I like trains like a lot of people but, sometimes a liking for trains leads to poor transit planning decisions (which to be fair are sometimes politically motivated).
One particular type of train route that many people are enamored with is the looping or orbital line, one which connects suburbs to one another. Such routes often are very useful for trips beyond just commuting and have a real network value in that they make the entire existing rail system more useful more than a typical rail line would.
And their popularity is significant, a lot of cities across the world have been building orbital light rail lines in the last decade or so, and more recently it appears like orbital metro schemes are gaining popularity, with projects such as the Suburban Rail Loop in Melbourne, and the Circular Line in Taipei,
But, a local example from Toronto of where I think you can argue buses are a better solution motivates a really good discussion of the tradeoffs between rail service and buses around the world.
Here’s the problem, a lot of people live in various areas in the Toronto region which are far from downtown Toronto, particularly on the west and the north. Today’s transit system is fairly good at the following things:
East west and north south travel in the city of Toronto (Toronto subway)
East west travel along the shore of Lake Ontario (GO Trains)
Long trips from outlying areas into the centre of Toronto (GO Trains and buses)
East west and north south trips within a single city or to one which is directly adjacent (local transit)
Thus, one of the biggest types of trips that is not well accommodated for by the current transit systems in the region are orbital ones. If you want to go between outlying areas it is likely possible on local transit but, it will be slow and inconvenient with many transfers, even in places with some decent infrastructure like todays VIVA BRT (east west suburban BRT route) or the coming Hurontario LRT (north south suburban tram route). The issue is that even when a relatively fast system exists it rarely connects well with fast routes which continue through the next city over - limiting the transit’s usefulness for long journeys. This is especially problematic because these trips do happen, in large numbers - just on the extensive network of highways connecting suburban Toronto. An obvious option to solve this then is some form of orbital rail route: heavy rail (think a suburban train) is probably prohibitively expensive and not capacity efficient relative to cost, while a tram is slow and also probably poor when it comes to the cost:capacity ratio. Therefore the obvious solution is probably some form of metro right?
Well the Ontario Government certainly thinks so and it’s “Connecting the GGH” plan includes an orbital metro through the suburbs which is #30 on the above map the “Ontario Line Loop Connection”. Which beyond looking a bit silly is something that I actually think would provide a less than optimal service for this type of transit problem, with similar problems faced to some other cities like Melbourne with it’s suburban transit loop.
Below, I am going to highlight the strengths of an orbital metro approach for suburban rapid transit coverage, as well as a regional bus approach.
Orbital Metro
With some sort of orbital metro route, you get a lot of benefits. For one - a metro by its very nature of being grade separated is going to be able to operate quickly and frequently reliably. The speed point should actually be further highlighted, because rail routes should they be designed for it can provide higher top speeds than bus services, 140 kph is a very common speed for suburban rail, and many new metro systems enable service this fast as well. You can also implement express service although this is not all that common for metro routes outside of Asia. Since this route is rail it will also have relatively spacious vehicles which will likely be comfortable to ride, particularly if riders are left standing. Of course, a metro will be electrified by default - the very nature of how a metro system operates requires it, and this has benefits for the perception of the service, not to mention in reducing its environmental impact. Perhaps one of the most underappreciated factors is that a metro is going to have a lower cost of operation per unit capacity than a bus system, given the high reliability of rail systems, the ability to automate, and the large capacity of each discrete vehicle.
All in all, that probably sounds really compelling - however, regional buses have a lot of potential benefits that you may not have considered.
Regional Bus
The most obvious is cost implementing some sort of “rapid” orbital bus scheme with limited stops is generally going to be free, because you already have roads to operate on, this is made worse somewhat by the higher cost of operation - but, that typically scales with the amount of use such a service has. Perhaps more importantly suburbs also have highways which when combined with limited stops can provide truly rapid transit like service speeds - often even faster than urban rapid transit like subways. You also obviously get the inherent benefits of buses, running them 24/7 is rather trivial as the roads are generally open 24/7, and since buses are not limited to a fixed guideway they can divert to serve different destinations.
Now, of course you probably aren’t going to run a very good regional express bus network without spending some money but, the nice thing is you can easily phase projects in. Spreading costs over time and as demand warrants improvements. Comfort can be an issue but, if you are using appropriate buses it might actually be better to ride a bus than a train. For example, in many cities the typical subway has hard seats, with little back support and facing every which way - whereas a regional bus will likely have mostly soft forward facing high back seats, lights and potentially air vents at seats, usb charging, and possibly even a second deck with excellent views - which is pretty great! It’s also probably reasonable to expect that all forms of buses are going to grow increasingly electrified with the major advances occuring in battery technology in electric cars. The Toronto region already has over 100 electric buses operating in transit service including some regional service appropriate double deckers, and given that many of these routes would mostly serve large terminals there is lots of room for potential charging on route.
