CTA Bus Rapid Transit (take two)

[Busjack]

Ok so is anything new going on a lot of guessing but anyone hear the city doing anything?

• They only got planning money.
• For the rest, you can download the budget yourself (page 26).

[MetroShadow]

And then, there's this:http://touch.redeyechicago.com/#section/2943/article/p2p-81934702/

[jajuan]

And then, there's this:http://touch.redeyechicago.com/#section/2943/article/p2p-81934702/

He does have a point that it doesn't add up for CTA to say it would run both the Ashland BRT route (which I still don't believe will get done anytime soon) and the local #9 along Ashland while still holding to that bogus reasoning that the #11 and Brown Line were redundant services between Western/Leland and Fullerton/Sheffield. But Pawar still isn't going to get very far with this because CTA can still argue that the North Side isn't really hurting for service and that viable alternatives do still exist even if the average 2 block distance from some Brown Line stations to a bus route that crosses Lincoln or from that bus route to a business on Lincoln is inconvenient for some senior and disabled riders.

[BusHunter]

Pawar needs to take a page out of the west 31st grant or whatever plan they applied for. They got service and the ridership is nowhere near what Lincoln could be going through those neighborhoods.

[Busjack]

Pawar needs to take a page out of the west 31st grant or whatever plan they applied for. They got service and the ridership is nowhere near what Lincoln could be going through those neighborhoods.

However, one has to go through CMAP and the RTA, and the issue with all the rest of the applications made by CTA is that someone has to come up with the matching funds.

So long as Brian Steele is telling Pawar to bug off, that isn't going to work.

[Busjack]

Related to the original Chicago Ave. BRT grant that fell through is an item on the CMAQ list for funding for Transit Signal Priorty on Chicago Ave. from Austin to Orleans, to begin in 2016.

[BusHunter]

I got to see this Western Avenue construction tonight from Logan to Diversey. Man they really got traffic messed up!! They have one lane going north, that's it. I couldn't help but think about the Ashland BRT being one lane. It's almost like a simulation of how bad that could be for motorists!!

[jajuan]

I got to see this Western Avenue construction tonight from Logan to Diversey. Man they really got traffic messed up!! They have one lane going north, that's it. I couldn't help but think about the Ashland BRT being one lane. It's almost like a simulation of how bad that could be for motorists!!

And to think their original thought for Ashland BRT was to bar local buses in the bus lane. Now they're really in La La Land in now saying 'okay we'll let the local Ashland bus use the bus lane too' and think they can keep the center lane island station proposal. Yeah okay.

[BusHunter]

And to think their original thought for Ashland BRT was to bar local buses in the bus lane. Now they're really in La La Land in now saying 'okay we'll let the local Ashland bus use the bus lane too' and think they can keep the center lane island station proposal. Yeah okay.

Put it this way, if I'm going up or down Ashland it will only be in a bus!! LOL!!

[Busjack]

And to think their original thought for Ashland BRT was to bar local buses in the bus lane. Now they're really in La La Land in now saying 'okay we'll let the local Ashland bus use the bus lane too' and think they can keep the center lane island station proposal. Yeah okay.

I'm not sure how you reached your premise, in that I took BusHunter to refer only to what happens if portions of the street are closed for construction, not that Rahm had finally come through with his promise to evaluate the criticisms of the Ashland project.

Put it this way, if I'm going up or down Ashland it will only be in a bus!! LOL!!

Garmon has another way.

[garmon757]

I'm not sure how you reached your premise, in that I took BusHunter to refer only to what happens if portions of the street are closed for construction, not that Rahm had finally come through with his promise to evaluate the criticisms of the Ashland project.

Garmon has another way.

Damn right!!! :lol:

[BusHunter]

Damn right!!!

What is Garmon's way?

[Busjack]

What is Garmon's way?

You mean you missed the discussion starting about here?

[BusHunter]

You mean you missed the discussion starting about here?

Which is?

[jajuan]

I'm not sure how you reached your premise, in that I took BusHunter to refer only to what happens if portions of the street are closed for construction, not that Rahm had finally come through with his promise to evaluate the criticisms of the Ashland project.

Garmon has another way.

Come on now Busjack. I was talking about more recent reports of them tossing out ideas off the top of their heads in response to the criticisms. BusHunter caught on to my meaning that his comparisons of similarities of what the construction on Western is doing to traffic on Western and what my be in store for Ashland through the current proposed structure of what BRT will be like is what fueled those reports I indirectly referenced.

