Comment by kjellsbells
6 months ago
Buses are considerably faster than walking, no? Eg 8 to 9mph or about 13kph in London on average[0].
I also observe that this is an average speed, which night be useful for statistical summarization but is not as useful as knowing whether the portion of the route that you want to take is in the faster part or the slower part of the data readings.
For example, if I took a bus from Aldwych up Holborn to Euston I might expect that the first mile would indeed be walking pace but the second mile I would be zipping along. It's important as a bus rider to not let the slow parts color your perception of the whole ride.
[0] https://www.london.gov.uk/who-we-are/what-london-assembly-do...
Whenever I've taken a bus in London it tends to be in zone 1. Between the walking to the right stop, waiting for the bus, the traffic, then walking at the far end, it's rarely quicker than walking.
Last week for example I took a bus from near St Pauls to Trafalgar Square, the entire jouney took about half an hour for 1.5 miles.
My data point: in NYC, the crosstown bus on 125th is noticeably slower than walking.
I usually take the tube in London but there are some point to points where bus is clearly faster than tube connections would be and absolutely faster than walking. Don't really know Manhattan up that far but crosstown tends to be slow in general.
Currently Apple Maps tells me great ormand street to Covent Garden is 19 minutes by bus and 21 to walk.
British museum to Shakespeare’s globe is 32 minutes plus up to 8 minutes waiting for the bus if there’s no delays. 40 minutes to walk.
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