INSTITUT Veolia Environnement

  • Home
  • Report n°6: Urban Public Transport

Report n°6: Urban Public Transport

ERW* : The tramway effect

In France, a combination of tram and exclusive right-of-way was the reference model for the 80s and 90s for increasing the efficiency and popularity of urban public transport in medium-sized towns. However, this winning combination has always been accompanied by concomitant measures such as on-line information systems, increased comfort in stations, greater frequency, reclassification of public land, etc. which have greatly contributed to what professionals call the "tramway effect". This effect has, for that matter, been widely exploited for communication with the public at large, through not perhaps at all times with strict regard for the results of evaluation.

Figure 1 : the network-effect of the exclusive right-of-way Full size version

Figure 1 : the network-effect of the exclusive right-of-way

Combined with exclusive right-of-way and the vehicle itself, this package of concomitant measures achieved the greatest possible effect on the population, both in terms of image and practicality, in so far as it revealed to the public a truly modern system, which can be described in terms of practical effectiveness combined with positive social and individual representation. The popularity of Urban Public Transport with Exclusive Right-of-Way (UPT/ERW) is dependent on these joint qualities: practical efficacy and positive representation.

However, tramways with exclusive right-of-way seem to have eclipsed to some extent other systems dedicated to "ordinary" buses, for which the systemic effect has been much weaker as regards efficacy and clarity, more often than not because they did not benefit from the same accompanying complementary efficiency-building and image-enhancing measures. In other words, although all the chances of success were lavished on tramways, this was generally not the case for buses, perhaps because the absence of any major technological leap forward as regards the equipment itself detracted from the system's validity in the eyes of decision makers and designers, leading them to view the bus-based UPT/ERW global system as being of lesser pertinence.

*ERW : Exclusive Right-of-Way