Definition of the Subject
Light Rail Transit
Light rail transit is one of several forms of rail public transportation designed to transport passengers within metropolitan areas, but there is no agreement on its precise definition. The Transportation Research Board of the National Academy of Sciences [1] and the American Public Transportation Association [2] define light rail to include streetcars and tramways. Both organizations also define light rail to include modern metropolitan rail systems characterized by multicar trains operating on tracks that are segregated from motor vehicle traffic except at cross streets. Vuchic [3] defines light rail with respect to the nature of metropolitan rail right-of-way that it uses. He categorizes metropolitan rail rights-of-way according to three types. Type A denotes grade-separated rail rights-of-way that have no conflicts with motor vehicle, other rail, or bicycle and pedestrian traffic....
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Abbreviations
- Average speed:
-
The speed that results by dividing the round trip time of a transit vehicle to traverse a transit route from beginning to end and back to the beginning, including the layover time until the beginning of the next trip, by the roundtrip length of the route. Average speed also may be calculated by dividing annual vehicle miles for a route by annual vehicle hours for the route. Average speed is slower than scheduled speed because average speed includes layover time at each end of the route.
- Bus rapid transit:
-
An application of buses in a way that emulates rail transit. Bus rapid transit usually provides for a reserved right-of-way for buses that includes wayside stations. Fare collection systems allow passengers to board and alight buses at all doors. Drivers are not involved in fare collection. Buses usually are articulated and contain several wide doors, all of which open when buses stop at online stations. Rights-of-way are usually Type A or B, and scheduled speeds of 20–25 mph are possible.
- CBD:
-
Central business district. The CBD typically is the largest business center in a metropolitan area and often dates from the streetcar era. At one time, CBDs contained almost all jobs, shops, and recreation in metropolitan areas, but since World War I when autos became the principal form of urban transportation, CBDs have been in relative decline as most job, shopping, and recreation growth has occurred in the suburbs.
- Commuter rail:
-
A form of rail transit in which transit vehicles use the same tracks (or have the capability of doing so) as do long distance freight and passenger trains. Commuter trains usually are comprised of several large cars containing closely spaced seats and two or three wide doors on each side of the car to allow rapid boarding and alighting of passengers. Commuter trains can be electrically or diesel powered and may be either pulled by locomotives, or have each car equipped with electric motors or diesel engines under the floor. Conductors typically collect fares from passengers while the trains are in motion.
- Edge city:
-
One of several terms used to describe large urban centers in metropolitan areas that rival central business districts in magnitude and diversity of employment. Edge cities typically cover a much larger area than CBDs, however, with much of the land devoted to parking lots and high-speed, multilane roads. It typically is difficult or impossible to walk from one part of an edge city to another part.
- Express bus:
-
A form of bus transit in which buses run nonstop over much of their routes. The most typical application is for express buses to run during weekday rush hours between outlying affluent suburbs and the metropolitan CBD. In the morning express, buses typically circulate through neighborhoods in which affluent commuters live, and when they fill up the buses travel nonstop on a reserved freeway lane or sometimes on a specially built busway to the edge of the metropolitan CBD. The express buses may use purpose-built ramps to gain access to or to leave their freeway lanes. Express buses then circulate through the CBD on city streets to distribute their passengers. In the afternoon peak period, express buses retrace their path to the suburbs. Most express bus routes offer a handful of one-way inbound trips in the morning and one-way outbound trips in the afternoon. Passengers pay their fares to the driver.
- Grid route structure:
-
A multidestination transit routing method, in which each north–south and east–west arterial road in a metropolitan area has its own bus, streetcar, light rail, or heavy rail route, typically providing frequent service. To travel from one part of a metropolitan area to another, passengers typically walk to a nearby bus or streetcar line, travel to a connecting route, and alight near their final destination. Grid route structures afford passengers the ability to travel from any place to any other place in a metropolitan area without out-of-direction travel, but grid route structures require most passengers to transfer. Grid route structures typically attract much higher passenger volumes than radial transit route structures and are more productive, as well.
- Heavy rail:
-
The word “heavy” refers to heavy infrastructure that is associated with subway and elevated rapid transit lines. Heavy rail lines are exclusively Type A rights-of-way achieved by directing the paths (or grades) of rail transit lines above or below paths (or grades) of conflicting transportation. Thus, heavy rail is also called, “grade-separated” transit. Typically, heavy rail is operated by trains of up to ten electrically powered cars, each car having two or three wide doors on each side. Stations are designed to be as long as the longest trains, an expensive proposition when, as is typically the case, the entire station is buried far below the surface or erected far above ground. Passengers pay fares at turnstiles or elaborate and expensive fare collection machines before boarding trains.
