CTA New Bus Order 2020

[Shannoncvpi]

1 hour ago, NewFlyerMCI said:

Ah, so do Chicago and 77th still have their artics?

yea they gone be at those garages for a while 

[jajuan]

13 hours ago, Mr.NewFlyer1051 said:

in my opinion we won’t see the 4000’s 4300’s back at their regular garages until at least fall pick or winter pick of this year but at the end of the day we will see how the virus is during that time 

It may even be later than that and might even be next year that artic assignments at the garages ease back to pre-pandemic standards because it's not just what's going on with the virus itself that's a factor. It's also how fast work patterns go back to what they were. A number of Uber drivers and other people I've spoken to have said that they have family members who work at downtown based companies who've been told to expect to continue to work from home through all of 2021 into at least the early months of 2022. So it also depends on how many downtown business offices want to go back to their prior business models of having all their employees come into the office. Some companies may decide they can still get a decent level of productivity with some mix of their employees working from home. So yeah we're going to be seeing artics spread across five garages and not crammed into just three for quite some time. .

[4CottageGrove95th]

I've been noticing the comments and discussions about the "shuffling" around of New Flyer artics due to the pandemic.  Since I'm no longer living in Chicago, the only way I have even a remote idea of what's going on there with respect to bus series assignments is by periodically looking at activity via CTA Bus Tracker and of course through the comments on this site.  Having said that, I do wonder from time to time how much of an impact this reassignment and juggling of equipment (due to the pandemic) will have on the kind of buses CTA will purchase in this latest order.  What I mean is, will the order lean more toward a purchase of 60 foot articulates with less emphasis on the 40 footers? Or will the order consist of mostly 40 footers with only a comparative handful of 60 footers being included in the mix? 

[Sam92]

I personally see more artics being ordered for the fact that post pandemic measures may encourage keeping space to slow any further diseases that may hit

[NewFlyerMCI]

38 minutes ago, Sam92 said:

I personally see more artics being ordered for the fact that post pandemic measures may encourage keeping space to slow any further diseases that may hit

Quite ironic considering we have a surplus and what artics we had pre-pandemic weren't all utilized correctly ?

[4CottageGrove95th]

1 hour ago, Sam92 said:

I personally see more artics being ordered for the fact that post pandemic measures may encourage keeping space to slow any further diseases that may hit

Yeah. That's pretty much what I was thinking.

[YoungBusLover]

25 minutes ago, NewFlyerMCI said:

Quite ironic considering we have a surplus and what artics we had pre-pandemic weren't all utilized correctly ?

Ask yourself this though. How much money would an agency save adding an additional 600 Hybrid or Maybe even electric artics? Or a mix of Hybrid electric 40/60 footers. Where would lets say 300 60 footers end up exactly? 100 each to Kedzie,Chicago and 103rd while NP and 77th have a mix of 40/60 like they do right now. The other 300 40 footers would end up going to FG and 74th in a even slpit of 150 a piece. I'm kind of going off of hypothetical scenarios at this point but hey you never know.

[Sam92]

52 minutes ago, YoungBusLover said:

Ask yourself this though. How much money would an agency save adding an additional 600 Hybrid or Maybe even electric artics? Or a mix of Hybrid electric 40/60 footers. Where would lets say 300 60 footers end up exactly? 100 each to Kedzie,Chicago and 103rd while NP and 77th have a mix of 40/60 like they do right now. The other 300 40 footers would end up going to FG and 74th in a even slpit of 150 a piece. I'm kind of going off of hypothetical scenarios at this point but hey you never know.

