🎸🌃 All The City Lights 🎶🚴
Andre VidelaPeople arguing that the state shouldn't run empty buses forget that most cars driven to work can seat 5 people and are 80% empty.
Maybe we shouldn't run empty cars either
Bob Downie@Andrev Don't forget that all car drivers are driving two abreast, even if they don't have passengers.
A land fit for all our futures@Andrev are these the same people who complain about traffic?
I have never understood why people who complain about traffic don't campaign more for the alternatives
@PenguinJunk highways in cities should pay rent at market rates
Darwin Woodka@PenguinJunk @Andrev People who complain about traffic ARE traffic
Karl-Johan@Andrev Also, most cars are parked and entirely empty most of the time.
Janne Moren@Andrev
Many, even most people who use the busy trunk lines and rail lines also rely on some sparsely used feeder line for part of their travel.
If you get rid of them, the trunk lines will no longer be busy. Can't focus on single lines; you have to look at the utilization of the system as a whole.
Jennifer C J Radtke@Andrev an empty bus is someone's reassurance that they can do their thing and still get home, because they know they won't miss the last bus.
adastra@Andrev San Francisco has laws already that you need a minimum number of occupants on some roads.
Haelwenn /элвэн/ 
@Andrev And those cars are also left unused >95% of the time.
The_Turtle_Moves@Andrev I'm really curious about the optimum amount of empty buses to run. Like, fundamentally there's huge value in availability, which empty buses provide, even if they don't provide actual transportation services. I imagine that when public transportation share is low, you should run more empty buses because the reason the share is low is because it is unusable and sucks, and empty buses make it less unusable.
@Andrev there's also weird tradeoffs in 3am bus routes. They're going to be 'mostly empty', but the people who need them really need them. Ideally, I guess you'd replace those bus routes with taxi vouchers or something that provides the same availability and price, but with more flex. In this ideal world, taxis would magically not suck, I guess.
xi timpin@Andrev It's hard: for 3 years I and a couple of colleagues had a car share going. Must have saved 160km driving every day, two fewer parking spaces required at the office.
Then we got reorganised and worked out of different offices. Back to the old way of three empty cars.
Then we got reorganised and worked out of different offices. Back to the old way of three empty cars.
vxo@Andrev A while back I remember seeing signs on the buses that said that if the bus has 8 or more passengers, it's more fuel efficient than those 8 people being in individual cars, and it goes up from there.
Pete@Andrev Yes! I'm reading this from a bus that was empty until I got on, and I needed it to run (empty or full) to take me where I need to go!
ferricoxide@Andrev
I haven't had a car that can comfortably seat 5 American adults in the 37 years I've owned cars (I've mostly owned 2dr sedans and roadsters)
I haven't had a car that can comfortably seat 5 American adults in the 37 years I've owned cars (I've mostly owned 2dr sedans and roadsters)
Kagan MacTane (he/him)@ferricoxide @Andrev Okay, but surely you must have noticed you're an outlier? The percentage of cars these days that are SUVs or similar is way higher than it needs to be, and still climbing.
(Then there are the pickup trucks, which have a reduced passenger capacity... but take up roughly 3 times as much road as they need to. Don't @ me without noting the percentage of pickups on the roads that have cargo in the bed vs. the percentage with empty beds.)
@kagan @Andrev
There's two types of SUVS, though: 2- and 3-row SUVs. While you can jam 5 people into a 2-row, you8nit going to do it _comfortably. The "5 seats" thing with 2-row SUVs is bullshit. When they say "seats 5", they mean 2+3 (i.e, 2 adults and 3 children).
As to the pickups: they're a daily gripe. Most of the ones around here are "take our Mini countryman, jack it up 18" (often more), tack on a bed and add a further half ton of weight" (for ICE; 3t for EV). The gripe being that they always take up a ridiculous amount of space in retail parking lots and often don't even fit in garages due to their height. And, for street parking, they usually take up a space and a half (but pay the same amount at the meter that I do).
There's two types of SUVS, though: 2- and 3-row SUVs. While you can jam 5 people into a 2-row, you8nit going to do it _comfortably. The "5 seats" thing with 2-row SUVs is bullshit. When they say "seats 5", they mean 2+3 (i.e, 2 adults and 3 children).
As to the pickups: they're a daily gripe. Most of the ones around here are "take our Mini countryman, jack it up 18" (often more), tack on a bed and add a further half ton of weight" (for ICE; 3t for EV). The gripe being that they always take up a ridiculous amount of space in retail parking lots and often don't even fit in garages due to their height. And, for street parking, they usually take up a space and a half (but pay the same amount at the meter that I do).
John-Mark Gurney@Andrev
At least the bus driver is getting paid in an empty bus, the mostly empty car driver is most likely not.
At least the bus driver is getting paid in an empty bus, the mostly empty car driver is most likely not.
Charles J Gervasi ⚡🛡️🥥@Andrev Most buses in my area are packed in some areas and less full in others. You can say a particular route is mostly empty or mostly full. It depends on where you get on and off.