I mostly agree with this. It’s also important to separate out the tech of full autonomous cars and autonomous transit. The former being orders of magnitude more complex than the latter
Yeah that doesn’t mean that we should reproduce the same problem on an industrial scale. If we can get self-driving cars that are safer and better then great, but I’ll believe it when I see it.
Ps I’m sure Elon will have those cars ready to go any day now Tesla promises ‘one million robo-taxis’ in 2020
I’m not following this. We have human drivers on an industrial scale today who are plowing pedestrians daily. If the standard is no accidents whatsoever then we will never have autonomous cars. If the standard is, correctly, they are safer than humans on average then we should have them immediately. My understanding is that this is already the case especially for transit.
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Also technology can get messed up.
Ok, this is pointless, enjoy your cybertruck or whatever
Odd thing to get mad about lol
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My only thing about bringing back fares is that you have to deal with people fumbling for money or arguing about not wanting to pay the fare. No fares meant quicker stops as people simply walked on. I’d be curious what the bus driver’s feelings are about it.
I’d also be curious about what bringing back fares would do. Would it bring better bus service? Better benefits for workers? Would bus service decrease if fares didn’t come back?
This is a valid question. I was actually pushed out of a bike lane from a bus driver on Hillsborough street. Dummy went by me and then started to pull into the bike lane for the next stop without even fully passing me. I was so pissed and wanted so badly wanted to react really harshly, but I don’t want to end up in a position where I lose my job or get arrested. Bus drivers can be just as bad as regular drivers. It doesn’t help that it is a very large vehicle.
Considering that major cities like NYC doesn’t have self-driving subways, the Bay Area with BART, DC with the Metro, I’d doubt self driving buses would be a thing soon. I have been curious why it isn’t a thing when airports have self-driving trains. Self-driving buses also would more than likely need to be a fare free option since there’s really no way to enforce fares although I guess there could be sensors which would prevent the vehicle from moving until the fare is paid. It’s kind of hard to argue with a robot. In Hamburg, the U-bahn I was on didn’t have fare gates. I’ve been told that if you do get caught without a ticket, you do get fined as they will check randomly.
I saw on Youtube that Seoul is testing self driving buses. From the looks of it, it’s still got a way to go. It could solve bus driver staffing problems:
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It’s my understanding that service is not impacted at all by having fares or not. It’s basically asking us, “How much of a budget shortfall do you want next fiscal year?”
Rough estimates are either $10 million without fares and $8 million with.
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To help add to this point, all transit agencies rely heavily on state and federal funding (mainly state funding). Fares only help to pay 10% of the total budget, if even that.
There actually 3 automated train lines at U.S. Capital in Washington that connects the building with several congressional offices. It’s not apart of WMATA it operated by the government.
im with you on covered bus stops, make it humane if you are going to have it…litchford road used to have weedy stop in the mud. doesn’t have to be fancy, just element resistant and not red clay splashing on your feet.
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I think the city could afford to put a shelter at every GoRaleigh stop GoTriangle I’m not sure. I’ll email @JonathanMelton or my district Megan Patton about it. They should also contract people to clean the trash cans, but being next to a bus stop is horrible.
I will note that I believe it’s in this or next year’s transportation work plan for GoTriangle to build several hundred bus stops across the system, many of which for GR.
A new one actually just popped up in front of North Hall on Hillsborough Street.
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There has been a big push to upgrade bus shelters, basically kicked off since funding for transit was approved with the 1/2 cent sales tax increase in 2017(?). Loosely, the shelters are prioritized due to a variety of factors, main one being ridership. We’re slowly upgrading them in waves and you can see a map of all stops here:
https://experience.arcgis.com/experience/3350db865917460a8d4218738526dd73
It’s quite a bit of work and each one presents different challenges. You can see more here and, as always, would love the comments at the Raleigh Transit Authority.
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Unrelated, but I’ve been wondering about how we can investigate purchasing some commuter-style buses for our express routes (instead of traditional low-floor local buses). Especially on routes like the upcoming 100x that will frequently carry folks with luggage going to the airport.
Is there an email I should contact? Or is there a public comment period at RTA meetings? Would love your thoughts.
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Worth noting that most of this region’s express routes are operated by GoTriangle, and, as far as I can tell, RTA doesn’t really have much input on what GoTriangle does. With that in mind, this might be a good place to start: Feedback | GoTriangle
Fun fact: GoTriangle piloted coach buses back in 2018. Nothing ever came of it; not sure why.
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Another thing is there way to many stops per line. There is a bus stop 3 blocks down from the other one it is ridiculous and because of that a lot of stops won’t have shelters because of low ridership. So that has to be a factor like this is insane (look below) no wonder every stop has such low ridership there way to many on one line.
Look at Millbrook this isn’t even a mile 4 stops in 3 blocks, GoRaleigh should downsize number it’s number of stops so it increases shelters and ridership numbers won’t be so low. It like there purposefully lowering their ridership.
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Exactly. You’d have to go to GoTriangle with that feedback, which makes sense to me. Also, each year, there’s the public comment periods that open up against each fiscal year’s work plan. That work plan is like the, “here’s the stuff we want to do this year” plan for the entire county so it includes GoRaleigh, GoCary, GoTriangle, GoBlanketyBlankBlank, etc. That’s where you can add comments as well.
The draft for the FY25 work plan was open in Feb to Mar but the final review for public comment, I expect to open up later this month.
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I guess there’s an art to it. I feel the thinking is that stops on local buses should be 1/4 mile apart, which is generally the accepted distance someone would walk to a bus stop. If there are less stops, riders have to walk more but you would have a bus that stops less often.
On the other hand, more stops means more service and easier time getting on/off. So there are tradeoffs here with each plan. I imagine bus shelter upgrades will be seen on more frequent bus lines and not these here which are infrequent.
Keep advocating for more transit! 
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I might run for city council I’ve been thinking about it. You will see a very neutral side of me.