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Comment by imatworknow | Hacker News Reader

I wonder whether this is the norm for other cities?

I live in Rome. Here we have a schedule for departures, and real time tracking. The schedule for departures is a lie, meaning that any given departure can be canceled without notice, so unless a bus has already left the terminus you cannot be sure it ever will.

So I'm guessing our public transportation works worse than the one the author describes in Rwanda.

Interesting! How do you usually plan your journey in Rome, and how often does your journey work out like the plan?

I walk out of my place, if I see a bus is approaching I might jump on it otherwise I'll use the subway or a car sharing platform.

Consider that:

* I'm one of the few people in this city to be in walking distance from a subway station (blame it on archeology)

* Car sharing can be cost effective compared to public transportation: it costs 20-30 cents per minute, so if your trip is 10-15 minutes and you're traveling with another person the car is faster and cheaper.

* The only reason I consider the bus at all compared to the subway is because the stop is literally at my doorstep.

At the very least, I would assume most bus time tables are written to reflect the worst case scenario regarding traffic lights. That alone should make the actual average waiting time lower than the theoretical one.

Where I live, buses have a few points where they 'synchronize'. That means they wait there long enough to be exactly on schedule. This to prevent people missing a bus that goes every hour because it was 5 minutes early.

In London, sometimes a bus will be held at a stop for a minute or three by dispatchers to “regulate the service”.

It's annoying when you’re on that bus, but it makes sense to try and avoid services bunching together.

(And occasionally when they do end up bunched together, the overcrowded bus in front will wait briefly so the empty bus behind it can pass)

The "El" (Elevated) trains in Chicago will do the same thing. Sometimes you simply stop between stations. Sometimes, it is only 25 ft before a station and you can see your goal in sight.

Why would they stop for regulation (as opposed to the track in front being occupied, which is obviously a good reason to stop at any place) at anything else but a station?

My guess would be some sort of naive algorithm that doesn't account for such proximity.

You definitely don't live in Seattle. Hell will freeze over before busses here are on time, even for a single stop.

Quite a few busses in London have timetables like https://imgur.com/a/XlSx68f saying "7am-11pm: About every 11-13 minutes"

(Obviously they don't tend to do that for hourly busses)

In Stockholm there is a per station schedule and the busses try to match it, generally being pretty good about it in the suburbs, so you can reliably get to the stop with below a minute to spare and catch the buss.

In the backwater I live in now, the situation is situation is supposedly the same, but the busses are much worse about matching the timetable. Be there 3 minutes before the timetable or watch the buss leave ahead of schedule to then spend those minutes waiting at the tow centre before getting under way again.

Leaving before the scheduled time should be punished with a double fine, really.

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