- Interurban:
-
A nearly extinct form of US rail transit in which lightly built electric rail lines connected more densely populated rural areas with nearby towns or cities. Lines typically were 15–40 miles long, but both shorter and longer lines were built. The longest through interurban run was from Detroit to Cincinnati, a distance of over 300 miles. Typically, interurbans entered city centers over the tracks of local streetcar companies, but they operated through the countryside either alongside state highways or across county on their own rights-of-way. Interurban cars stopped frequently and offered scheduled speeds typically of about 20 mph. Interurban cars were the size of smaller mainline railroad coaches but typically each car was electrically powered, using streetcar technology. Interurbans usually operated as one-car trains but could operate in multicar trains controlled by a motorman in the lead car, much as rapid transit trains. Interurban lines appeared in the USA during the decade before the automobile appeared and spread rapidly. They declined just as rapidly after World War I and with a few exceptions disappeared before the USA entered World War II.
- Light rail:
-
“Light” refers to light infrastructure and not to the weight of the rail or of the cars. Light rail evolved from streetcars in northern European cities in the three decades following World War II and is characterized by short trains of high-capacity rail cars operating though metropolitan areas on mostly Type B rights-of-way. Each train has multiple wide doors, and light rail systems employ fare collection systems that obviate the need for employees to be on trains to collect fares. Passengers board and alight at all doors. Light rail lines are intended to function like heavy rail lines but at a much lower capital cost. In the USA, they are most effective where they are configured as long routes up to 30 miles long, along which are situated major destinations. Scheduled speeds typically are in the range of 19–30 mph in contrast to typical local bus speeds of 10–15 mph. Bus routes are reconfigured from CBD-radial service to light rail stations at major destinations in the suburbs, thereby creating multidestination transit systems with improved productivity. Metropolitan transit networks having such characteristics are among the most successful in the USA and Canada.
- Mode:
-
A type of transportation technology, such as the walk mode, the auto mode, the bus transit mode, or the rail transit mode.
- Multidestination transit route networks:
-
A transit network so structured that users can reach many destinations in a metropolitan area while avoiding out-of-direction travel. Doing so usually requires a transfer, however. A grid network is one type of multidestination network, but not the only type. Multidestination transit systems stand in contrast to radial transit systems, where most transit routes radiate outward from the one destination that is deemed the most important to serve, usually the CBD.
- PCC Streetcar:
-
A streetcar developed by the Presidents’ Conference Committee (a committee of the presidents of US and Canadian streetcar companies) between the late 1920s and mid-1930s. The objective of the development was to create a quiet and smoothly riding streetcar that could accelerate and decelerate as rapidly as autos in stop-and-go traffic while not jerking standing passengers off their feet. The PCC car, particularly its control system, is considered one of the marvels of North American industrial engineering, but a streetcar that was like a bus on rails competing with the auto in its own environment was not what was needed to save the transit industry.
- Proof-of-payment (POP) Fare Collection System:
-
Passengers are required to determine what their fare for a particular trip should be and to then purchase a ticket for that trip before they board the vehicle. They may board any door. Nobody on board monitors fares while passengers board, but roving inspectors may ask for proof of payment at any time. Passengers without valid proof are warned or fined. Managers typically employ a sufficient number of inspectors to inspect 1% or 2% of passengers. The percentage of passengers without valid proof of payment is the fraud rate, which is generally lower than that of driver-administered fare systems. Its chief advantage is allowing passengers to board at all doors, important for high-capacity lines but not important for low patronage bus lines. Most passengers using such systems buy monthly, weekly, or daily passes. Passengers buying 90 min passes may do so at simple vending machines on train platforms.
- Radial transit route systems:
-
Most transit routes radiate outward from the one destination that is deemed the most important to serve, usually the CBD. Passengers are given a one-seat ride from their homes to the CBD. Underlying a radial route structure is the belief that passengers will not transfer. Radial route systems stand in contrast to multidestination route networks (of which the grid network is an example). Most radial transit systems in the USA are characterized by falling demand and productivity. They typically have higher operating costs per passenger mile than multidestination networks.
- Rapid transit:
-
The traditional name for what now is known as heavy rail.
- Scheduled speed:
-
The speed that results by dividing the length of a route by the time that it takes for a transit vehicle to travel from the beginning to the end of the route. Scheduled speed is much slower than the top speed at which transit vehicles operate, because scheduled speed includes time spent at stops, acceleration and deceleration time (which is what transit vehicles are doing much of the time – hence the design objective of the PCC car), and it includes time lost in traffic congestion. Scheduled speed is faster, however, than average speed, because the later includes the layover time at each end of the route.
