Advice for CapMetro
I can’t be the first person to make this point, but the bus ride down Congress is unbearably tedious if there’s any traffic at all. Here’s the pattern:
Board passengers at the corner of 9th and Congress.
Watch the light turn from green to red as the last passenger boards.
Wait through the red light.
Drive to the corner of 8th and Congress.
Board passengers.
Watch the light turn from green to red as the last passenger boards.
Wait through the red light.
. . .
Board passengers at the corner of Caesar Chavez.
Watch the light turn from green to red as the last passengere boards.
Wait through the red light.
It’s taken me as long as 15 minutes to get down Congress on the bus, even in relatively light traffic. Do we really need bus stops on every corner? If CapMetro limited stops to every other block, it would shave minutes off the trip down Congress and save fuel from the extra starts and stops. This would hardly be a harship on riders — they’d never be more than one block of a bus stop. It’s not worth the cost in time and fuel just to save riders a half-block walk.
