Journal of Transport Geography 24 (2012) 58–66

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Journal of Transport Geography

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Istanbul Metrobüs: first intercontinental bus rapid transit

Pelin Alpkokin ⇑, Murat Ergun
Faculty of Civil Engineering, Istanbul Technical University, Maslak 34469, Istanbul, Turkey

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Keywords: Whilst debate comparing the technologies of bus-based transit ways with rail systems continues, the
Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) comparative cost advantages and capability of responding to rapidly changing mobility needs offered
Istanbul Strait crossing by Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) systems are well acknowledged. Istanbul has recently developed its 42 km
Sustainable mobility BRT network with further extensions currently being constructed. The Istanbul BRT system (Metrobüs)
consists of three main sections. The first section (2007) was initially built on the European side of the city
through a high demand arterial and its extension as the section was completed in 2008. It received crit-
icism for having been preferred over rail alternatives. The third section (2009) runs over one of the two
Istanbul Strait (Bosporus Strait) Bridges connecting Asia and Europe, by which Metrobüs has uniquely
acquired the distinction of crossing a major water barrier and connecting two continents. Istanbul Strait
is a major transportation bottleneck and source of congestion and Metrobüs is the only transit system for
crossings. Shortly after the opening of the bridge section, the whole system has recorded a directional
capacity of 24,000 passengers/h and patronage of 620,000 daily ridership. The number of passengers
attracted from car users and intermediate forms of public transportation is also notable. This paper first
contributes to the BRT literature by introducing this special and recent BRT system with all its planning
and operational aspects. Furthermore, for policy guidance, Metrobüs is evaluated as to whether it has
made effective inputs for sustainable development and mobility aims in Istanbul.
Ó 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction in most cases for providing BRT systems as an alternative to rail

The experiences point to the importance of mass transit sys-
tems to compete with cars towards more sustainable mobility
scheme in cities (Cervero, 1998). Among the mass transit options,
Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) has increasingly gained interest and is of
recognized importance to urban policy-makers. Over the past
two decades, BRT systems have emerged in many cities on six con-
tinents especially those of North and South America, Asia, and
many others from Europe, Australia and Africa (Levinson et al.,
2002; Ernst, 2005; Hidalgo and Graftieaux, 2008; Kaenzig, 2010).
Advantages of BRT are low investment and operational costs
that provide fast solutions to growing mobility needs (Campbell,
2009; Hensher and Golob, 2008; Badami and Haider, 2007). Such
ability to operate without subsidies and sufficient flexibility to re-
spond to social needs has importantly increased its political accep-
tance. Lessons to date reinforce the importance of providing high
quality public transport services to meet the expectations of the
society for higher public transport patronage. This is one of the
motivations for improving the service quality of conventional
buses running in mixed traffic (Edwards and Mackett, 1996) and
⇑ Corresponding author. Tel.: +90 542 630 3773; fax: +90 212 285 3420.
E-mail addresses: alpkokinp@itu.edu.tr (P. Alpkokin), ergunmur@itu.edu.tr
(M. Ergun).
systems requiring higher budgets. However, the current discus-
sions of whether to develop bus rapid transit or light rail transit,
or to consider BRT mainly as a feeder route system yet seem para-
doxical amongst urban planners (Hensher, 1999).
Nevertheless, planning, implementing and operating a BRT sys-
tem is not easy and it requires political leadership and consistency,
social acceptance, and technical and managerial skills. There are
many different BRT design and technology schemes and different
financial and operational programs which need to be considered
in the complex web of urban planning and urban economics to
combine necessary urban policies such as land use and intermodal
integration (Hensher, 2007). There is obviously more potential for
BRT developments which will effectively shape the form public
transport in many cities. Therefore, it will be of considerable inter-
est to critically evaluate the different applications of BRT systems
and monitor their outcomes, each of which will importantly con-
tribute to the literature and dissemination of experience and
know-how.
Amongst the cities that have adopted BRT systems, Istanbul is
one of the recent and major cities (population of 13 million) to
introduce a BRT system. The Istanbul BRT (known as Metrobüs in
Turkey) is unique in its nature as it runs across the Istanbul Strait
which is one of the major water barriers that separates the city into
two main land masses in Asia and Europe. Therefore it is an inter-

