What’s the point of bus lanes?

[quisquose]

What’s the point of bus lanes?

 

As a relatively frequent user of buses I am often grateful for them, but I have heard so many different reasons put forward for them, many of them contradictory, that I thought I would start a discussion.

 

(Actually, I’m a bit peeved after listening to a conversation about the busy roads this morning with the schools back, with one lady in the office bragging that she gets the kids to school, and then herself to work, in no time because her husband owns a taxi!)

 

Anyway, I recall that when bus lanes were first introduced the main thrust of the reason given was that they were to speed up buses, make them more reliable, thus encouraging people out of cars and into buses, with the aim of reducing overall congestion. As both a car user and bus user I pretty much bought into that strategy.

 

But over the years the reasons I have heard have expanded to include environmental, parking, and simply providing priority to certain vehicles.

 

To be honest, as soon as they started to allow taxis to use them I lost faith in the reasons I was being fed, since that seemed to contradict most of the reasons for them. Add to that the fact that I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve seen them actually being policed.

 

I think it’s about time a proper reason was sold to us, with a strategy devised with that in mind. If it’s really about congestion then let’s allow multiple-occupancy vehicles instead of taxis, which actually increase it.

 

Discuss.

[MrSmith]

Taxis don’t have an automatic right to use a bus lanes its down to the local authority to decide who can drive in a bus lane. This might help you and its appears that Rotherham and Barnsley don’t allow taxis to use bus lanes but Sheffield and Doncaster do.

[Forumosaurus]

They should be called public transport lanes.

 

I don't have an issue with taxis using them because 9/10 times there's more than one passenger in a taxi.

 

In some places bus lanes are a success, in others they aren't. Look at Eccy road for example, traffic on there at 5/6pm is manic, the bus lanes there are very useful.

 

In other places it would make more sense just to open up all lanes to all traffic and it would just ease traffic flow in general.

[Rupert_Baehr]

The driver of a car is also (effectively) a passenger.

Why should taxis be given priority over cars? - I'm aware that they use the roads to make a living, but then again, many of the people in cars are using the car to make a living or to get to the place where they make a living.

[LeMaquis]

The driver of a car is also (effectively) a passenger.

Why should taxis be given priority over cars? - I'm aware that they use the roads to make a living, but then again, many of the people in cars are using the car to make a living or to get to the place where they make a living.

 

I think the logic behind letting taxis use bus lanes is that taxis mean passengers have left their cars at home and so for every taxi ride in theory there's a car left at home. Of course this isn't strictly true as taxis get used by people who don't have cars anyway and by people who might otherwise use a bus if taxis always got stuck in traffic with other cars. In London taxis get to use Oxford Street where cars can't go but a lot of tourists use them instead of buses and tubes. I'm not 100% sure of the benefits of letting taxis have prioroity over cars but there are some.

[Forumosaurus]

I think the logic behind letting taxis use bus lanes is that taxis mean passengers have left their cars at home and so for every taxi ride in theory there's a car left at home. Of course this isn't strictly true as taxis get used by people who don't have cars anyway and by people who might otherwise use a bus if taxis always got stuck in traffic with other cars. In London taxis get to use Oxford Street where cars can't go but a lot of tourists use them instead of buses and tubes. I'm not 100% sure of the benefits of letting taxis have prioroity over cars but there are some.

 

Yeah I think you're right really. In theory, if 10 people caught a taxi to work in town instead of driving, that's 10 cars off the road*, 10 car parking spaces free*.

 

*At least, if they've picked up a colleague on the way it's more.

[MrSmith]

Yeah I think you're right really. In theory, if 10 people caught a taxi to work in town instead of driving, that's 10 cars off the road*, 10 car parking spaces free*.

 

*At least, if they've picked up a colleague on the way it's more.

 

But wouldn't the taxi have covered a greater distance than the total distance the cars would cover, so would use more fuel and produce more pollution.

 

Car sharing would work out better.

[quisquose]

I think the logic behind letting taxis use bus lanes is that taxis mean passengers have left their cars at home and so for every taxi ride in theory there's a car left at home. Of course this isn't strictly true as taxis get used by people who don't have cars anyway and by people who might otherwise use a bus if taxis always got stuck in traffic with other cars. In London taxis get to use Oxford Street where cars can't go but a lot of tourists use them instead of buses and tubes. I'm not 100% sure of the benefits of letting taxis have prioroity over cars but there are some.

 

That's okay if the aim is to reduce the need for parking in the city centre, but, since I never have a problem parking there and usually contribute £pounds to the council for doing so, I can't think it is.

 

If it's really about congestion/pollution/CO2 then letting taxis use bus lanes is illogical. Me driving to town is one journey, whereas me phoning a taxi is two journeys, thats adding to congestion not relieving it.

 

I would much prefer to see multi-occupancy vehicles allowed in bus lanes since it would encourage car sharing. This would even allow taxis when they have a passenger, but not when the driver is nipping to the shops.

[quisquose]

Taxis don’t have an automatic right to use a bus lanes its down to the local authority to decide who can drive in a bus lane. This might help you and its appears that Rotherham and Barnsley don’t allow taxis to use bus lanes but Sheffield and Doncaster do.

 

Interesting statistic from that link:

 

taxis produce 70% more carbon dioxide per passenger mile than a private car (Transport Statistics GB, HMSO)

 

Due to unoccupancy rates, which occur when going to fetch the passengers as well as delivering them to destination.

[Muldoon]

I worked on the M4 bus lane, what a ferkin joke that is...