What Makes Public Transport More Efficient
Launch library · evergreen read
Public transport achieves efficiency largely through scale: a single bus or train carrying dozens or hundreds of passengers uses considerably less energy and road space per person than the equivalent number of individual cars would require to move the same group of people across the same distance travelled each day.
This efficiency depends heavily on ridership, however, since a mostly empty bus running a long route delivers far less benefit than a well patronised one, which is why route planning, frequency and integration with other services all matter just as much as the vehicles themselves within the overall transport system.
Well designed public transport networks also reduce congestion for everyone, including drivers who never use the service directly, since fewer cars on the road benefits traffic flow generally, an indirect benefit that is easy to overlook when evaluating transport efficiency in isolation from the much wider network functioning around it.