MISC | Bus Rapid Transit

[ParadiseLost]

Originally Posted by JustinB

In many ways, Suburbanist is correct. Buses are more dangerous than a motorcycle or car because buses do not have certain safety features that are available for cars. Same goes with rail lines. Most LRT, and subway lines are protected with signals, or ATO/ATC. Buses are at the mercy of the traffic around it, and the bus drivers. So yeah, buses are more dangerous than rail, or automobiles, if one thinks about it.

Of course, no one thinks about it, or cares. I am not going to think about how much more dangerous a bus is, than LRT.

No this is simply wrong and stupid.
Buses are more dangerous than motorcycles in the same way that sitting in your couch without a helmet is more dangerous than going skydiving with a parachute.

[Silly_Walks]

Originally Posted by JustinB

Buses are more dangerous than a motorcycle or car because buses do not have certain safety features that are available for cars.

Show me the per-trip and per-kilometer figures showing more casualties for buses than motorcycles or cars, and I might believe you.

[joezierer]

Originally Posted by ssiguy2

accidents with buses are extremely rare while quite common on LRT such as in ... Houston.

Unless I'm mistaken, 100% of the accidents on Houston's light rail are because of cars running red lights or turning left when not allowed.

[JustinB]

Originally Posted by ParadiseLost

No this is simply wrong and stupid.
Buses are more dangerous than motorcycles in the same way that sitting in your couch without a helmet is more dangerous than going skydiving with a parachute.

http://www.thestar.com/news/article/...dden-stop?bn=1

Passengers injured because the driver stopped too quickly. Not an uncommon occurrence, unfortunately. You can huff and puff, and throw insults all you want, but the fact remains: buses are more dangerous to ride due to their design, and lack of safety features that cannot be built-in due to costs. Cars have built in safety features that mitigate the dangers, and motorcyclists are required to wear helmets, and protective clothing(In Canada, anyways)

And I say it again,. No one is thinking about the dangers of riding a bus, why would they? It’s an interesting argument, but it’s not going to deter anyone from riding a bus.

[ParadiseLost]

Originally Posted by JustinB

http://www.thestar.com/news/article/...dden-stop?bn=1

Passengers injured because the driver stopped too quickly. Not an uncommon occurrence, unfortunately. You can huff and puff, and throw insults all you want, but the fact remains: buses are more dangerous to ride due to their design, and lack of safety features that cannot be built-in due to costs. Cars have built in safety features that mitigate the dangers, and motorcyclists are required to wear helmets, and protective clothing(In Canada, anyways)

........ So you are quoting anecdotal stories as evidence now?
Are you SERIOUS? I mean your whole premise is ridiculous to begin with
but at least post some stats to support it. I've tried to find them but it's hard.
I'm 99.99% sure riding a bus is safer per passenger mile as far as rider traffic accidents/fatalities go, and 200% sure they are safer than motorcycles. Sure it might be true that in a city like Detroit there's a non negligible chance you will get stabbed on the bus or something (just making up an example for sake of argument) but that doesn't have anything to do with general modal safety.

edit: I did find something, it's not perfect but it's a million times better than anything you've come up with so far (which is basically nothing)
http://airfare.michaelbluejay.com/modes.html#ev
Bus fatality rate per billion miles is 2.0
car is 7.2

We all know motorcycles are even more dangerous for the rider.
Hopefully this shuts down this whole ridiculous discussion but I do hope you find some even better stats (none of which will say cars are safer for the riders than buses).

Cheers

[JustinB]

........ So you are quoting anecdotal stories as evidence now?
Are you SERIOUS? I mean your whole premise is ridiculous to begin with
but at least post some stats to support it. I've tried to find them but it's hard.
I'm 99.99% sure riding a bus is safer per passenger mile as far as rider traffic accidents/fatalities go, and 200% sure they are safer than motorcycles. Sure it might be true that in a city like Detroit there's a non negligible chance you will get stabbed on the bus or something (just making up an example for sake of argument) but that doesn't have anything to do with general modal safety.

edit: I did find something, it's not perfect but it's a million times better than anything you've come up with so far (which is basically nothing)
http://airfare.michaelbluejay.com/modes.html#ev
Bus fatality rate per billion miles is 2.0
car is 7.2

We all know motorcycles are even more dangerous for the rider.
Hopefully this shuts down this whole ridiculous discussion but I do hope you find some even better stats (none of which will say cars are safer for the riders than buses).

Cheers

You clearly do not seem to get it. Stats mean nothing in this case, because the number of auto drivers are far, far higher than transit users in the US and Canada, which would skew any data. You do not need to show stats to conclude buses could be more dangerous than cars in an accident.

1)Riding a bus, you have no seatbelt. Any impact, and you're going flying.
2)Standing in a moving vehicle means you have less control over your movement. Again, any impact to the vehicle, and you'll flying. Hence the purpose of the article, a hard brake injured bus passengers.
3) Because of their design, buses cannot have safety features such as seatbelts, and airbags installed. For that reason, chances of injury could be higher than in a car.
You are missing the point that WHEN AN ACCIDENT, OR INCIDENT occurs(impact, hard brake, swerve), the risk of injury in a bus is greater than a car that has required safetly features. Do you get it now? I doubt it.

You do not stats to show cars have more safety features than buses. It's simple fact.

A bus brakes hard, people go tumbling, a auto driver brakes hard, the seatbelt stops his momentum.