That depends on how the post pandemic world views spacing. Before this artics were thought to be the solution to crowding on local routes which is why they were tried briefly at 77th on 3, 4 and 79 and Chicago on 66. Then the discovery was that some routes needed to speed up buses instead of putting artics which actually slowed down those routes. The idea pre pandemic was a bus that was full and packed was making the most money (also the reason why so many operators fallbehind as layover/recovery times were cut to the bare minimum so as to keep the bus moving with passengers) but now that may change and with the current situation we actually need about 50 more 

[Shannoncvpi]

6 minutes ago, Sam92 said:

That depends on how the post pandemic world views spacing. Before this artics were thought to be the solution to crowding on local routes which is why they were tried briefly at 77th on 3, 4 and 79 and Chicago on 66. Then the discovery was that some routes needed to speed up buses instead of putting artics which actually slowed down those routes. The idea pre pandemic was a bus that was full and packed was making the most money (also the reason why so many operators fallbehind as layover/recovery times were cut to the bare minimum so as to keep the bus moving with passengers) but now that may change and with the current situation we actually need about 50 more 

This was before my time at CTA back in 16 when 7 & C had artics then how did the artics make the buses even slower seems like more room to fit people so better service correct me if I am looking at it wrong 

[Tcmetro]

A few things make artics slower in my opinion:

1. Typically artics mean running less service overall, to make use of the extra capacity. More people are getting on and off at each stop, which slows buses down. 

2. It's a longer bus with the same amount of doors, so passengers take more time to exit. 

3. The wheel wells in the middle and the accordion are harder to navigate, so riders take more time to sit down.

4. A lot of bus stop zones don't seem to accommodate artics well. One of my main stops on the 21 is difficult for an artic to pull in to, so the back door empties into the street instead of the curb. That back step is quite high and harder for the older folks to negotiate. 

As for the new bus order, I believe it has been advertised as a 40-foot order. From what I remember in the budget, it seems that a 60-foot order will be coming soon to replace the 4000s and the 4300s will be rehabbed. The 4300s were only bought to run for the Dan Ryan Red Line reconstruction. Pre-pandemic they weren't making use of the whole artic fleet, when the pandemic hit they spread them around for social distancing and capacity when they were enforcing limits. 

 

[Erin Mishkin Jr.]

I have a feeling they will be more Novas since a friend of mine thought they were Novas again but we not sure we'll have to find out 

[artthouwill]

5 hours ago, 4CottageGrove95th said:

I've been noticing the comments and discussions about the "shuffling" around of New Flyer artics due to the pandemic.  Since I'm no longer living in Chicago, the only way I have even a remote idea of what's going on there with respect to bus series assignments is by periodically looking at activity via CTA Bus Tracker and of course through the comments on this site.  Having said that, I do wonder from time to time how much of an impact this reassignment and juggling of equipment (due to the pandemic) will have on the kind of buses CTA will purchase in this latest order.  What I mean is, will the order lean more toward a purchase of 60 foot articulates with less emphasis on the 40 footers? Or will the order consist of mostly 40 footers with only a comparatively handful of 60 footers being included in the mix? 

For now, the order is for 40 ft buses as they are replacing 40-foot buses.   When CTA decides to retire some srtics. They will probably replace them with artics.

[Sam92]

2 hours ago, Shannoncvpi said:

This was before my time at CTA back in 16 when 7 & C had artics then how did the artics make the buses even slower seems like more room to fit people so better service correct me if I am looking at it wrong 

Dwell times and slower accel. First time artics came about some runs were cut so the same number of people took longer to board at those stops.  79 and 66 gain better capacity through frequency rather longer buses. And with C and 7 having more routes that benefit from high frequency it’s better to have those two garages house 40 ft so they have more room to maintain the sheer amount of buses those two garages require for the heavy amount of trunk service they provide and still keep a spare ratio for maintenance. 103rd, NP and K all have heavier peak based service and provide either feeder or  short routes outside of their downtown service so they don’t need as many buses but what they do have need to be able to carry the  more downtown commute based service found at those two garages so artics are more justified vs 77 and C who does more trunk service 

[Shannoncvpi]

29 minutes ago, Sam92 said:

