photo: flickr's Fluer-de-louis

TARC's 4th street trolley is never worth messing with. As one TARC driver dryly observed of my attempts to use it - "Don't use the Trolley, you just lazy!". She was right. Here's the math.

[Editor's note: this article was written this summer with 2009-era service levels for all routes. Now that the new route cuts have been announced, this only strengthens the argument]

The 4th Street Trolley services from the Galt House to Main Library, 0.88 miles, to be exact. It runs at 15 minute intervals, and a trip takes 7 minutes. Walking the same distance takes 18 minutes (@3mph).

Since the headway is 15 minutes, the average wait is 7.5 minutes. Add to this the 7 minutes travel time, and you've got 14.5 minutes. You've only beaten walking by 3.5 minutes, and you're out a fare. Walking the route takes pretty much constant time - always 18 minutes. The trolley travel time can vary wildy from 7 minutes, up to 22 minutes. That variability imposes a penalty which makes the whole deal a wash.

This assumes that you're at the Galt House and want to go to the Main Library. Not exactly a common trip profile. A more realistic trip is going from Main Street to Theater Square - 0.65 miles, 13 minutes to walk, average trolley time 7.5 minutes average wait, plus 6 minutes onboard, for a total of 13.5 minutes. Walking is actually faster on average!

For even shorter hops - Jefferson Street to Chestnut - the Trolley is even worse: The walking trip is only 7 minutes, typically taking less time than just standing there waiting for the trolley.

The way to improve north-south connection times is to have really frequent service. One way to do that is to put two drivers and two trolleys on the line, but that doubles costs, and its not worth it in my opinion. Another way to improve service is to mothball the trolley completely. Save all the money. If you need north south connectivity very badly, 1 block over there is the #4, the most glorious line in the city, with 11 minute headways. For riders who walk or roll very slowly, this does not impose any cost, since they will be transferring from an E-W line and can just ride one block less. In fact, the shorter headway will save them time on average.

The major operating cost of any bus is paying the salary of the driver. With the saved money, the driver could be put on a different fixed route. Reinforcing the #4 with a 9th bus would be the obvious move. The 9th bus would cut the headways on that line by an addtional 80 seconds, making north-south movements that much more efficient. I haven't ridden them recently, but I seem to recal these buses being pretty crowded at peak hours, and the additoonal capacity would be handy at rush hour as well. Double duty.