[Falubaz]

So the point is: lets ban all buses? Coz there might be one or two stupid person who doesnt now that it's smart to hold the handrails when standing on the bus.

[JustinB]

The point is, you BRT fanboys are easily wound up, and LRT is better!

I guess I did not make myself clear, even if buses are more dangerous than cars, It's not going to stop people from riding the bus. I use the bus every single day, and I do not think about the dangers. No one does! (until the bus crashes, of course)

[Silly_Walks]

Originally Posted by JustinB

You clearly do not seem to get it. Stats mean nothing in this case, because the number of auto drivers are far, far higher than transit users in the US and Canada, which would skew any data. You do not need to show stats to conclude buses could be more dangerous than cars in an accident.

1)Riding a bus, you have no seatbelt. Any impact, and you're going flying.
2)Standing in a moving vehicle means you have less control over your movement. Again, any impact to the vehicle, and you'll flying. Hence the purpose of the article, a hard brake injured bus passengers.
3) Because of their design, buses cannot have safety features such as seatbelts, and airbags installed. For that reason, chances of injury could be higher than in a car.
You are missing the point that WHEN AN ACCIDENT, OR INCIDENT occurs(impact, hard brake, swerve), the risk of injury in a bus is greater than a car that has required safetly features. Do you get it now? I doubt it.

You do not stats to show cars have more safety features than buses. It's simple fact.

A bus brakes hard, people go tumbling, a auto driver brakes hard, the seatbelt stops his momentum.

You are the one who clearly does not get it. It's on a per (billion) miles basis. How unsafe the design of a bus is in your mind does not matter, what matters how unsafe it REALLY is, which can easily be checked with facts and figures, as provided before.

The conclusion you should reach, knowing what you now know: even though buses would seem to be less safe when looking at their design (no seatbelts, etc.), they AREN'T less safe than cars, but in fact SAFER.

As a motorcyclist myself, I am appaled at your ignorance for thinking a motorcycle is safer than a bus, even if just looking at it's design. A bus has a large protective casing for you. Even though you might move IN the bus during a crash, it is far less bad than me being thrown into a car while wearing my helmet.

[ParadiseLost]

Originally Posted by JustinB

You clearly do not seem to get it. Stats mean nothing in this case, because the number of auto drivers are far, far higher than transit users in the US and Canada, which would skew any data.

You clearly do not understand statistics.

As for the rest of your post the only thing that might prove is that cars have more safety features than buses. But IT DOESN'T PROVE that cars are SAFER than buses. By the same token the space shuttle has far more safety features than cars. Are you going to claim space shuttles are thus safer?

You have provided no evidence for the silly assertion that cars and motorcycles are safer than buses. And in fact the contrary is true as my stats have pointed out. These stats are per passenger mile, so the total number of cars or buses or riders or distance is IRRELEVANT, unless the number of transit riders would be so small as to be statistically insignificant which they are nowhere close to.

I know it takes a big man to admit they were wrong, but I suggest you step up. The statistics leave no room for interpretation or discussion on this issue. In fact it is widely known that buses and transit are safer than cars I think most people know this (this doesn't prove anything of course, the stats do).

edit:
Silly Walks:
Thank you, I think you've explained it to our friend here just about as well as I have.

JustinB:
There's no shame in being wrong, dogmatically holding on to a wrong viewpoint after having seen the evidence that said viewpoint is simply wrong is rather silly though so I hope you will accept the statistics. The fact that buses and other forms of mass transit are safer than private transit per passenger mile is not controversial at all and widely known.
And I am not a bus fanboy, I like trains and heavy rapid transit. I never take the bus here in Holland because my bicycle is simply a lot faster for intra city travel in our small and medium sized cities. BRT is another animal though (not really very useful to my country though).

[State of the Union]

Originally Posted by JustinB

You clearly do not seem to get it. Stats mean nothing in this case, because the number of auto drivers are far, far higher than transit users in the US and Canada, which would skew any data. You do not need to show stats to conclude buses could be more dangerous than cars in an accident.

1)Riding a bus, you have no seatbelt. Any impact, and you're going flying.
2)Standing in a moving vehicle means you have less control over your movement. Again, any impact to the vehicle, and you'll flying. Hence the purpose of the article, a hard brake injured bus passengers.
3) Because of their design, buses cannot have safety features such as seatbelts, and airbags installed. For that reason, chances of injury could be higher than in a car.
You are missing the point that WHEN AN ACCIDENT, OR INCIDENT occurs(impact, hard brake, swerve), the risk of injury in a bus is greater than a car that has required safetly features. Do you get it now? I doubt it.

You do not stats to show cars have more safety features than buses. It's simple fact.

A bus brakes hard, people go tumbling, a auto driver brakes hard, the seatbelt stops his momentum.

Do you I have to teach you physics too? Seriously, it's disturbing how people assume how things act instead of researching how this work in real life.

The people won't go flying in a bus. Due to higher mass of the bus, it will have a much lower change in velocity due to conservation of momentum. A lower change in velocity means the people in the bus wouldn't go flying because the bus wouldn't change much in speed in relation to the speed of the people inside it.

Look at this video. Which would you rather be in?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rx5vqyoV264

Seriously, these transit obstructionists need to cut the "no seat belts, people will go flying" bullshit. Really you only make yourself look like dumbasses to those of us who actually know physics.

However, as in the case of your quote in my sig, I do agree with you about BRT, but I guess not for the same reason. I hate BRT because cities use it as a cheap-ass replacement for rail, not because I think a bus is unsafe.