Dwell times and slower accel. First time artics came about some runs were cut so the same number of people took longer to board at those stops.  79 and 66 gain better capacity through frequency rather longer buses. And with C and 7 having more routes that benefit from high frequency it’s better to have those two garages house 40 ft so they have more room to maintain the sheer amount of buses those two garages require for the heavy amount of trunk service they provide and still keep a spare ratio for maintenance. 103rd, NP and K all have heavier peak based service and provide either feeder or  short routes outside of their downtown service so they don’t need as many buses but what they do have need to be able to carry the  more downtown commute based service found at those two garages so artics are more justified vs 77 and C who does more trunk service 

Yea I know K we have them heavy downtown routes just didnt know bout C & 7

[NewFlyerMCI]

6 hours ago, YoungBusLover said:

Ask yourself this though. How much money would an agency save adding an additional 600 Hybrid or Maybe even electric artics? Or a mix of Hybrid electric 40/60 footers. Where would lets say 300 60 footers end up exactly? 100 each to Kedzie,Chicago and 103rd while NP and 77th have a mix of 40/60 like they do right now. The other 300 40 footers would end up going to FG and 74th in a even slpit of 150 a piece. I'm kind of going off of hypothetical scenarios at this point but hey you never know.

The general consensus seems to be that hybrids aren't worth the savings, and considering how legislation has been looking around the country, it might be prudent to buy electrics anyhow. Your hypothetical would be fine with me however

[NewFlyerMCI]

5 hours ago, Sam92 said:

That depends on how the post pandemic world views spacing. Before this artics were thought to be the solution to crowding on local routes which is why they were tried briefly at 77th on 3, 4 and 79 and Chicago on 66. Then the discovery was that some routes needed to speed up buses instead of putting artics which actually slowed down those routes. The idea pre pandemic was a bus that was full and packed was making the most money (also the reason why so many operators fallbehind as layover/recovery times were cut to the bare minimum so as to keep the bus moving with passengers) but now that may change and with the current situation we actually need about 50 more 

 

2 hours ago, Sam92 said:

Dwell times and slower accel. First time artics came about some runs were cut so the same number of people took longer to board at those stops.  79 and 66 gain better capacity through frequency rather longer buses. And with C and 7 having more routes that benefit from high frequency it’s better to have those two garages house 40 ft so they have more room to maintain the sheer amount of buses those two garages require for the heavy amount of trunk service they provide and still keep a spare ratio for maintenance. 103rd, NP and K all have heavier peak based service and provide either feeder or  short routes outside of their downtown service so they don’t need as many buses but what they do have need to be able to carry the  more downtown commute based service found at those two garages so artics are more justified vs 77 and C who does more trunk service 

I still maintain that if the 79 & 66 had kept their original frequencies, artics would've worked just fine. No one likes a packed bus anyhow, you could've kept the same amount of people on a bus (and probably more) but spread out, and made the same money, and there would be less people waiting for a bus and less overcrowding. And I'm willing to be the problems with bunching would've either gotten better or stayed the same. WMATA introduced artics on routes without changing frequencies and did just fine.

I think high-capacity routes would benefit from high-capacity buses, and CTA is mostly unwilling to commit to finding a solution to this that isn't just "run more 40ft". If you're going to have routes like the 4 and 79 running relay races with 2-3 buses, you might as well mix some artics in there as well. There are ways to effectively utilize artics for things more than peak travel, CTA just doesn't want to invest in that. I hope the current arrangement of the fleet stays post-pandemic (with minor changes)

[YoungBusLover]

21 minutes ago, NewFlyerMCI said:

 

I still maintain that if the 79 & 66 had kept their original frequencies, artics would've worked just fine. No one likes a packed bus anyhow, you could've kept the same amount of people on a bus (and probably more) but spread out, and made the same money, and there would be less people waiting for a bus and less overcrowding. And I'm willing to be the problems with bunching would've either gotten better or stayed the same. WMATA introduced artics on routes without changing frequencies and did just fine.