- Streetcar:
-
An electrically powered rail transit vehicle, in North America traditionally about 40 ft long and 8 ft wide. Streetcars historically ran on tracks imbedded in the middle of streets, and they competed for street space with vehicular traffic. Thus, they ran on right-of-way type C. Passengers board and alight from streetcars in the centers of streets, sometimes on raised concrete islands. In North America, streetcars typically operated with two-person crews, a motorman to drive the car and a conductor to collect fares while the car was in motion. PCC cars, which appeared in the mid-1930s, were operated with foot pedals that left the driver’s hands free to collect fares, enabling one-person operation.
- Traction:
-
Until the 1920s, streetcar and interurban companies were known as traction companies. One still hears the term, “electric traction.”
- Transit-oriented development, or TOD:
-
A type of development advocated by many planners but not often seen that is comprised of dense, clusters of various types of housing units, retail stores, restaurants, bars, and offices clustered within a quarter of a mile of a transit stop, preferably a rail station. TODs also are characterized by pleasant pedestrian paths linking all of their parts with each other and with the transit station. Studies of the behavior of residents of and visitors to TODs indicate that most use automobiles but that a significant minority do in fact use transit. TODs built to date usually have large parking structures as well as transit access.
- Transit:
-
The generic name used today in the United States for fixed-route, scheduled public transportation services, whether they are bus or rail. One may speak of transit agencies, rail transit, bus transit, or just transit.
- Trolley bus:
-
A bus powered by electricity delivered to the vehicle by overhead wires. Upward-sprung dual trolley poles (one for positive current and the other for negative current) connect with dual parallel overhead wires strung above the street. Trolley buses may travel in the traffic lane under the wires, or they may travel in lanes on either side of the lane under the wire.
- Vehicle miles traveled (VMT):
-
An automobile or light truck traveling 1 mile. VMT is the standard unit for measuring the magnitude of auto use in a metropolitan area.
- Verkehrsverbund or federation of transit operators:
-
A form of transit organization used in several German metropolitan areas. The Verkehrsverbund is characterized by separation of ownership of transit services in the metropolitan region among many different transit operating companies or agencies, and coordination between all of the transit services in the region through a small, centralized public marketing and planning body. Passengers may navigate transit routes throughout the metropolitan area without being aware of boundaries between different transit operating agencies. The idea behind this form of organization is that smaller operators may control their timeliness as well as their operating costs far better than large operating companies, while a central coordinating body insures coordination among all operators through scheduling, fares, and provision of information. The San Diego MTDB created and ran this form of organization from about 1979 to 2003 and experienced better coordination between its various transit services and lower costs per passenger mile than any of the large public transit districts in the USA. It also experienced among the highest rates of passenger growth during this period.
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Authors’ Note
One of the authors (Thompson) is researching a book on light rail adoption in Canada and the USA. Some statements made in this entry derive from that research, which has not been published, yet.
Abbreviations
- APTA
-
American Public Transportation Association, the lobbying organization for transit agencies in the USA
- CBD
-
Central business district
- FRA
-
Federal Railroad Administration, a division of the US Department of Transportation
- FTA
-
Federal Transit Administration, a division of the US Department of Transportation
- MTDB
-
The San Diego Metropolitan Transit Development Board, which planned and built light rail in the San Diego region but which organized a Verkerhsverbund arrangement (of which it was the centralized coordinating body) to operate all transit services in its jurisdiction
- PCC
-
Presidents’ Conference Committee, which conducted basic research to develop a radical new streetcar design between the late 1920s and mid-1930s
- POP
-
Proof-of-payment fare collection system. Also called self-service, barrier-free fare collection system
- TOD
-
Transit-oriented development
- TRB
-
Transportation Research Board, a division of the National Academy of Sciences devoted to expanding knowledge about various transportation systems of all modes
- TriMet
-
The tri-county transit district that builds and operates light rail lines and bus services in Portland, Oregon
- UMTA
-
The Urban Mass Transit Administration, which is what the FTA was called before 1991
- USDOT
-
The US Department of Transportation, headed by the Secretary of Transportation, a member of the President’s cabinet
- VMT
-
Vehicle miles traveled (generally by autos and light trucks) during a certain time period over a particular road or within a given area, such as a metropolitan area. One can speak of, for example, daily VMT in a metropolitan area, such as Portland, or VMT per capita
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Thompson, G.L., Brown, J.R. (2012). Light Rail Transit , Systemic Viability . In: Meyers, R.A. (eds) Encyclopedia of Sustainability Science and Technology. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-0851-3_416
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