MEMORANDUM
DATE: 22 April 2022
TO: Department Head of CTrans
FROM:
Bhumika Raj, Peter Son, Minjae ParkSUBJECT: Improvements to Cubetown’s Transit Network
Summary
In this memorandum, we intend to propose several alterations to Cubetown’s transit network in an effort to explore the possibility of expanding Cuberail We have explored three options in this memo:
1 Redistributing buses from red-line
2. Adding buses (6 total) to red, blue, and flash-lines
3. Consolidating buses to Cuberail, adding a rail car and two buses to connecting bus services
Background
The explicit aim of this memorandum is to explore whether it is possible to promote the use of rail trips to downtown Cubetown, and potentially reduce bus service to reallocate resources accordingly to reduce headway for rail service; this will have two favorable outcomes: enhancing Cuberail’s financial viability and ridership overall
Cubetown is currently serviced by three bus lines (blue line, red line, and flash line) and one light rail services, the Cubetown Rail, also referred to colloquially by Cubetown’s denizens as ‘Cuberail,’ which was championed by former Cubetown mayor Cubert Cubbard. Cuberail only services the northeast region of town, ranging from Broadway and 10th.
Currently, the headway on Cuberail stands at approximately eight minutes, whereas this figure is fifteen for blue and red lines and ten for the flash line Headway is essentially the time in between trains or buses; that is, Cuberail’s headway of eight minutes indicates that if you miss a train, the next one will come in eight minutes.
Figure 1 is a density map of Cubetown. This map represents population adjusted per acre; it is a density map. As can be seen, the density of the southern regions is relatively small whereas the population is most concentrated in the northeastern corner of the city This explains primarily why Cubetown’s light rail only operates in that relatively narrow corridor between Broadway and 10th; the capacity of light rail is not necessary in the rest of Cubetown, which is best serviced with buses
“FUTURE 1”
(Redistributing Buses from the Red-Line to Blue and Flash Lines)
Increase Headway for Red Line (Red: 15 min to 20 min) Resources (Buses) are redistributed to Flash and Blue, promoting more rail use in north of CubeTown
As proposed in the summary statement, our aim is to promote Cuberail service; therefore, we opted to explore reallocation of bus services from the redline to other lines. To do this, we chose to model the transfer of one bus from the red line to flash and increased the red line’s headway from 15 minutes to 20 minutes.
Theoretically, we should have two favorable impacts Firstly, this will reduce use of the red line, which overlaps with Cuberail’s area of service As can be seen in Figure X, the red line crisscrosses northeastern Cubetown The second proposed effect is that it will better enable those in other parts of Cubetown (particularly the southwest) to access the transit network (reducing headway and increasing the ridership). This should hopefully reduce vehicular traffic and make bus-rail transfers a viable option for trips into downtown.
Results
Decreasing headway by 5 minutes - from 15 minutes to 20 minutes - resulted in a drastic decrease in ridership on the red line and noticeable increases in all the other routes
Impact on the Red Line
Inference: In figure 1a and 1b, we can see that ridership levels on the red-line downtown fell from around 210 to 120 riders when a bus was removed and the headway increased from 15 to 20 minutes. This is a drastic decrease in ridership - almost 43%! A similar loss can be observed in the uptown direction - falling from approximately again 200 to 130-140.
Impact on the Flash Line
The addition of a bus to the flash line saw headway on the flash line fall to eight minutes This saw increased ridership by nearly 100, as can be seen in figure 2a and 2b. In the flash line, we see ridership levels in the downtown direction improve by almost 100 and flash uptown by almost a scale factor of 3. We made sure that these figures were accurate, but the pattern in ridership confirms that this is the same route. This means that this redistribution of one bus to the flash line saw an almost 300% increase in uptown facing ridership.
Figure 1a. Redline Downtown - Base vs. Redistributed
Figure 1b Redline Uptown- Base vs Redistributed
Impact on the Blue Line
The impacts on the Blue line were fairly minimal, with decreases in max volume. The changes were negligible, however, and not worth mentioning.
Figure 2a Flash Downtown Ridership - Base vs Redistributed
Figure 2b Flash Uptown Ridership - Base vs Redistributed
Impacts on Cuberail
Finally, we explore the changes in ridership on the Cuberail resulting from cuts on the red line. Ultimately, we found that ridership increased a substantial amount, with max volume being 1443 in the post-change vs. 1310 in the prior. We see similar changes in the Uptown. All in all, we can see quite conclusively that Cuberail ridership benefits significantly from the rerouting of the one bus
Figure 3b Blue Uptown - Base vs Redistributed
Figure 4a Cuberail Downtown - Base vs Redistributed
“Future 2A” (Adding 6 More Buses)
Add buses to Red and Blue , flash Lines,Keep the adjusted headway from Future 1. Supply more buses to all bus lines to remedy potential ridership loss due to adjusted headways.
In this case we increase the number of buses and make changes in headway,
● 3 more Buses on redline (Headway 9)
● 2 more on blueline (Headway 11)
● 1 more on flash line (Headway 7)
Results
Not a significant change, because we did not make any changes to rail Capacity of buses has increased in all the lines as we added more buses
Impact on Flash Line
Adding two more buses to Flashline saw headway on the flash line fall to 7 minutes from 10 minutes in the base scenario.Also,this saw a increase in ridership of about 200 passengers as depicted in figure 5a and 5b.There is change in the ridership but the pattern remains same as there is no change in route We can infer that addition of two bus on the flash line saw approx 200% increase in down in route following uptown to downtown pattern
Impact on Red Line
Inference: In figure 6a and 6b, we can see that ridership levels on the red-line downtown increased from around max vol 211 to 564 riders when two more buses were added and the headway decreased from 15 to 9 minutes This is a significant increase in ridership - almost 60%! A similar pattern can be observed in the uptown direction - increase from approximately again 209 to 450.
Figure 5a Flash Downtown - Base vs Redistributed
Figure 5b. Flash Uptown - Base vs. Redistributed
Impact on Blue Line
The impacts on the Blue line were less significant, with an increase in max volume. The changes were not that high i e 246 to 359 Same for uptown the numbers observed were 234 to 296
Figure 6a Redline Downtown - Base vs Redistributed
Figure 6b Redline Uptown - Base vs Redistributed
Impacts on Cuberail
Here, we explore the changes in ridership on the Cuberail resulting from an increase in two bus lines on the Flash, Blue and Red line We found that ridership increased in fair amount, with max volume being 1425 in the post-change vs 1310 in the prior In the Uptown we see very less difference All in all, we can see that Cuberail ridership does not benefit significantly by adding two buses to each Flash, Blue and Red line.
Figure 7a Blueline Downtown - Base vs Redistributed
Figure 7b Blueline Uptown - Base vs Redistributed
Figure 8a Cuberail Downtown - Base vs Redistributed
Figure 11b Blueline uptown - Base vs Redistributed
