http://www.sheepsheadbites.com/2015/07/the-commute-how-common-is-bus-bunching/
THE COMMUTE: Last Thursday, I had an appointment near the Kings Highway train station on the Brighton line. I either take the B1 or B49 to the train. At around 11am, three buses arrived, all three not in service. Shortly thereafter a B1 did not stop and only had about 15 passengers. Then I boarded a nearly empty B49. Who knows how much longer I would have had to wait if I had to take the B1? I have written many times about buses regularly bypassing passengers on this route. Returning home I decided to take the B68 to the B1. The B68 arrived right away, but no B1 for quite a while.
The situation is all too familiar: No route is immune to long delays. Generally, I find that buses work fairly well about a third of the time. While a third of the time there are minor delays, and a third of the time the delays are severe enough to cause you to be late, even if you left a little earlier because you expected delays in order never to be late, your alternative is to always allow so much extra time you will often arrive a half hour early. This unpredictability of travel time serves as a huge deterrent to not use local buses...
THE COMMUTE: Last Thursday, I had an appointment near the Kings Highway train station on the Brighton line. I either take the B1 or B49 to the train. At around 11am, three buses arrived, all three not in service. Shortly thereafter a B1 did not stop and only had about 15 passengers. Then I boarded a nearly empty B49. Who knows how much longer I would have had to wait if I had to take the B1? I have written many times about buses regularly bypassing passengers on this route. Returning home I decided to take the B68 to the B1. The B68 arrived right away, but no B1 for quite a while.
The situation is all too familiar: No route is immune to long delays. Generally, I find that buses work fairly well about a third of the time. While a third of the time there are minor delays, and a third of the time the delays are severe enough to cause you to be late, even if you left a little earlier because you expected delays in order never to be late, your alternative is to always allow so much extra time you will often arrive a half hour early. This unpredictability of travel time serves as a huge deterrent to not use local buses...