I mean, it's only fair, when your argument was predicated on not catering to people who are being lazy.
If you use provocative language, it's fair dos to expect someone to reply with equally provocative rhetoric.
Though not explicitly advertised as such.
I'm not saying there isn't room for express service, but you have to be pragmatic about it. We'll use Jane as an example as it's one of the few express routes to operate all day. The peak hour frequency for both the 35 and 935 is every 6 minutes, which is far and away superior to the quality of service provided on every 'parallel' route for rapid transit lines (25 minutes on the blended portion of Yonge, 24 minutes for Sheppard Central).
Presumably the TTC has done the math and figured out an optimized level of blended service on Jane, but the overall level of capacity is similar to what has been provided historically (the peak frequency on all branches of the 35 in 2006 was 3 minutes, so there was a minor downgrade in service quality to the local stops, but the level of personnel required was about the same - 33 in the morning rush hour today vs 34 in 2006, and 42 in evening rush hour today vs 32 in 2006). To provide an equal playing field, your proposed local bus route MUST run at frequencies matching the current LRT frequency, and be allowed to use the same right of way, otherwise those who use the local route will rightfully accuse you of shafting them and treating them like third class citizens. And it must be asked... what are the time savings? Are they worth the untold extra numbers of buses that would be required to provide the local service?
If you implemented 5 extra stops, there is no way that would add up to more than 1-3 minutes, tops. Many of the TTC express routes have dramatic differences in travel times that far outpace 1-3 minutes, so it makes sense to run their express routes. It doesn't remotely make sense to run a parallel service for the Hurontario line.
Without knowing which particular city you are referring to, I can only speculate. But it is not accurate to extrapolate this as being any kind of European standard, for for every city with wide stop spacing you can point to I can counter with one that has 400-500 m stop spacing instead.
If Mississauga's landscape looked like a European metropolis, you might be on to something. Do you really think that anyone is falling over themselves to walk for long distances in a place that looks like this?
Explore a place in a more immersive way in Google Maps.
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