[BusHunter]

According to the Tribune, construction is supposed to also begin next month on the BRT traffic lanes in the loop. Looks like the Union Station bus station is being built as part of the project. It will have an under the street connection to Union Station so no one will have the cross the street. One thing that needs more explanation is will the buses in these bus only lanes be able to cross back into traffic or will it be like the old State street mall where buses are stuck behind each other. Some WB buses are slower than others, the #20 and #60 probably being the slowest followed by the #56. If one is on a #J14, they might now have to wait for the slower traffic. Lane markings, a solid white line denotes at least to the rules of the road that buses cannot pass each other, I don't know if they will follow this. EB, they would probably have double the wait time for #J14 boardings. It would probably be better off if they left them on Monroe as that affects no one.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/redeye-city-to-break-ground-on-loop-express-bus-system-in-march-20150223-story.html

[Busjack]

According to the Tribune, construction is supposed to also begin next month on the BRT traffic lanes in the loop. Looks like the Union Station bus station is being built as part of the project. It will have an under the street connection to Union Station so no one will have the cross the street. One thing that needs more explanation is will the buses in these bus only lanes be able to cross back into traffic or will it be like the old State street mall where buses are stuck behind each other. Some WB buses are slower than others, the #20 and #60 probably being the slowest followed by the #56. If one is on a #J14, they might now have to wait for the slower traffic. Lane markings, a solid white line denotes at least to the rules of the road that buses cannot pass each other, I don't know if they will follow this. EB, they would probably have double the wait time for #J14 boardings. It would probably be better off if they left them on Monroe as that affects no one.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/redeye-city-to-break-ground-on-loop-express-bus-system-in-march-20150223-story.html

Prior maps, including what Kevin posted, and consistent with the rendering in the article, were that the preliminary plans were for segregated bike, bus, parking, and car lanes, at least on Washington. I suppose that nothing prevents a bus from swinging out into the one or two traffic lanes, but the theory must be that the buses can load up faster at a "station" than pulling to the curb.

That probably leads to the question whether various bus lines will have separate boarding areas on each "platform."

[jajuan]

According to the Tribune, construction is supposed to also begin next month on the BRT traffic lanes in the loop. Looks like the Union Station bus station is being built as part of the project. It will have an under the street connection to Union Station so no one will have the cross the street. One thing that needs more explanation is will the buses in these bus only lanes be able to cross back into traffic or will it be like the old State street mall where buses are stuck behind each other. Some WB buses are slower than others, the #20 and #60 probably being the slowest followed by the #56. If one is on a #J14, they might now have to wait for the slower traffic. Lane markings, a solid white line denotes at least to the rules of the road that buses cannot pass each other, I don't know if they will follow this. EB, they would probably have double the wait time for #J14 boardings. It would probably be better off if they left them on Monroe as that affects no one.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/redeye-city-to-break-ground-on-loop-express-bus-system-in-march-20150223-story.html

Plus one also have to remember that this whole process started when the J14 was still on Washington coming EB before in subsequent years being routed as it is now on Monroe. The references now to the J14 being affected by this project I think has to do with the NB buses still being on Madison and not that they intend to put SB buses back on Washington. But of course, it's up to CTA clarifying that part of it. As far as buses being able to pass each other, looking closely at the renderings in RedEye, where I read the story and which are the same renderings Kevin had linked in the archives that Busjack alluded to (interesting that the pic Ms. Swartz used in the main Tribune article doesn't have the dashed lines as that same pic in her article in the RedEye did), the white lines separating the bus lanes from the traffic lanes do appear to be dashed white lines which would allow a bus to cross over and pass around a bus on a route taking on more passengers and thus has longer boarding times. It's the current setup that technically they shouldn't be able to pass each other up as far as rules of the road go since the current bus lane dividing lines are solid. The setup shown in the RedEye for Canal in front of Union Station might pose an interesting challenge to the concerns you mention though as that bus lane has a median to the left of it and the coach bus parking lane to its right. And if I remember correctly the old State Street Mall setup had the dips in the curb that created an extra lane about two bus lengths long at the intersections that had bus stops (can't remember if NB and SB stops were staggered against each other as they are today with downtown State Street turned back over to car traffic) and buses mainly got stuck if they hadn't yet pulled into that dip lane.

[Busjack]

...interesting that the pic Ms. Swartz used in the main Tribune article doesn't have the dashed lines as that same pic in her article in the RedEye did), the white lines separating the bus lanes from the traffic lanes do appear to be dashed white lines which would allow a bus to cross over and pass around a bus on a route taking on more passengers and thus has longer boarding times.....

