Some of the latest decisions of the city of Tallinn regarding opening or changing bus lines are surprising, to put it mildly, because they do not obey the usual logic of public transport planning, writes Marek Karm.
It was only then that the change of bus line no. 8 in Tallinn angered residents of the Mähe and Lepiku settlements, because they could no longer reach the heart of the city by bus. Reid Road is an easy option to get around the city center from the north, but bus passengers are diverse and many of them want to get to the Viru ring road area.
Petitions have been launched, but to no avail, because unfortunately city leaders know better how to operate public transport lines and what is best for residents. City leaders did not want to involve residents in the initial phase and take their feedback into account in the next phase, when the city had already found that the reorganization had not worked in the best way.
Another new collision occurs with the long-awaited Nõmme night bus line n. 96. There are 1.9 kilometers left between two bus stops in the center of the Nõmme neighborhood. This distance between the Astri and Nõmme bus stops is unfathomably long compared to the distances between other bus stops.
After all, every public transport planner should understand, looking at the map, that it is necessary to add a stop at the intersection of Valdeku street and Vabaduse puistee, that is, a hub, and also a stop at the Nõmme district government building within the ‘settlement. . The addition of lines must also be accompanied by infrastructure, not building new stops is not a solution. Also, along Valdeku Street, no account was taken of the fact that steep thresholds that do not meet the norms are very annoying for bus traffic, both for drivers and passengers.
Recently passengers on the Nõmme bus were penalized even more by increasing travel times on line 5, when the stop at Liiva station was added to the direction towards the city center between the Värava and Liiva stops, 400 meters apart. one from the other. Although the stop on this bus line closest to Liiva train station is Liiva, it is unclear why this additional stop is needed. The distances between the stops before Värava and after the Liiva stop are even longer, more than 500 meters.
In light of this change, it seems that transport planning decisions are completely arbitrary and do not take into account the fact that the distances between stops should be of reasonable length, which would also take into account ensuring a higher overall average speed of the public passengers. transport if it wants to compete with cars.
There is also an oddity, for example, on line 36 in the direction of Väike-Ìismäe, where the distance between the Kadaka and Pöoris stops is only 155 meters. The Pöoris stop is located in a completely wrong place and should be placed just as many meters further in the direction of Järveotsa street, so that a large number of inhabitants of the Pöoris neighborhood would have less problems walking between the bus stop and their homes on a daily basis.
It is obviously a shame that the express lines in the direction of Mustamäe end where the border of Mustamäe was located during the Soviet era. Lines 9 and 11 should certainly also guide the inhabitants of the Pöoris district, because if it is almost 600 meters on foot from home to the express line stop, convenience often wins and therefore the decision is in favor of driving. Thousands of residents around Mäepealse Street, Kadaka Buieste and in the Hõbemetsa neighborhood are also waiting for the express line. Why are they less important than the inhabitants of the so-called Vana-Mustamäe?
Following the errors mentioned for example, is there any hope that Tallinn’s public transport network will become more convenient and faster for users?
We can only hope that Tallinn will eventually transform its public transport network to meet today’s needs and expectations. For this it is necessary to base the development of the route network on the results of the traffic model, on mobile positioning data, on information resulting from the involvement of city residents, on validation data and on expert opinions.
“Free public transportation for city residents can place very high limits on large investments in public transportation.”
However, to fully improve the public transport network in the city, much more money is needed, where the right to travel for free poses significant limitations. Free public transport for city residents can place very high limits on large investments in public transport, such as the construction of new tram lines.
Before building new tram lines, the Tallinn Transport Authority would have to make several key decisions, one of which concerns the tram’s rolling stock. In Tallinn, trams have a driver’s cab only at one end of the tram, which makes it possible to make a U-turn at the final stops. However, a lot of land is consumed under this U-turn circle, which means that it is worth building U-turn circles only once at the point where the end point of the line will actually be located in the distant future.
If there was a driver’s cab at both ends of the tram, it would be enough to build a one-way branch between the two directions of travel at the end of the tram line. This would allow the gradual construction of the tram line in sections much further from the city center or the construction of terminus in places where there is no free land.
In the field of public transport in Tallinn, there are many key decisions that have been postponed, because they either do not dare to make decisions, because they are satisfied with the stagnant network of lines, or because there has not been enough funding due to the provision of public transport in Tallinn. Tallinn. right to travel free.
It is necessary to start making decisions now in Tallinn so that in the future public transport is attractive, fast and competitive for users, offering a serious alternative to the personal car and not twice as slow as the car, as it is now.
Tallinn has an excellent development document “Tallinn Development Strategy 2035”, which covers urban space and mobility goals and activities in depth. So let’s do something to reach them by 2035, because otherwise in 2035 we will continue to talk about the need for this and that, but in essence we have gotten nowhere or achieved anything important and we will continue to be a car-traveled capital of Eastern Europe.
2024-01-11 11:50:00
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