Bringing Bus Rapid Transit to Life

For the past six years, TransForm has been working in the cities of Berkeley, Oakland and San Leandro to build community awareness of AC Transit's proposed East Bay Bus Rapid Transit project. Our intent is to help the cities and AC Transit fine-tune their BRT proposal to most effectively meet the community's needs.

Traveling along Telegraph Avenue, International Boulevard, and East 14th Street, BRT is proposed to reduce current trip times along this corridor by 39%, and will attract over 9,000 new daily passengers. Currently, TransForm is working in each of these cities to build awareness and understanding of the project.

If implemented, the East Bay BRT project could become a model for other BRT routes around the Bay Area. For more on this project, go to AC Transit's BRT website.

TransForm will also be assisting in the planning and implementation of BRT in other Bay Area counties, to include Santa Clara County and San Francisco (Van Ness and Geary Boulevard lines). Winning Bus Rapid Transit for the Bay Area is an essential part of TransForm's strategy to create a reliable, frequent, affordable, comfortable, safe, efficient and interconnected regional public transportation network, as outlined in our 2002 report Revolutionizing Bay Area Transit on a Budget.

The Status of Bus Rapid Transit in the East Bay

In May 2010, San Leandro joined Oakland in supporting the study of creating dedicated BRT lanes.  This means AC Transit can now move forward in looking at the impacts and benefits of a full BRT system with dedicated lanes, stations, proof-of-payment system, and other amenities that will greatly improve service along the heavily used 1/1R line.

Center-running dedicated lanes would keep BRT out of traffic, allowing for reliability that current "Rapid" buses cannot deliver, while still allowing for the creation of bike lanes, and preserving most of the parking that some merchants have expressed concerns over.

We applaud Oakland and San Leandro's City Councils for their efforts to help find a way to improve the comfort, safety, frequency, reliability, and affordability of bus service.

AC Transit has also recently announced that they are pursuing a source of funding for the purchase of new, state-of-art BRT vehicles that would have doors on both-sides (like BART), allowing for left-side door boarding. By allowing north and southbound passengers to board from the same platform, dual-side door BRT vehicles minimize the amount of parking that would need to be relocated to accommodate BRT platformed stations. We can expect a study and an update on the status of the project in the fall.

Questions about TransForm's work to shape and win Bus Rapid Transit in the East Bay?  Want to get involved?  Contact Joel Ramos.

East Bay BRT illustrations courtesy of FMG Architects and Cambridge Systematics.