I take it you are relying on a traffic law distinction that one is not supposed to cross a solid white line. I don't know if that much thought went into the rendering, and I really doubt that any bus driver would respect that difference.

The more distinctive thing is the SBS type maroon lane, which is supposed to give the message that cars are to stay off. Besides wondering how any lane marking would work in this kind of weather, the depiction in the Tribune article is of a left turn intersection, which leads to the question what are they going to do at a right turn intersection?

But the picture in the online RedEye looks the same as in the online Tribune. You reading an actual paper?

The rendering on the CDOT site looks about the same, except it is an eastbound perspective instead of westbound, and has a separate left turn lane.

I thought I had enough independent recollection of the State St. situation, but not really other than the dips at the bus shelters.

[Kevin]

Besides wondering how any lane marking would work in this kind of weather, the depiction in the Tribune article is of a left turn intersection, which leads to the question what are they going to do at a right turn intersection?

If you look closely at the top of the Tribune rendering, you'll see a right turn intersection depicted. It appears as though cars will be allowed to cut across the bus lane to enter a right-turn lane. It's possible that these turns will now be signal protected, similar to Dearborn, to prevent conflicts with cyclists.

This project was also covered in CityLab yesterday. They show an additional rendering of Madison & LaSalle.

[BusHunter]

Reading the Citylab link, the trouble with Ashland BRT is is going to make one travel lane for cars. We just need to head over to north Western to see what that does to traffic. But it has the potential to be successful if done right. I think they are seriously going to have to consider removing parking on Ashland especially in the rush. Now they could keep it for the overnight periods as the traffic volume is low, maybe making it no parking 6AM to 8PM They could build a few parking lots like they did with Cicero. This could at least be done on the south side as they might have a few more open lots, but I don't what they will do with like an Ashland/Division type scenario. Someone might have to just get eminent domained.

[jajuan]

I take it you are relying on a traffic law distinction that one is not supposed to cross a solid white line. I don't know if that much thought went into the rendering, and I really doubt that any bus driver would respect that difference.

The more distinctive thing is the SBS type maroon lane, which is supposed to give the message that cars are to stay off. Besides wondering how any lane marking would work in this kind of weather, the depiction in the Tribune article is of a left turn intersection, which leads to the question what are they going to do at a right turn intersection?

But the picture in the online RedEye looks the same as in the online Tribune. You reading an actual paper?

The rendering on the CDOT site looks about the same, except it is an eastbound perspective instead of westbound, and has a separate left turn lane.

I thought I had enough independent recollection of the State St. situation, but not really other than the dips at the bus shelters.

Yeah I was looking at an actual paper (those do still exist you know ). But I did think about it after my post and later took into account difference in picture quality between print and electronic media to explain the difference. Also considering that current bus lanes downtown have solid white lines, it is true that operators probably won't pay attention to that anymore than today and that the main difference will be the different colored pavement of the bus lanes signaling cars (including those annoying downtown cabbies) to keep off.

[BusHunter]

I got to see how this works in front of Ogilvie, that is the double park capital!!

[Busjack]

If you look closely at the top of the Tribune rendering, you'll see a right turn intersection depicted. It appears as though cars will be allowed to cut across the bus lane to enter a right-turn lane. It's possible that these turns will now be signal protected, similar to Dearborn, to prevent conflicts with cyclists.

This project was also covered in CityLab yesterday. They show an additional rendering of Madison & LaSalle.

If you mean the intersection a block to the west, maybe, but as you indicate, whatever is behind the car in presumably what is in the right lane where otherwise the platform would be isn't clear.

Maybe the more interesting thing in both articles is the speculation about the Ashland BRT, between Swartz saying "has gone nowhere" to CityLab "leading to speculation that the mayor has pulled back for political reasons." I previously noted somewhere that Emanuel was not going to run on that.

[Busjack]

Ye I was looking at an actual paper (those do still exist you know ). But I did think about it after my post and later took into account difference in picture quality between print and electronic media to explain the difference. Also considering that current bus lanes downtown have solid white lines, it is true that operators probably won't pay attention to that anymore than today and that the main difference will be the different colored pavement of the bus lanes signaling cars (including those annoying downtown cabbies) to keep off.

The CityLab piece had a bit about there won't be cameras to enforce the lanes. I'm sure their point was to keep cars out of the bus lane, but the converse would also be the case.