibly with former OC Transpo artics:

• Video Link

Here we have one artic getting stuck (unknown reasons) while the one behind tries to turn out and jackknifes, gets stuck and blocks the track.

I know that the LRT folks in Calgary absolutely do not like having to share 7th Ave with buses, and this is one of the reasons why. This is also exactly the kind of thing that would have happened on a regular basis had the N-S LRT with its downtown shared BRT+LRT lanes gone ahead because the curb lane was going to alternate between being an LRT platform (i.e. the current BRT platforms) and a BRT stopping lane (i.e. the current parking/loading areas). The operating plan was to replace all standard buses with artics, and all these artics would constantly be pulling in and out of the BRT stopping zones, leading to incidents like this one.

In addition, being stuck on Albert and Slater, or on the Transitway, at rush hour is a recipe for breakdown as it delays everything else forced to go around or detour.

In Uhuniau's defence, though, more curving layouts increase the potential for stuck buses as well, since there are a lot more curves in the street and more turns they have to make. I believe it happened a few times in the suburbs as well yesterday on express routes. (It is rarely an issue with local routes, since they rarely use artics except for a few peak trips and school runs).

It is easier on the weekends (as in 2007-08) since they can pull all the artics without reducing service and having extra buses to spare - even if it means requiring all the garages to be open.

[eternallyme]

Also about the double deckers, this is the first high wind event that I can think of that they were tested in to a great degree. But how to do a bait-and-switch? That means putting the double deckers in town on routes like the 4, 12 and 85 (instead of artics) to keep them from the windswept cross-Greenbelt corridors and the interprovincial bridges. They seemed to do quite well in just the snow though from what I could tell.

Since they entered service, other high winds have been:

* October 29 - peak gust 82 km/h at YOW (some parts of town reportedly higher), mostly late evening (long after they returned to the garage, few buses running at the time)

* October 30 - peak gust 78 km/h (sustained ~60 km/h), mostly very early morning with a midday secondary peak (little impact on double deckers but only a few in service at the time)

* November 12 - peak gust 67 km/h, late evening with brief squall line (long after peak)

* November 24 - peak gust 65 km/h (on a Saturday, no impact)

* December 4 - peak gust 63 km/h (mostly during midday so little impact to double deckers)

* December 21 - peak gust ~60 km/h (morning peak period)

[JCL]

Originally Posted by eternallyme

Also about the double deckers, this is the first high wind event that I can think of that they were tested in to a great degree. But how to do a bait-and-switch? That means putting the double deckers in town on routes like the 4, 12 and 85 (instead of artics) to keep them from the windswept cross-Greenbelt corridors and the interprovincial bridges. They seemed to do quite well in just the snow though from what I could tell.

OC Transpo has already decided to put the double decker buses mostly onto express routes (and routes 41 and 93 being non-expreesses) because there isn't as much on/off flow. So your idea on putting the double deckers on Routes 4, 12 and 85 on days with high wind will be a non-starter.

[eternallyme]

Originally Posted by JCL

OC Transpo has already decided to put the double decker buses mostly onto express routes (and routes 41 and 93 being non-expreesses) because there isn't as much on/off flow. So your idea on putting the double deckers on Routes 4, 12 and 85 on days with high wind will be a non-starter.

True, but I just chose routes which do not get seriously impacted by wind conditions (as opposed to routes that cross open sections of the Greenbelt or approach exposed shorelines such as across the Ottawa River). It would not be the ideal passenger flow, but would be for safety issues - winds are usually higher in those shorelines and open areas.

[Jamaican-Phoenix]

So is anyone else as unimpressed by the "uniqueness" and design of the LRT stations as I am?

[Harley613]

i'm in your boat. they look pretty dull indeed. at least it's finally being built...

[eternallyme]

No surprise, summer ridership is down.

It appears that the 2011 cuts didn't have much impact during the fall and winter, but were significant in ridership losses in the spring and especially summer months when fewer were at work and school. Why would they wait an hour or more for a trip for leisure purposes? It's a challenge trying to serve lower-density communities in off-peak periods, that is for sure.

I would argue, though, that a lot more ridership could be gained beefing up the major corridors than trying to restore service in low-ridership areas.