Urban Transport Strategy. Management in Developing Countries John A Cracknell, страница 63

c)  Less is known about cities in Africa but it is thought there are few bus priority measures outside the schemes introduced many years ago in the Bank project in Abidjan.

7.3.2.      The lack of bus priority, outside Latin America, is likely to arise from a combination of reasons.  In some cities:

a)  the absence of a conventional bus system and the reliance on para –transit makes bus priority very difficult to implement due to the high volumes of relatively small vehicles, e.g. Manila;

b)  bus services are embryonic - buses are few in number, bus service is of poor quality and the bus is regarded as the transport of last resort e.g. some cities in China, Hanoi etc;

c)  the problems of enforcement of “complex” bus lane schemes which require vehicle selectivity (buses versus others) are viewed as too great to overcome;

d)  there is a lack of understanding of the objectives of bus priority and politicians are unwilling to commit to measures which adversely affect the (rich) private cars users;

e)  buses are regarded as a second class mode and preferential treatment over cars, or even over other public transport modes (such as trams in some Eastern European countries), is unacceptable; and

f)  there is a lack of trained-experienced professional staff with sufficient vision to appreciate the benefits of road space reallocation to buses.

7.3.3.      The trend in developed cities is completely the reverse of developing cities (outside Latin America).  Road space reallocation to buses from cars on a highly preferential basis is increasingly accepted in many richer developed cities, (in most western European cities including in UK, France, Holland, Italy etc but also understood to be the case in Australia and no doubt others.  This policy is underpinned by (i) the acceptance that full demand for private car use can never be accommodated in cities, (ii) car demand must be managed, (iii) buses are efficient users of scarce road space and

(iv) improved quality of bus services offers an alternative to private car travel.  This is a strong rationale for the justification of reallocation of road space from cars to buses.

7.3.4.      It seems evident that if bus priority is adopted as an integral part of traffic management policy, then the poor as important, but not the only, users of bus services will benefit. The TOR poses the question “how can priorities in road space reallocation be changed”.  By-and-large, developing cities in Latin America have gained acceptance for bus priority.  This can only have been brought about by resolving the issues noted above by better planning, better information to decision makers, better enforcement, better image for buses, better dissemination of information on the benefits of bus priority and by the implementation of schemes which work well and are able to generate political support.  In particular, in some cities in Latin America, politicians have realised the potential of busways.  Unlike fixed-track systems, busways can be delivered quickly and offer have proved to be successful.  For example, while extending well beyond "traffic management", the case of a major busway on a strategic corridor in Quito (Ecuador) is a good demonstration of what can be achieved.  The scheme was approached on a system wide basis and includes, as well as a segregated busway, new trunk line buses, re-organized feeder bus service, integrated fares, high quality bus stops and so on.  The scheme cost about US$5 million per km including buses (say some 25% of the cost of a rail based system) and was implemented in about 2 years.  Again, the case of Curitiba is rightly known world-wide as the best example of a bus based transport system.  The success of the Curitiba transport system with its segregated busways, range of bus services (trunk, feeder, inter-district, express etc), integrated fares, private sector operation, transport-land use integration, etc show what can be achieved with inspired political direction and continuity and professional planning.