It is important to mention that highways alone likely aren’t enough to create a network that most people would agree is better than a metro line. To make regional buses a truly compelling experience you also want large enclosed terminals with as many amenities as possible - especially good wayfinding that allows riders to find their bus, ideally direct ramps which connect buses to highways, to prevent long jogs to major destinations off of the mainline, and some sections of “transitway” in places that see a lot of service but, do not have a free flowing highway available. The good news is many cities like Toronto already have a lot of these, and because bus infrastructure is decoupled from the service, you can do a lot more piecemeal upgrading. Some examples that already exist in Toronto:
Many GO stations already have passable bus facilities with ticket machines and enclosed waiting areas, some newer subway stations - such as highway 407 also have these for use by regional buses. Better yet, good interchange points are available with a ton of rail services, including 5/7 GO rail lines, 2 Toronto Subway lines and likely more in the future as extensions and stations are added (Barrie Line Concord Station, and Line 2 Scarborough Extension for Example)
The Mississauga transitway provides a fast and reliable bus link from Pearson / the 401 & 409 interchange to Mississauga city centre.
Highway 407 with its high tolls is essentially always free flowing and decongested, nullifying the need for transitway on this corridor, Highway 427 does not have tolls but, is also generally free flowing. There are also various sections of HOV / Bus lanes on other regional highways.
This means that to build out a really comprehensive regional express bus network you only need to add HOV lanes or shoulder running lanes to the 401, 400 and parts of the 403 / QEW, add as many direct bus ramps as possible (likely during highway and ramp rebuilds), and upgrade terminals.
The map below does an excellent job highlighting these connections.
But, it also does an excellent job showing another huge benefit of a regional bus approach, you have the opportunity for tons of overlapping service patterns and connectivity. Imagine for example you want to go to Seneca College from Oshawa with a rail option; you would need to make at least one transfer likely onto a slow local bus - but, with a regional bus option there could be a fast bus which takes you almost if not the entire way on dedicated lanes. Even if passengers have to wait slightly longer for their bus the time travelling is reduced and the journey is a one seat one on a comfortable vehicle. Fortunately, the long journeys which would be common for such a system are quite accommodating of longer headways (~15 minutes as opposed to ~3 minutes with metro) because the ratio of waiting time to travel time is still favorable. That’s not even mentioning that with buses a local and express service pattern is very plausible!
The map also does a good job highlighting the coverage such a solution provides, as you can see there are tons of major destinations near the two main east west highways which cross Toronto - and many cities are like this, suburban destinations are dispersed. With a bus based solution you need to worry less about carefully managing capacity of each route and can instead decide your service pattern based on connections between common origin destination pairs. While an orbital rail route would be very unlikely to provide great fast direct connections between Yorkdale and Mississauga City Centre or Richmond Hill Centre to Scarborough Centre these connections are trivial with buses. You could imagine “octopus” style maps in stations with various lines showing you which buses to take to different destinations and while individual route frequencies would be low (as many routes would travel beyond the core “express” network to service other destinations) many trunk routes would arrive every few minutes much like the central section of an S-Bahn.
To wrap things up the ultimate point I am making is that for many cities, a more distributed network of fast bus services would probably better service outlying areas than a single linear rail line - even with branches. With buses you can have a lot of branching and diversions to directly connect more destinations, high frequency, great comfort, and more one seat rides. They also much better adapt to the existing urban area rather than trying to shape urban development around a rail line (which is obviously possible - but, large cities have a lot of inertia!). Essentially, a bus system while less sexy probably just provides a better experience for riders from A to B.
Now, that’s not to say we shouldn’t try to walk and chew gum and do both at once - but, tradeoffs need to be made. A bus network overlaid on an already good rail network can allow your rail service to make less stops, and add helpful redundancy while also shortening specific trips. Moral of the story, trains just aren’t always best!
Also could be interesting for cities who are adding various rail-based transit systems. I know one of the (less-than-ideal) things they did after the O-Train came online was retire some buses, combined with attrition in driver numbers.
While that ended up being premature because of the brutal launch and requirement to run buses anyways, even if everything HAD gone smoothly, pivoting that equipment and workforce into a suburban/orbital linkage would have been ideal.
There are numerous Hydro corridors in the GTHA that could also host express bus lanes. Those corridors in industrial areas, such as Rexdale and north Etobicoke, would not face NIMBY resistance to implement. Other Hydro corridors, such as the one east-west just north of Finch Avenue, already have a cycling and multi-use trail in most of its length. To not raise the ire of homeowners backing onto this greenspace, battery electric trolleybuses would be a quiet, non-polluting mode. Also the Meadowway in Scarborough.
It remains an exercise for transit authorities to determine which corridors provide the most potential to fill in the gaps between existing bus-only lanes and free flowing highways that the Author describes.
I totally understand not wishing to have a noisy, belching hybrid diesel bus in a quiet Hydro corridor. But we have the technology - In Motion Charging (IMC) buses - which don't require long lengths of wiring, and are literally whisper quiet.