BRT bus service to stop end of April

 

 

BANGKOK: -- The Bangkok Metropolitan Administration (BMA) will put an end to its only bus service from Sathorn to Ratchapreuk station at end of April after suffering a loss of 200 million baht a year.

 

The rapid bus service or officially called Bangkok Rapid Transit or  BRT service operated on a special route was introduced in 2010.

The Bangkok BRT service covers a 15.9 km long route from BTS Chong Nonsi station (Sathorn) to Ratchapruek via Narathiwat Ratchanakharin and Rama 3 roads then crossing into Thonburi via the Rama 3 bridge for the final station.

 

The BRT route has a total of 12 stations.

 

Bangkok deputy governor Pol Maj Gen Amnuay Nimmano said although the BRT service was not 100% good or bad, it was the only rapid bus service that linked the sky train service or BTS at Chong Nonsi station, and runs on a special lane on the roads.

 

This prompted the majority of road users to resist the service, and on several occasions motorists drove on this special bus lane provided only for BRT service.

 

With other vehicles using the special bus lane, BRT buses therefore could not travel fast, but slowly, he said.

 

Because of the slow travel, the service is therefore unpopular, he said.

 

He said parts of its passengers are students and the aged who are given free rides.

 

This caused the BMA to suffer an accumulated loss of 200 mil baht a year, he said.

 

Full story: http://englishnews.thaipbs.or.th/brt-bus-service-stop-end-april/

 

-- © Copyright Thai PBS 2017-02-07

Have ridden it a couple of times.  It seemed okay.  B200Mil deficit is not that much.  Can the system be fixed, so it can run at a profit ?

I have ridden it a couple of times and the buses they use must be the noisiest in Asia. If you sit in the back you are bound to disembark with a raging headache from the noise and vibration.

 

Maybe this is why people don't like using this service?

29 minutes ago, yellowboat said:

Have ridden it a couple of times.  It seemed okay.  B200Mil deficit is not that much.  Can the system be fixed, so it can run at a profit ?

Maybe increase ticket prices and cut costs. Of course, increasing ticket prices will probably lead to less passengers. 

200m baht might not be much to you, but that's about 550,000 baht per day in losses. So they they would need to find about another 27,000 passengers per day just to break even. 

So probably the answer is no.

 

The ticket cost was reduced to a flat 10 Baht a few years ago (for any distance) in order to encourage more users to leave their cars at home, but guess it did not work. I have used it several times and the quality of the buses and service was good. 

Without a fully segregated busway which physically kept non-busses out it was never going to work well (or at all). The high-occupancy lanes which it shared with normal road users were simply not enforced and immediately jammed up with every man and his dog noodle cart, fouling up the "Rapid" part of Bus Rapid Transit.

 

BRT can and does work and is a relatively low-cost alternative to light rail, but routes have to be chosen carefully and connectivity with other modes considered. The Sathorn route was really only ever intended as a technology demonstrator which it did adequately.

 

Anyone want to buy some high-floor (useless other than for a BRT), right-hand door (useless in Thailand) buses, going cheap?

 

 

1 hour ago, Crossy said:

Without a fully segregated busway which physically kept non-busses out it was never going to work well (or at all). The high-occupancy lanes which it shared with normal road users were simply not enforced and immediately jammed up with every man and his dog noodle cart, fouling up the "Rapid" part of Bus Rapid Transit.

 

BRT can and does work and is a relatively low-cost alternative to light rail, but routes have to be chosen carefully and connectivity with other modes considered. The Sathorn route was really only ever intended as a technology demonstrator which it did adequately.

 

Anyone want to buy some high-floor (useless other than for a BRT), right-hand door (useless in Thailand) buses, going cheap?

 

 

Was not an occasional blockage, as the article lead us to believe, but a constant problem due to lack of enforcement.  " routes have to be chosen carefully and connectivity with other modes considered".

 

Sounds if there was better planning and enforcement, it could have worked. 

When the BRT line first went into place I was against it as I thought it would really muck up traffic on Narathiwat. Traffic did suffer on Narathiwat since they removed a lane plus they got rid of most of the u-turns that were incredibly useful. It pushed traffic to the side and limited the flow. It would make far more sense to just put in a BTS line along the same or similar route.

 

I have used the BRT and do find it useful to bypass the stuck traffic on Narathiwat to get to the Chong Nonsee BTS station area. But in the end, I think having the lane back and better traffic flow outweighs the small benefit the BRT brings. It think I did read that they plan to put in an additional bus line along the same route. I wish they would as there is no direct bus line that follows that same route.

8 hours ago, saakura said:

The ticket cost was reduced to a flat 10 Baht a few years ago (for any distance) in order to encourage more users to leave their cars at home, but guess it did not work. I have used it several times and the quality of the buses and service was good. 

Even less than that. I ride it pretty regularly out of Sathorn and AFAIK, the standard current fare to go anywhere on the route is 5 baht one-way. It used to be 10 baht, and originally, the system was supposed to have a graduated fare system (of higher prices) based on distance like BTS and MRT. But that didn't last long, if it ever was actually implemented, before the authorities dropped it to the flat 10 and then 5 baht fares.

 

AFAIK, it's probably the best transit value anywhere in Bangkok right now at a flat 5 baht fare -- assuming you want to go somewhere on the BRT route. Originally, there was supposed to be a whole network of connected BRT bus routes for Bangkok, but they built the first one, and by the time they finished it, the governments had changed and those in charge later never saw fit to build out the network.

 

What I'd like to know is, what are  they going to do with the current bus lane segments that currently are separated from the regular street lanes by a raised concrete divider? And, what are they going to do with all the station structures along the BRT line, of which there must be more than a dozen?

 

PS - I've never had any problem with the BRT buses themselves. They're comfortable, air conditioned and far newer than most of the BMTA's regular bus fleet. They also seem to do a pretty good business in the morning and afternoons, especially when schools are letting out.

 

BTW, the claim about cars using the BRT bus lanes and making the buses slow and causing low ridership is B.S. in my experience. I rarely see any cars driving in the separate BRT bus lane, but more often some motocy taxi guys seem to use it for short distances. But what happens more often is the BRT buses may get caught temporarily at intersections and corners where backed up cars on the cross streets or waiting to turn end up blocking the BRT bus lane. But I've never seen that as any kind of major operational problem for the line, more of an occasional, short-time inconvenience.

 

 

 

Just fyi, the final story on this subject may not have yet been written.

 

Today, I was talking with BRT staff at the Sathorn terminus station, and when queried about the coming end of the service, one of the supervisors I spoke with wouldn't confirm the idea that they were going to be canceled, saying instead people should wait and see.

 

Later in the day, I ended up calling and speaking with a staff member in the BMA governor's office. And between his Thai and my English, he seemed to be saying that the issue was still under consideration/discussion and that there likely is going to be some further development/decision announced next week.

 

I was trying to find out from the BRT staff if there was some place or way that members of the public who support the service could make their views known to the BMA leadership -- a Facebook page, a Twitter account, a BMA phone number to call.  And despite my best efforts, they were spectacularly unhelpful about that, and had nothing to offer. Maybe they simply didn't know, but I suspect there's something brewing out there somewhere, perhaps only in Thai language.