Bus and tram usage is a mystery to me

[Gojak_v3]

I'll have a city with over 1000 for each of the three districts. I'll have a bus line and a tram line that run on different paths that can hold 100 or more each and a frequency of 30-40 seconds. The tram will seem to get used pretty regularly, but the bus line will only have like 10 people on it at a time.

This is just one example, I could have a city half the size and there would be 50 people waiting at a stop and I can't add trams fast enough it seems. Or I could have a city and they don't use the tram or bus that much. It just seems completely random. Wish it wasn't so random and a bit more predictable in how they work.

[chrisasnyder]

For me the basic rule for city bus/tram routes is to make sure I connect each zone of the city, green yellow and blue in a transit loop. One stop is my train station. Setup the loop so that a line runs in each direction. As the town grows add another 2 line loop further out, making sure everything is covered. If one bus stop tends to get overloaded, I'll add more bus stops and vehicles to the line.

Trams or buses? Trams I tend to prefer since they don't get re-routed when the townies add streets and can have more capacity, but the down side is to get the loop right you need to build streets, where busses you can easily adjust.

As the city gets bigger, I might added a cross town bus line to help townies get from the station to downtown to the oposite side of town.

Most of the time they are profitable, but I usally don't care because they act as feeder for the train lines which is where the money is made.


There are other methods, this is one I find that works and is a usually a set and forget. There is another thread in here where the poster expermited with different loop lines and had a process for forcing city growth sprawl my manipulating the ring lines.

[clixor]

A frequency of 40s for local transportation is kind of low (or high). If you take into account a whole year is 730s. Then you have agents waiting for a bus for like 3 weeks. Agents prefer the fastest way to their destination and if walking is faster than waiting for a bus/tram, they will walk.

So first thing to look at that the frequency of buses/trams is high.

My setup personally is one clockwise/couter clockwise tram-route. And then point-to-point bus routes to where needed.

[Gojak_v3]

The frequency wouldn't matter. I had more buses and trams on the line before thus decreasing frequency. I cut them back cause they aren't being used.

[clixor]

Originally posted by Gojak_v3:

The frequency wouldn't matter. I had more buses and trams on the line before thus decreasing frequency. I cut them back cause they aren't being used.

ok, frequency is the first thing to still check though, you could also checks the streets if there are a lot pedestrians. If you have efficient public transport, and the walk to the nearest stop is not to far, you wont see that many pedestrians.

Another thing to check if your routes are setup properly. Residential zones need to go to the train station (to travel to other destinations obviousy) and likewise, travellers need to go to the shopping/workplaces zones.

In the end though, have topnotch tram/bus routes early on is not the highest priority (aside except from losing money on them). As long as you provide train or other outside connections, cities will grow. And with limited bus/trams what you will see it that the land value will only increase around the station and other areas won't develop that much.

You will still see growth though and that's what matters the most.

[canophone]

Originally posted by Gojak_v3:

The frequency wouldn't matter. I had more buses and trams on the line before thus decreasing frequency. I cut them back cause they aren't being used.

You may find the answer from checking the type of passengers waiting for the buses and trams: whether they prefer 'fast' or prefer 'cheap'!

[Jebako]

I usually start with one or maybe two lines in the city and make sure I cover as much streets I can. In some cities I have around 20 bus/tram stops per line (10 clockwise and 10 anti-clockwise) and as the city grows I add more stops or create whole new line. Line usage in cities is 60-80% Still, around half my tram lines are not profitable but if they are under -50k that is fine with me. As someone said before me, tram lines are mainly there to feed the train

[slippybee]

Just a personal approach but I used trams for transportation around my cities - I focus on funnelling Agents to and from my train stations to residential, commercial and Industrial and back again and Buses for cheap transport from one city to another.

Trams and buses can be tough to make wash their own face in terms of costs but I think you need to see them as a link in an overall chain. So while the tram and bus line loses money the Agents they push onto the trains make you a profit and every Agent on a tram or bus isn't in a car gluing up your inner-city deliveries (goods and people).

Sometimes it makes sense to knock down large parts of the game provided street network to make a layout more sympathetic to public transport.

[fredbull]

Passengers are allways doing the same: going to shop, going to job, returning back home.
If u join a commercial zone to another commercial zone, u ll have nothing on it

Check what are your stations connected to first ;-)
After that, there are passengers that look for economic transport and some that look for fast transport.
Trams are cheaper and a bit slower than busses, so if your busses are empty, that s probably because you dont have enough passengers looking for a fast transport.
(Yeah with Passengers, the price/km depend of the max speed of your vehicle, so a faster vehicle will make your Economic passengers reach their destination by feet ;) )

[Gojak_v3]

Originally posted by fredbull:

Passengers are allways doing the same: going to shop, going to job, returning back home.
If u join a commercial zone to another commercial zone, u ll have nothing on it

Check what are your stations connected to first ;-)
After that, there are passengers that look for economic transport and some that look for fast transport.
Trams are cheaper and a bit slower than busses, so if your busses are empty, that s probably because you dont have enough passengers looking for a fast transport.
(Yeah with Passengers, the price/km depend of the max speed of your vehicle, so a faster vehicle will make your Economic passengers reach their destination by feet ;) )

I've been thinking about this post a lot. Normally I just focus on the "catch area". But does it actually matter if you place stops in certain "districts"?

For example, stop A and stop B have nearly the same catch area. Will placing a stop in front of the residental area at stop A be used to travel to the commercial area at stop B despite the catch area? I always think of catch area as the distance someone is willing to walk. Maybe that's wrong.

[chrisasnyder]

Well yes, the number of stops in the zones do have an impact for the traveler who is looking for fast, since the longer walk to the bus stop influences the choice. Especially when they own their own cars. If the bus stop to fast transport is too far, their own car is the better choice for them.

However, oversaturating the bus stops slows down the line. So there is a tradeoff.

I also believe, though have not proven, that the shade in the cachement area for each people and cargo effects the land value. Then land value is used by the town growth algorithm. This explains why growth is strong near stations. Passenger train stations that also have cargo dropped will have very strong growth.


As fedbull said, people go from their residential to either commercial or industry and back using either a fast or cheap method. Your transport mesh should provide both options on those paths "everywhere." Meaning within each city and from city to city. That's the game in a nutshell really.

Personally, I've tried several designs, CW & CCW loops, busses and trams, loops with downtown cut throughs, direct lines to each zone, single direction loops, and just random stops.

I find that most have situational usage if you are trying to optimize, it just comes down to how much time you want to spend messing with it, only to have the city morph in a few years and make you re-do it. I read on one thread where someone said (sorry couldn't find who) "Optimizing city busses is a fool's errand" Nice quote, I like it. Meaning you'll be jumping from city to city tweaking all the time. If that's your thing, have at it.

As I said above, the CW/CCW loops require the least attention and generally solve the problem. If I see too many people starting to wait at a stop, I add vehicles and sometimes additional stops. The small bus stops have a limit to how many people will stand at them.