0966-6923/$ - see front matter Ó 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jtrangeo.2012.05.009
 P. Alpkokin, M. Ergun / Journal of Transport Geography 24 (2012) 58–66
continental BRT system. In December 2005, the government initi-
ated construction of the first phase of Metrobüs. It was designed
to have one dedicated lane per direction and was completed in
September, 2007. Subsequently, Metrobüs was extended to pro-
vide the city with a 42 km length BRT corridor by March, 2009.
Notwithstanding the delayed decision to develop BRT in Istanbul,
where buses have long been the major means of transportation
through an extensive network, the system has been consistently
improved.
The main part of the Metrobüs network is on the European side
but now it extends to the Asian side through the First Bridge of the
Istanbul Strait. Istanbul Strait crossings are provided by public pas-
senger ferries and two highway bridges that constitute the two
busiest corridors (approximately 11% of the metropolitan total dai-
ly motorized trips) where traffic bottlenecks that have long been
the source of urban transportation problems in the city. Through
this network, the Istanbul Metrobüs system provides an improved
public bus service on one of the main arteries of trip demand lying
on the European side. Furthermore, it serves as a high capacity and
fast means of transportation across the Istanbul Strait crossings,
which makes it a special mode on a very critical bottleneck.
However, Metrobüs has been criticized for being the preferred
alternative to a higher capacity rail system which might have bet-
ter met the high and increasing demand (especially along the Euro-
pean side corridor). Whilst such issues are debated, the Istanbul
Metrobüs has received public and political acceptability. Today it
transports a huge number of passengers boosted by a notable mod-
al shift from car users.
In a critical and thorough assessment of the Istanbul Metrobüs,
this paper starts with the planning attempts and policy consider-
ations behind the selection of BRT for Istanbul. The aim is to pro-
vide an ex-post evaluation as to how efficiently this application
of BRT has been adopted, and how well it fits with the objectives
of developing public transportation systems in a broader scope of
sustainable mobility policy aims (Mackett and Edwards, 1998;
Wheeler and Beatley, 2004; Cervero, 2009) in the city. To under-
take this policy assessment a number of indicators are formulated
to qualitatively and quantitatively evaluate the short-term and
long-term impacts within an outlined framework of sustainable
mobility. The focus is on how effectively BRT contributes to system
performance, financial viability, political and social acceptability
and environmental sustainability.
2. Planning background for BRT in Istanbul
Istanbul is a major global city and the economic center of Tur-
key, producing 22% of the total national GDP (the average GDP
per capita is around 10,000 USD). The rapid population growth
since the 1950s – at an annual rate of 4% (although at a slightly
lower rate over the past 10 years) – and economic development
have led to rapid motorization in Istanbul. Personal vehicle owner-
ship increased from 43 per 1000 people in 1980 to 134 in 2007.
Cars have a 27% share of the whole motorized trips in Istanbul
whereas the public transport mode share dominates at around
50% with the company and school buses having an additional
23% of the total motorized patronage.1 However, Istanbul is yet at
its early stage of vehicle ownership and this is expected to grow
sharply over the next two decades.
The Asian and European sides are both highly urbanized
although the European side accommodates more population and
job opportunities. The city has a poly-centric structure and a linear
1 2
There is no cycling habit in Istanbul mainly because of the hilly terrain and the
lack of available cycling ways. Therefore, the only means of non-motorized trips are
walk trips (35% of the total trips).
59
pattern of development from west to east across the Istanbul Strait.
Undesirably, over the past decade, there is urban sprawl towards
the north and the green part of the city. The two Istanbul Strait
Bridges and their expressways constitute the two main and busiest
transportation corridors and have strongly influenced the direction
of urban development (Fig. 1).
Istanbul has only recently developed its modern bus transit way
by Metrobüs. In fact, Istanbul is one of the early examples of cities
that had already established bus priority lanes during the 1970s
(Vuchic, 2002). Motorization in the late 1970s generated high loads
on the roads which severely affected the performance of the bus
network. To mitigate such adverse affects, in 1979 the local author-
ity allocated a 6.5 km-long bus priority lane through the busiest
corridor, where one third of the metropolitan bus routes operated.
It was a success at that time as right after the bus priority lane was
introduced, the number of passengers carried by this bus lane in-
creased from 110,000 to 180,000. One year later patronage in-
creased to 240,000 passengers per day. Despite this promising
example, and the fact that bus has always been the major form
of public transportation in Istanbul (Alpkokin et al., 2008), BRT sys-
tems had not been included in the bus network development plans
until quite recently.
Over the years, by the lack of major bus or rail transit improve-
ments, the conventional buses together with intermediate forms of
public transportation (minibuses2 and shared taxis), have remained
dominant in the public transportation network. The share of buses
has increased from 29.9% in 1970 to 50.1% in 2007 (of public trans-
portation trips) where minibuses and shared taxis carried 41.2% of
all public transportation passengers. The remaining 10% public
transportation trips were either on railways or on inland water
transportation.3 By the early 2000s, when public transportation
qualitatively and quantitatively fell far behind the growing mobility
needs driven by the population growth and economic development,
the government initiated the planning and construction of a number
of public transit systems – one of which was Metrobüs.
2.1. Political considerations
Metrobüs has been developed and operated by the local govern-
ment, Istanbul Public Transportation Authority, under the Istanbul
Metropolitan Municipality. The idea of BRT for Istanbul came out of
an initial plan along a different route which is relatively a lower de-
mand corridor. Shortly after, it was altered to a more heavily-
patronized corridor, mainly for the urgent need for a high capacity
system then the conventional buses and intermediate forms of
public transportation.
While accepting Metrobüs as advantageous, some of the plan-
ners criticize it over the selection of the route through a very high
demand corridor on the European side (first and second phases).
These critics argued that the demand could have only been met
by a higher capacity rail transit system and was introduced on
political grounds to recover the planning shortfall that a timely
decision to provide a rail system instead was not taken.
The other debated political dimension to the issue was its
extension (third phase) over the First Bridge of the Istanbul Strait
which was long discussed because of the perceived negative im-
pacts the dedicated lanes would have on the car capacity of the
Bridge and its expressways. The Istanbul Strait Bridges are oper-
ated by the State Highway Department and they did not agree with
the local government’s plan for the allocation of bus lanes over
their bridges. Eventually, the dedicated lanes were designed to
only stop at the entrance and exit of the First Bridge, thereby taking
Minibuses with 14 seats but can carry 20 passengers.
3
The current railway network constitutes of a 16.5 km-long subway, a 19.5 km
long LRT, and a 20 km-long tramway.
60 P. Alpkokin, M. Ergun / Journal of Transport Geography 24 (2012) 58–66

