Making new Bus Stops but confused about capacity

[schizoslayer]

I'm making a new set of Bus Stops and I've managed to get myself very confused about the required capacities for Road Top networks and how buses contribute to traffic.

The new lots are all at least 2 tiles in size (4 for the avenue lot) and are plopped lengthways along the road. They are UK styled so the sidewalks are cut away to let buses pull in out of traffic when picking up so in theory they shouldn't be causing through traffic to slow down much.

I have 2 questions regarding how the NAM treats buses:

1 - Are buses now just very fast cars? I read that they contribute to traffic and congestion so a Road with 6000 sims in buses is considered at 100% capacity even before the car traffic is added on. I did some tests in a purposefully gridlocked city and adding bus stops in the right places dropped the commute time from 80 to 20 but the number of vehicles on the roads stayed the same. I can only assume this is because buses are much faster than cars. There was a point (around 12k vehicles going each way down the Avenue) where no matter how many sims I converted from cars to buses the commute time wouldn't drop any further so I guess there is a balancing point where moving sims from cars to buses is no longer beneficial (except to the cities coffers I guess).

2 - How is the capacity value calculated for RTMT tiles? I placed a bus stop on my main avenue where nobody would want to get off and the regular avenue tiles had around 10k vehicles and 5-8k pedestrians on them but the bus stop query window said it's actual usage was 32k - Do I need to increase the capacity because it's 4 tiles in size so it matches 4 tiles worth of Avenue (24k)?. The tiles outside of the bus stop had the same number of cars and only a few hundred peds and different numbers of buses (more buses would leave the stop than entered which was odd considering the cars stayed exactly the same). Are the pedestrians that are inside the bus stop counting towards it's capacity or is it counting every vehicles on every tile ( so double the number of buses and cars compared to a 2 tile bus stop?).

I've been searching all over the forums to try and find answers to these questions but so far I've come up with nothing.

I also get the feeling that when it comes to road top bus stops there isn't much point in putting the capacities of them higher than the networks they are based on. Do they need to account for the pedestrians?

[jdenm8]

TE'd LOTs count all forms of traffic passing through the lot (pedestrians are just another kind of very slow car to the game), both in the morning and the afternoon.

So, 32k from 10k cars and 5k pedestrians isn't out of the question.

[z]

1. The base speed of buses in the NAM is actually slightly lower than the base speed of cars - just like in RL.  However, the 24-second penalty that all car trips have added to them often makes buses faster for short routes.  Additionally, some Sims prefer mass transit to cars, and this gives buses a further advantage in their selection.

I did some tests in a purposefully gridlocked city and adding bus stops in the right places dropped the commute time from 80 to 20 but the number of vehicles on the roads stayed the same. I can only assume this is because buses are much faster than cars.

You can't trust the commute time graph; it's inherently broken, and it's best to ignore it.

2. You should also keep in mind that the capacities that the game posts for all transit stations are false.  All transit stations perform at 100% service quality until their usage exceeds at least 400% of their nominal capacity; the exact figure varies by station.  If this happens, though, the stations shut down for the rest of the day.

Each vehicle (and pedestrian) is counted only once per commute period; the number of tiles in the station is irrelevant.

I also get the feeling that when it comes to road top bus stops there isn't much point in putting the capacities of them higher than the networks they are based on. Do they need to account for the pedestrians?

You have to take into account that networks can go over capacity - sometimes way over capacity.  Since the lowest speed caused by congestion is 30% of the nominal speed, all networks can theoretically carry an infinite number of Sims.  Station capacities in RTMT (for example) are generally set so that at their typical highest usage level they don't break, as described above.

You might want to read the tutorial Transit Switch Entry Costs and Station Capacities, if you haven't already.