Rapid transit operations
According to the reviewed cases, two transit conditions
enhancing the BRT system development are as follows:
– High service level: Almost all of the reviewed cases
provide headways of less than 5 minutes during peak
hours (1.5 minutes in Curitiba)4, and around 10 minutes
during off-peak hours. Feeder services’ headways
are less than 15-30 minutes, timed to match the main
service. The service span basically runs from 5a.m.
until midnight (almost 24 hours a day in Ottawa)14.
This is one important characteristic of BRT service.
– Providing exclusive busway: More than half of the reviewed
cases provide exclusive roads for buses. In Nagoya,
they constructed the guided busway elevated
above the road surface passing the Central Business
District (CBD) to avoid traffic congestion15. This facility
is an obvious physical attraction to passengers.
However, it should be noticed that the cities of those
systems have been designed, the space for the busway
occurred at the initial urban planning stage, so that the
bus operation would have no impact on other traffic.