Let's get the Quickbus back!

In MTA's many attempts of making the bus system more attractive, effective and reliable one particular idea stood out: The Quickbus. The name was coined by then deputy administrator Brown but the idea came from Bob Flannigan, Republican Governor Ehrlich's Secretary of Transportation.

When Flannigan and Ehrlich inherited the Red Line project and made it very clear that they were really more interested in a bus solution than light rail they did not kill the Red Line but let the New Starts project take its course and just made sure that a number of Rapid Bus alternatives were included in the analysis.

Quickbus 40 and special sign pylon at Greene Street

But MDOT's Flannigan also want to test some elements of a rapid bus on the heavily traveled east west corridor for which the Red Line was planned. Whether it was to give riders improvements faster than the Red Line would be realized or whether it was an attempt of reducing the need for the Red Line was hard to tell then and may never be known.  Fact is, he charged the MTA and consultants to study how a faster bus service could be overlaid over the existing #23 bus which went from Catonsville to Essex. On the western end the Secretary's deviated from the local bus route and followed the proposed Red Line alignment to Social Security and CMS. On th east side, he kept the local bus route and did not terminate the faster bus at Bayview where the Red Line would have ended but let the QB extend all the way to Essex.

Thus the QB 40 was born which soon became quite popular. It got its extra speed from skipping many lower level stops in favor of stops with high ridership or connections to other buses. The bus stops got some extra shelters and some were even equipped with new stop signs and next bus real time arrival signs. After the success of the Quickbus 40 three other Quickbus lines were introduced, some ran all day, some only in peak hours, some were completely congruent with a local service, some deviated a bit like the QB 40 did but all shared the distinction that they were an additional service in which nobody lost a bus stop and nobody lost a local service.

It is surprising, that the next Republican Governor who also preferred buses to the point that he killed the Red Line rail project then proceeded to also eliminate the Quickbus as part of the biggest bus overhaul in MTA's history.

WMATA buses in DC: Rapid and local 

The logic for taking out the Quickbus service was that the new Link system itself had a two tier service system, City Link and Local Link. The color coded City Link buses were supposed to be faster than the numbered Local Link service and the stops would be spaced a bit further apart. But the distinction between the two service types eluded most anyone from the get-go. It wasn't what WMATA or the Los Angeles MTA have, a set of local buses as the regular work-horses and a set of Rapid Buses taking riders on the main routes quicker to their destinations. Instead, City and Local Link represented more of a hierarchical differentiation in the system based on frequency of service, but even that distinction didn't hold the water if one studied headways for City and Local Link which were frequently the same.

The reality is, that in spite of more dedicated bus lanes, signal priority for buses on some signals (TSP) and shorter routes, the much touted distinction between City and Local Link service is lost on almost all riders. Faster service took a back-seat to more reliable or more frequent service. Today the MTA itself has given up on branding the fleet individually and, instead, mixes the buses up, no matter what the color scheme.

RapidRide, Seattle: Limited stops, faster service

The color coded buses are by no means as fast as the Quickbuses were, no matter that there is now some TSP and some dedicated bus lanes. Buses stop too often and are frequently too crowded. Thus, for example, the CityLink Blue which essentially runs on the western half of the old QB40 route is much more like the old #23 than the old QB 40.

Rapid buses in LA

There wouldn't be any more obvious improvement to the whole Link system than bringing the rapid overlay option back for the most heavily traveled routes such as Gold and Blue. It would follow a practice that has been successful in many other US cities, including Seattle, one of only two US cities where bus ridership actually increased. Rapid routes could also be the pilots for additional bus acceleration methods which MTA plans to introduce, such as all door boarding and cashless payment.

Sure, this will cost some extra money, especially if the service would not take substantially away from existing service already on the ground. But if Governor Hogan and his Secretary Rahn are really serious about giving Baltimore a modern, more customer friendly and faster bus, i.e. the best bus service possible, bringing the Quick Bus back would go along way.
Klaus Philipsen, FAIA

Related:
Transit After The Red Line: First Steps after the Blow