Bus Rapid Transit in Downtown Orlando, FL, USA

Institute of Transportation Engineers. ITE Journal, Feb 2005 by Kimbler, Jim

THIS FEATURE DESCRIBES THE LYMMO BUS RAPID TRANSIT SERVICE ESTABLISHED IN DOWNTOWN ORLANDO, FL, USA. THIS EXCLUSIVE-LANE BUS SERVICE ADDRESSES SEVERAL PUBLIC PURPOSES, INCLUDING DOWNTOWN REVITALIZATION, ENHANCED MOBILITY, PARKING MITIGATION AND A PLEASING PEDESTRIAN/TRANSIT ENVIRONMENT.

BACKGROUND

In 1997, the Orlando, FL, USA, Downtown Development Board partnered with the City of Orlando parking system, the Community Redevelopment Agency, the Central Florida Regional Transportation Authority (known as LYNX) and the Federal Transit Administration to establish a free, exclusive-lane bus service known as LYMMO.

The three-mile route, on a combination of median, same-side and contraflow lanes, provides bus rapid transit (BRT) service to address several public purposes, including downtown revitalization, enhanced mobility, parking mitigation and a pleasing pedestrian/transit environment.

The LYMMO route replaces Freebee, a downtown bus circulator that similarly charged no fare. LYMMO originally was intended to be a streetcar system, but the total cost for the LYMMO BRT system was $21 million-half the projected cost of the planned streetcar system. Operations and maintenance are funded jointly by the Community Redevelopment Agency and the City of Orlando parking system.

The LYMMO project had a number of goals, including connecting the Orange County Courthouse and a parking garage with 900 spaces about one-half-mile away. The parking garage is LYMMO's management and dispatch center.

Connection to the regional system was achieved in November 2004 when LYNX Central Station was opened on the LYMMO line (see Figure 1). The system had operated since 1997 without a direct connection to the downtown transit station, which is the destination of most routes in the threecounty LYNX system.

Pavers distinguish the exclusive BRT lanes from the general traffic lanes. With loop segments at each end, the middle segment allows two directions for LYMMO on the same street (see Figure 2). One lane operates contra-flow to the travel lanes.

Since the implementation of the LYMMO project in 1997, monthly ridership on the system has grown, from 61,150 in August 1997 to 88,774 in October 2004, with annual average ridership in excess of 1.1 million since 1998.

LYMMO has provided a convenient mode of travel for special purpose trips in the downtown since its inception. A survey by the Center for Urban Transportation Research showed that 48.5 percent of riders use LYMMO for a variety of special purpose trips. LYMMO operates Monday through Thursday from 6:00 a.m. to 10:00 p.m., with extended hours on weekends and during special downtown events. LYMMO has had a positive impact on special events by alleviating automobile trips and reducing the demand for downtown parking.

MARKETING LYMMO

With the goals of encouraging transit use and pedestrians in the downtown and providing a convenient mode of travel for special purpose trips downtown, marketing for LYMMO set out to persuade people who had never used transit to step on a bus. A 2001 survey showed that 7.6 percent of LYMMO users were first-time riders.

The survey also showed that riders used LYMMO for a variety of special purpose trips, such as lunch, shopping, or errands (17.4 percent); jury duty (8.7 percent); and Orlando Centroplex events (1.8 percent). Other special purpose trips (20.6 percent) included Church Street, the downtown library, Lake EoIa Park and downtown banks. The survey showed that the remaining 51.5 percent were work trips.

THE ROLE OF INTELLIGENT TRANSPORTATION SYSTEMS

LYMMO's exclusive running ways and traffic signal preemption originally were designed to deliver patrons anywhere within the service area within 10 minutes. Despite these features, there were inconsistent round-trip speeds and sporadic bus arrival times. This resulted in joint efforts in 2001 with the University of Central Florida and Transit Television Network LLC (formerly The ITEC Network) to create an intelligent transportation system (ITS) network using a high-speed wireless mobile network to optimize LYMMO operations.

The ITS network uses state-of-the-art global positioning system technology to locate and announce bus arrival times. Just as important, it dispatches LYMMO buses (using a countdown clock) every 5 minutes during office hours from the Centroplex garage where LYMMO operations are managed.

The purpose of the project was to significantly improve the quality, ease of use and reliability of the existing kiosk information system. The new system allows 100-percent remote modification, adding value to customer service by customizing text or audible messages as desired (see Figure 3).

GROWTH IN THE ORLANDO AREA

Downtown Orlando is the regions transit hub. Numerous commercial and high-density residential development and redevelopment projects are occurring in the downtown area. The availability of transit service, including LYMMO, to employees and area residents has allowed the downtown to continue developing at a high rate. The downtown also is in a designated transportation concurrency exception area, which provides flexibility in terms of roadway capacity requirements due to the availability of transit at a high level of service.