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[quote user="YoHo1975"][quote user="daveklepper"] Dedicated bus lanes and bus rapid transit work well where there is already a substantial user base for public transportaton, and the greatly improved bus service can be expected to add 15-25% ridership, taking some cars off roads and reducing traffic congestion, with the additional reduction from removing the buses themselves. But rail is the only widely proven transit that can swing a substantial number of private auto commuters to use public transportation, where a ridership base can be built from essentially nothing.   There have been experiments with bus rapid transit attempting to do this job, but they have not been really successful. Once the investment is made, because of labor and maintenance costs and vehicle repalcement costs, even including right of way, the operating cost per passenger mile is about 50-60% that of bus transportation.[/quote] This follows on with a comment I was going to make. The problem with BRT is the word BUS. In the public's mind, bus equates to "low rent" cheap, slow, dirty. You can give all the reasons that's not true, outline the advantages of BRT, but the odds that you will change the perception of busses is exceedingly low. Light Rail on the other hand is viewed as good, environmental, modern, hip. That is why it draws new users. People perceive Light rail as good and will flock to it. As for electric busses. San Francisco and Seattle have had them for years. The run off of overhead wire just like Light Rail. One last comment about the spread of suburbs. The City of Portland solved the issue of sprawl by dictating how it could go and then developing along the Light Rail corridor. The businesses in Hillsboro and so forth embraced the transit and supported it. It's a little thing called Urban Planning. Now, that's probably a little too far to the left for the average Texan, (j/k) ut the fact remains, that step one is to establish a solid long range plan and build to it.[/quote] BRT (buses) may be a dirty word, but once the taxpayers see the difference in cost, they may get to like the bus.  Although heaps of people claim that riders will shun buses in favor of light or commuter rail, they don't seem to have any hard data to support their views.  The electric buses in Denver are powered by batteries.  No overhead wires!  I visit San Francisco four or five times a year.  And I ride the trolley buses.  So do a lot of other people.  The #49 and #30 buses are chockers most of the day. Contrary to popular belief, Texas is not berift of urban planning.  Outside of Houston, most of Texas's major cities have well developed urban plans.  However, they are not as restrictive as those on the east and west coasts.  As a result, according to Thomas Sowell, Economist, Hoover Institute, housing is much more affordable in Texas than it is on either coast. The key point made by Mr. Rogoff, as well as yours truly, is that light rail is not an optimum transit solution in every community.  In fact, according to Rogoff, it is a good fit in a relatively few situations.  Texas has four cities where light rail or commuter rail is a potentially good fit:  Austin Dallas, Houston, and San Antonio.  Dallas has a well developed light rail and commuter rail system, albeit a very expensive system.  Houston has a short light rail system, and it is looking to develop a commuter rail system.  Austin has the Leander to Austin commuter rail system.  It is lightly patronized.  San Antonio has said no thanks to light rail and is concentrating on rapid bus technology.
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