Schedule Scare

It looks like the scheduling department at Caltrain is very quick to publish a proposed reduced 48-train timetable when funding cuts loom... and yet for years has utterly failed to publish or market an improved timetable to promote the electrification project. They do a great job selling the downside of service cuts, but when it's time to sell the upside of electrification, nobody's home. Hello?

UPDATE 2/15:

Caltrain's reduced "Armageddon" timetable has been put through the metricator, using the same methodology as before.

First, the Caltrain 2010 timetable: the basis of comparison is today's 90-train-per-day, 5-train-per-hour timetable, to which we assign a score of 100 as before.

• Input timetable file (tab delimited text)
  
• Metrics that matter table (318 kB PDF)
• Effective trip time table (35 kB PDF)
• Origin & Destination service score table (539 kB PDF)
• Overall rush hour service quality score: 100
  

Now, the 48-train Armageddon timetable, which features 4 trains per hour serving fewer stops, during rush hours only:

• Input timetable file (tab delimited text)
• Metrics that matter table (343 kB PDF) -- also compared with Caltrain 2010 (324 kB PDF)
  
• Effective trip time table (34 kB PDF) -- also compared with Caltrain 2010 (36 kB PDF)
  
• Origin & Destination service score table (213 kB PDF)
  
• Overall rush hour service quality score: 86

Not surprisingly, the rush hour service quality score drops, but not quite as much as you might first expect. That's because service to the highest-ridership stops is mostly retained. A curious feature also emerges: rush hour service to certain stops such as California Ave and Sunnyvale is actually improved thanks to regular half-hourly service.

Do note, however, that these metrics measure only peak-hour service quality… obviously, the score for off-peak service would be zero.