Blink Bus - A Review of Victoria's First Rapid Transit System
I finally had the opportunity the other day to try out the Blink Bus, Victoria’s mild attempt at rapid transit. Many of you will know that I have pretty low expectations for bus rapid transit (BRT), and this form of BRT in particular. If you want to get into the planning of the system before reading this, and what my issues are with BRT you may want to check out this previous article I wrote.
On Friday, I had to go to Uptown Mall. I really didn’t have the time to walk there and I didn’t want to spend the money on a taxi, so I thought, the Blink Bus of course! The Blink Bus started running in the spring and is essentially, a limited stop, high-capacity, high frequency bus route between Downtown Victoria and Langford. The key for me to consider using it over a taxi was that the Blink Bus is supposed to be rapid transit and not a commuter bus. That means riding it should provide easy fast connections to all the stops in-between the end points, just like an LRT or Subway, and it should run all day at a high frequency.
I checked my Umo app to make sure I had money on it (I will give a bonus review of that app at the end) and headed down to the closest stop from my work at Douglas and Pandora. I purposely did not check a schedule because, well, with rapid transit you shouldn’t have to. There was a bad sign as I got close to the corner, a bus numbered 95 was moving past Pandora. I had just missed it. It was early afternoon so if it was at a fifteen minute frequency, it would be a while to wait. Just afterwards a 30 bus rolled up which I knew would get me to Uptown, but I decided to wait to see how long the next 95 would be.
While I waited for the next Blink bus, I took in the stop, which did have a fair bit of branding. There was a bus stop graphic on the shelter indicating all of the stations and a couple of QR Code spots to get to the Blink Bus website. I also noted that the bus stop sign was topped with a yellow colour, I believe to indicate that this was a Blink Station. That said, apart from some signage, it was just another bus stop. I think is unfortunate and will certainly impact ridership. On a positive note, after about five minutes I could see the next bus bearing the Blink Bus name. That is impressively fast. As I boarded the bus and flashed my phone at the UMO app reader, I took note of the time and headed upstairs to get a view of the road from the front of the bus. It was pretty quiet, with maybe about 20 people onboard the whole bus as we left the Pandora Station. There is a voice telling you the direction and upcoming stop as there on all of the buses around the city now. It seemed a little more clear than I have heard recently on other buses, but that could be as much about the speaker quality on the particular bus I was on, rather than about any new PA system.
The Blink Bus does not stop at all the regular bus stops along Douglas Street. In fact, between Pandora and Uptown there were to be only four other stops. That said, the lack of stops does not mean that you don’t stop at some of the other stops anyways if the bus ahead of you is stopping at a stop not on the Blink route. Bus lanes are great but if a stop doesn’t have pullouts, then every bus behind it is going to have to stop. Also as we headed out of downtown, the right lane was still filled with parked cars and there is no ability for the bus to move faster than the stop and start traffic that is regularly on Douglas. Over the years I have put forward a couple of ideas on how we could improve Douglas Street for transit (Bus Tunnel / Douglas Street Rapid Bus) and I have heard that the City is looking at the street again, but I haven’t seen anything come out publicly indicating which direction they are going.
Cars parked in the bus lane on Google Maps
Once we were out of downtown, we moved along much faster except for the spots where as I mentioned the bus ahead of us stopped and there wasn’t a bus pull out allowing us to pass. The stop at Cloverdale has been greatly updated and give passengers a lot of room to stand under a covered space and look more like what you would expect for a basic rapid transit system. When I stepped off at the station afterwards, Uptown, the trip had taken 13 minutes which seemed pretty good especially with the minimal wait at the bus stop initially and that I had not scheduled the trip at all. Factor in the lack of the need to park and I would say that the trip at least matched if not outpaced what I would have been able to do with a car.
On my way back downtown, I also managed to catch a 95 and again I only waited maybe five minutes. The southbound bus at 4pm was quite a bit busier and only had standing room. Again, the bus seemed to move along the bus lane quite quickly and as we didn’t have a local bus ahead of us, we didn’t have to wait at the bus stops we were not stopping at. I hopped off at Hillside and that trip took about 6 minutes. Overall, I would say that since I had gone into the whole trip with some pretty low expectations, they were significantly surpassed.
So what did I like? The frequency was the biggest bonus. I mean, I really didn’t have to wait more than a few minutes either time I just walked up to the bus stop. That is what you want in a rapid transit system. Lack of the needing to plan for when a bus to come is likely the largest single obstacle to increasing ridership for those that are willing to consider taking a bus. The second biggest bonus was the speed, while it took a while to get out of downtown (and this will come up in my dislikes too) overall getting to Uptown in less than 15 minutes makes it seem closer and will increase my likelihood of using the system if I want to get something at Mayfair on a lunch break. The bus lanes north of downtown definitely aided in this. The final thing that I will say as a plus is the ease of using the Umo app to pay for the bus. While this isn’t really just a thing with the Blink Bus, it came along at the same time and it really creates a seamless way of accessing the system.
What didn’t I like? Well, it is still just a bus riding on a bus route, stopping at bus stops. While I like the new station at Cloverdale, it seems like that is really the only one that is at the level I would call a true “station”. While it has some of the trappings of rapid transit, it isn’t rapid transit. And even if it is just as frequent and just as fast as a real dedicated right-of-way rapid transit system (which it still isn’t…) a large portion of the population is never going to consider using it. There are some simple things that they could do. Fixing up all of the stations that it uses to make them look different than the regular bus stops is one thing and a second one is branding the buses. The first one I took had a full wrap advertising the Umo app so they can do this pretty easily. Make the Blink Buses all look the same and ensure that they are completely different than the other buses in the fleet. The second bus I took was just a regular blue, red and white double-decker.
Another huge problem I still have with the current set-up is the way that the bus operates downtown. As I linked above, I would like to see Douglas Street optimised for transit. But even simple things like north of Herald Street there is still quite a few blocks where the bus lane is only in operation during peak times meaning that the rapid transit is just operating in the lanes with the cars. This is really unacceptable and kills any of the illusion of being on a new system. For this to really work in the sub-optimal way it has been planned, you need the bus lanes to be clear all day and the local bus stops all need to be in a bus bay so that the rapid bus doesn’t have to stop behind a local bus. The final issue I will raise is likely one that is not going to work with how we have set-up the payment system with Umo, but double door loading on the buses would be faster and again, would give you the feel of being on a rapid transit line.
Umo - I said I would give a bonus review of the new app. It seems to work really well. Just as Google Maps has the plan your trip, so does Umo, and I would bet it works off the same technology. I have used it for local buses in addition to the Blink Bus and it has been pretty accurate as to bus arrivals. I also like the feature of it having the connection to the Uber app in there. I haven’t used Uber since they came to Victoria, as it seems a little pricey, but giving people options in one place makes it easier to choose to go out without your car. I would love to hear your thoughts on the Umo app if you have used it and if you are not using it, let me know why. As a sidenote for BC Transit, currently if you go to the homepage for Victoria, there is no link to this new premiere rapid transit system, this seems like a huge miss for obtaining new ridership.
Of course, I would love to hear your thoughts on the Blink bus more broadly and whether you have used and if it met your expectations or like me, actually exceeded them to an extent. I am hopeful that this is just a timid step before a big leap into a real rapid transit system for Victoria, I will keep dreaming about it.