I think high-capacity routes would benefit from high-capacity buses, and CTA is mostly unwilling to commit to finding a solution to this that isn't just "run more 40ft". If you're going to have routes like the 4 and 79 running relay races with 2-3 buses, you might as well mix some artics in there as well. There are ways to effectively utilize artics for things more than peak travel, CTA just doesn't want to invest in that. I hope the current arrangement of the fleet stays post-pandemic (with minor changes)

Speaking of relay races this happens quite a bit during rush hour. The empty convoys of artics on cottage and 79th are quite amusing to me especially when 1 out of the 3 buses are actually doing the work sometimes.

[NewFlyerMCI]

13 hours ago, YoungBusLover said:

Speaking of relay races this happens quite a bit during rush hour. The empty convoys of artics on cottage and 79th are quite amusing to me especially when 1 out of the 3 buses are actually doing the work sometimes.

The 79 is always hilarious, cause you have all the passengers poking their heads up like the seagulls from finding nemo trying to figure out which bus is going to Wentworth, Western, Ford City or Solo Cup

[Sam92]

15 hours ago, NewFlyerMCI said:

 

I still maintain that if the 79 & 66 had kept their original frequencies, artics would've worked just fine. No one likes a packed bus anyhow, you could've kept the same amount of people on a bus (and probably more) but spread out, and made the same money, and there would be less people waiting for a bus and less overcrowding. And I'm willing to be the problems with bunching would've either gotten better or stayed the same. WMATA introduced artics on routes without changing frequencies and did just fine.

I think high-capacity routes would benefit from high-capacity buses, and CTA is mostly unwilling to commit to finding a solution to this that isn't just "run more 40ft". If you're going to have routes like the 4 and 79 running relay races with 2-3 buses, you might as well mix some artics in there as well. There are ways to effectively utilize artics for things more than peak travel, CTA just doesn't want to invest in that. I hope the current arrangement of the fleet stays post-pandemic (with minor changes)

Well Your second point while making sense would encounter issues cause to keep the same frequency on say 3, 4, 79 and 87 and use artics means 30 buses each and with artics being 1 1/2 buses thats 45 each across those 4 routes (180 buses for those). So including spare ratio that’s 200/250-300 storage space used for those alone. You add in the other routes now 77th is over loaded With barely room for a spare ratio (meaning more breakdowns and less replacements to keep service flowing)and with all the delays that still end up occurring the artics are essentially taking up extra space with no real trade off thus cta went back to 40ft buses and instead used short turns and pull-ins. Some routes artics work cause more buses And riders take longer trips but trunk lines, the way to thin crowds is to short turn and keep the buses where most of the boardings occur since those trip types tend to be shorter rides to either connect with another bus or whatever generator is there. Think 14 vs 79. 14 riders all load on Jeffery to go downtown so artics are more needed since people stay on longer. 79 yeah the bus stays crowded but more people are probably doing something like cottage to red line or something so they’re not too worried about a seat or comfort. That’s honestly a big mistake Seattle made. Buying longer buses instead of increasing frequency with shorter buses so you have to be lucky to get a bus near you that runs 15 min or better

[Anthony Devera]

43 minutes ago, Sam92 said:

Well Your second point while making sense would encounter issues cause to keep the same frequency on say 3, 4, 79 and 87 and use artics means 30 buses each and with artics being 1 1/2 buses thats 45 each across those 4 routes (180 buses for those). So including spare ratio that’s 200/250-300 storage space used for those alone. You add in the other routes now 77th is over loaded With barely room for a spare ratio (meaning more breakdowns and less replacements to keep service flowing)and with all the delays that still end up occurring the artics are essentially taking up extra space with no real trade off thus cta went back to 40ft buses and instead used short turns and pull-ins. Some routes artics work cause more buses And riders take longer trips but trunk lines, the way to thin crowds is to short turn and keep the buses where most of the boardings occur since those trip types tend to be shorter rides to either connect with another bus or whatever generator is there. Think 14 vs 79. 14 riders all load on Jeffery to go downtown so artics are more needed since people stay on longer. 79 yeah the bus stays crowded but more people are probably doing something like cottage to red line or something so they’re not too worried about a seat or comfort. That’s honestly a big mistake Seattle made. Buying longer buses instead of increasing frequency with shorter buses so you have to be lucky to get a bus near you that runs 15 min or better

