To be fair --
The good. There are a bunch of good points in the report, like the need for the 10-Year HSR Rapid Ready plan, and the overall need for rapid transit. Legitimate concerns like Bombardier delays, etc.
The bad. The report contains many issues as well as is biased with cherrypicked information, mixed in with sensible writing. Heavily cherrypicked against LRT. Was not peer-reviewed as Terry originally apparently promised.
There's been quite a local buzz, both in the media and the twitterverse. Both the pro-LRT and anti-LRT sides are making exaggerations and are fighting each other, even as I stay out of that.
A doctorate at McMaster University, Chris Higgins, with specialization in transportation has peer reviewed Terry's report, and found several errors.
CHCH
http://www.chch.com/terry-whiteheads-lrt-report/
CBC:
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/hamilton/terry-whitehead-lrt-1.3693863
Dr. Chris Higgins (Transportation), critique:
Dr. Chris Higgins' peer review on Google Drive:
https://1drv.ms/b/s!Ag0JyHxqHIsm3zgmH_7WLJ4t5ZsP
Needless to say; even after reading this, my position has not changed -- I remain pro A-Line and B-Line LRT.
Also, the HSR bus ridership numbers are suspect, from anecdotes, despite having come from HSR's Dixon. Automatic passenger counters are not used, and very rare, not always the correct peak hour (given McMaster peak is not always fully in sync with work peak), infrequent manual counts were done -- often months go by before counting passengers on HSR bus routes.
Also, needs to be factored in -- express and local service often cannibalize each other's passengers because of full buses for either in the morning service. There's often room if you're boarding near the end of the route but by the middle of the route, the bus is full of McMaster students, for example -- at Sherman and King My spouse tells me he has often missed a lot of B-Line buses going westwards that were full by Sherman and King, and had to catch the #1 local bus instead; so there's some ridership consolidation effects not currently factored in this report. Also, local bus service will continue to run along the LRT route or parallel to the LRT route, with LRT being express -- but with the favourability of LRT it is expected to get a bigger lion's share of riders. (TTC also runs bus routes above subways in some suburban sections where the stop spacing is large, even if these local bus service may be a smaller percentage of total riders). HSR's bus network is a little inefficiently laid out in some parts (with some multi-route choke points, like near Westdale, getting a bus every 2 minutes at peak) which pushes people onto different bus routes that are thusly not counted.
Today, at this time, the B-Line is every 10 minutes at its most frequent, so poor service levels along sections throttle ridership of the B-Line, which is just six articulated buses per hour -- an unfair projection of LRT ridership if you're limiting the service capacity. Residents I know (and spouse) say they often get onto the local bus anyway, after missing a full B-Line Express that does not always stop to pick up new riders in the morning peak once it's filled up halfway on its route during peak period (student & work).
Given the conflicting numbers that exist out there, I really think some citizens probably need to commission a private passenger count on multiple LRT-corridor bus routes -- to get the real truth on bus ridership. What I'm seeing on the buses appears inconsistent with Terry's claims of peak hour ridership.
