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Comment by stevekemp | Hacker News Reader

> there are stops every 100-200m

This is true, but it's actually fascinating that this is required for the elderly and immobile. If the stops are too far apart then people have to walk too far to get the bus, and so in practice they don't.

I used to feel the same when I lived in Edinburgh, that the stops were too frequent, but despite the stopping/starting it was useful for others.

Edinburgh has (had?) a fantastic local bus-service. Definitely the best I've experienced in the UK, cheap, reliable, and an unusually friendly set of drivers.

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I've often argued half the stops should be marked as disabled/elderly stops. The stops are so frequent, I wouldn't mind walking one stop further at all (or in a few cases even two stops), and I'm really lazy when it comes to physical exercise. Some stops are so close you can recognise people standing at the previous or next one.

I would at least like to see a trial, where half the stops (of those which are really close) are marked as meant for disabled/elderly/blind people. Everyone can stand at every stop and the bus will service it, but everyone likes faster transport and hopefully they'll choose to not stand at disabled stops. Some assholes will undoubtedly refuse, but if that happens at one or two stops out of ten or twenty, that's a win.

Or, alternatively, only service each stop with every other bus. The lines where there are enough people to have stops every 1 minute walking distance, there are also enough buses (like every 10 minutes) to not have to wait long if you don't want to walk to the next stop. Or you time leaving work so that you're there when your closest stop gets serviced: that's no disadvantage for you and a win for speed.

I suspect the average number of stops must be factored into the schedule - such that if the bus stopped at only 50% of the shelters on its route the timetables would need changing.

(And of course sometimes a bus will stop when people want to get off, not necessarily because people want to embark.)

Yes, timetables would be adjusted for it. They do that every year anyway, here in NL at least.

And for disembarking same thing: half of them are for disabled people (or aren't serviced with every other bus, depending on the variant of the idea).

I hope you're just referring to the bus routes in Edinburgh!

The payment system stinks: cash-wise, they only accept exact change only. You can pay a £1.70 single with £2, you just don't get change.

You can pay with the bus app, but this is a hideous payment app that is seriously flawed. Firstly, you have to top up minimum of £10, so no automatic integration to your bank account or PayPal. Secondly, you have to 'purchase' a ticket on the app just before the bus arrives, and it has a time limit. Within this time-limit of 2 minutes, you have to show the driver the ticket. The driver does nothing other than Yay/Nay it. No scanning or anything. Makes it infuriating to use. This is not just Edinburgh, but other parts of Scotland, like Dundee.

That's why I don't feel bad counting and dumping dozens of pennies out of my wallet into their machines. Ask for exact change, get exact change! And the bus can wait till I've paid.

I lived in a city like that: exact change only. It was 50cents for a single ride, but if you gave them $1 they gave you a day pass. I usually didn't mind since I was going to take the bus home anyway. In any other case, it irritated me.

Exact-change-only is certainly an annoyance, but the routes, promptness, and decent busses were always a plus-point.

If you pay too much you can get a form from the driver to claim your refund - alhtough I know almost nobody does it, and I never did the few times I was caught short of change.

(I remember before it was a flat-far, when I moved to Edinburgh in 1994 there was a sliding scale to pay for bus-journeys. Something like 50p for 1-3 stops, 60p for 1-5, etc. I remember when that changed and it became 80p for any journey and gradually crept up to £1, £1.10, £1.20, etc.)

Yes, and the fact that it must waste everyone’s time accommodating the lowest common denominator is a serious challenge to the alleged efficiency of public transport. Merging and passing are incredibly powerful capabilities for both time-efficiency and resilience. The rare public transit systems that incorporate them (NYC subway, etc) are disproportionately more effective than those that don’t (most buses).

You need the frequent stops for sure, although perhaps they could make 1 in every 4 buses and express, with limited stops.

Either way, if there’s 4 double doors along the whole side of the bus that can be used to board / alight, without a tap in queue, the turnaround time per stop could be 3-4x faster.

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