It's a bit difficult to compare Seattle's transit system with Chicago's. For a long time, most bus routes in Seattle went to Downtown, and there weren't as many crosstown routes. Like you said, Downtown routes usually have people taking longer rides, so artics make sense for those routes. In recent years, Seattle's system has become more of a point-to-point grid system, and there are many more frequent routes today than there were 15 years ago. I believe most of Seattle's crosstown routes are operated with 40-footers, and only a few of them (e.g. 8, 44, 45, 48) have mostly artics. To add to this, Seattle has always struggled with funding, so it's possible that it was cheaper to run artics on infrequent routes than run 40-footers on frequent routes.

[jajuan]

For now, I think CTA is still fine with operating no more than 300 artics because of the fact that others pointed out, namely that prepandemic CTA was very inefficient in how it deployed its artics already on hand. Even during both rush periods on weekdays, 100 of them on average sat unused and parked at the garage for reasons that had nothing to do with maintenance. Now they're seeing that it was smarter from the get go that having them spread among five garages instead of crammed and overstacked at only three for a gang of them overall to sit unused is more efficient and smarter to do. 77th and C managers can't do their usual shenanigans they done in the past to get out of having them longer than just a few months now that rider behavior dictates that deployments and assignments be more efficient than what we were seeing out of them in the prepandemic days. And the other angle from before the pandemic says to me that it's not smart to act on impulse and jump increase the overall number of artics if from looking at past actions and decisions, bus operations bosses at the main downtown office are going to allow 77th and C find a way to get out of having any artics and then go back to K, NP and 103rd overstacked with them to a point that we see a significant percentage of the overall artic count unused. They should keep the current setup of keeping what artics are already on hand spread among five garages for the longer term, and then only after the pandemic finally starts dying down for good with increases in vaccinations assess whether increasing beyond 300 artics is warranted.

[Tcmetro]

Artics in Seattle were definitely used to keep frequencies low while managing demand. Until recently it was common that major lines used artics on 30 min frequencies. They've put a lot of money into frequency, but good service there is generally 12-15 min headways.  

I hope any new artic purchases in Chicago are of the three-door model. If CTA decides to go forward with all door boarding on the J14 (and expand to other lines) they can really improve travel speeds and capacity. 

[NewFlyerMCI]

4 hours ago, Sam92 said:

Well Your second point while making sense would encounter issues cause to keep the same frequency on say 3, 4, 79 and 87 and use artics means 30 buses each and with artics being 1 1/2 buses thats 45 each across those 4 routes (180 buses for those). So including spare ratio that’s 200/250-300 storage space used for those alone. You add in the other routes now 77th is over loaded With barely room for a spare ratio (meaning more breakdowns and less replacements to keep service flowing)and with all the delays that still end up occurring the artics are essentially taking up extra space with no real trade off thus cta went back to 40ft buses and instead used short turns and pull-ins. Some routes artics work cause more buses And riders take longer trips but trunk lines, the way to thin crowds is to short turn and keep the buses where most of the boardings occur since those trip types tend to be shorter rides to either connect with another bus or whatever generator is there. Think 14 vs 79. 14 riders all load on Jeffery to go downtown so artics are more needed since people stay on longer. 79 yeah the bus stays crowded but more people are probably doing something like cottage to red line or something so they’re not too worried about a seat or comfort. That’s honestly a big mistake Seattle made. Buying longer buses instead of increasing frequency with shorter buses so you have to be lucky to get a bus near you that runs 15 min or better

 

3 hours ago, Anthony Devera said:

It's a bit difficult to compare Seattle's transit system with Chicago's. For a long time, most bus routes in Seattle went to Downtown, and there weren't as many crosstown routes. Like you said, Downtown routes usually have people taking longer rides, so artics make sense for those routes. In recent years, Seattle's system has become more of a point-to-point grid system, and there are many more frequent routes today than there were 15 years ago. I believe most of Seattle's crosstown routes are operated with 40-footers, and only a few of them (e.g. 8, 44, 45, 48) have mostly artics. To add to this, Seattle has always struggled with funding, so it's possible that it was cheaper to run artics on infrequent routes than run 40-footers on frequent routes.

Seattle has pretty much locked the peak direction travel game down and they absolutely need their artics. Almost all of Seattle's 3 transit agenices that use artics, are for routes that serve a similar purpose to the J14 or the LaSalle express routes. After that, King County Metro uses artics for their high-capacity RapidRide routes, most of which operate crosstown. Additionally, a lot of the express routes that do use artics, only have a couple of runs (such as CT Route 421 with 8 runs btwn 4:30a-7:30a and CT Route 880 which has 7 runs btwn 5a-8a). 

Personally, it's hard to compare Chicago's artic usage to other places (primarily Seattle and NYC who I believe are the only markets with more artic usage than us) because their needs for artics vary so differently.

[NewFlyerMCI]

2 hours ago, Tcmetro said:

Artics in Seattle were definitely used to keep frequencies low while managing demand. Until recently it was common that major lines used artics on 30 min frequencies. They've put a lot of money into frequency, but good service there is generally 12-15 min headways.  

I hope any new artic purchases in Chicago are of the three-door model. If CTA decides to go forward with all door boarding on the J14 (and expand to other lines) they can really improve travel speeds and capacity. 

I remember this discussion previously, I think all-door boarding needs to be in place before CTA considers buying 3-door artics. I also think 3-door artics are useful on routes that experience simultaneously boarding & alighting, which are most prevalent on north-south crosstown routes (9, 49, 52, etc) and then on other high-capacity crosstown routes. Peak-direction routes would be just fine with 2-door artics.

[NewFlyerMCI]

3 hours ago, jajuan said:

For now, I think CTA is still fine with operating no more than 300 artics because of the fact that others pointed out, namely that prepandemic CTA was very inefficient in how it deployed its artics already on hand. Even during both rush periods on weekdays, 100 of them on average sat unused and parked at the garage for reasons that had nothing to do with maintenance. Now they're seeing that it was smarter from the get go that having them spread among five garages instead of crammed and overstacked at only three for a gang of them overall to sit unused is more efficient and smarter to do. 77th and C managers can't do their usual shenanigans they done in the past to get out of having them longer than just a few months now that rider behavior dictates that deployments and assignments be more efficient than what we were seeing out of them in the prepandemic days. And the other angle from before the pandemic says to me that it's not smart to act on impulse and jump increase the overall number of artics if from looking at past actions and decisions, bus operations bosses at the main downtown office are going to allow 77th and C find a way to get out of having any artics and then go back to K, NP and 103rd overstacked with them to a point that we see a significant percentage of the overall artic count unused. They should keep the current setup of keeping what artics are already on hand spread among five garages for the longer term, and then only after the pandemic finally starts dying down for good with increases in vaccinations assess whether increasing beyond 300 artics is warranted.

I definitely agree with this plan of action the most. Especially considering looking at the ridership stats (Sept 2020 most recent) and see routes like the 53 climb to #4 on the list (previously I don't think it's made higher than #6 or #8) and seeing the 79 still reign #1 (since the late 1990s) even though it's ridership has been slashed nearly in half since Sept 2019 (655k riders vs 315k riders)