Fig. 1. Metrobüs routes.

Before Metrobüs After Metrobüs

Fig. 2. Metrobüs corridor views.

the buses into the mixed traffic partly on a bridge that is approxi-
mately 2 km long. Obviously, this implementation reduces the
capacity of Metrobüs, but the capacity reduction has been slight,
impacting more on total travel time than frequencies, because
the real problematic congestion is throughout the expressways
that collect the traffic and the flow gets more regulated and stable
on the Bridge.
2.2. Planning and construction
The success of any infrastructure planning and its implementa-
tion ultimately rests on political and financial strength of the
authorities and the integrity of the government agencies. In the
case of Istanbul, from planning to construction and operation, the
Istanbul BRT has fully been under the control of strong local
authorities (the Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality and the Istan-
bul Public Transportation Authority).
Istanbul BRT is a corridor implementation more like the Nagoya
BRT in Japan in that it does not constitute the main means of public
transportation throughout a wide network, as it is the case in some
cities (e.g. Curitiba). Along this selected corridor, the planning and
accordingly construction of Metrobüs contained three main items:
BRT infrastructure; re-organization of public transportation and
intermediate forms public transportation lines; and highway
improvement. The Metrobüs construction prompted the local gov-
ernment to undertake highway improvements that led to a higher
utilization of highway capacity along the corridor. The removal of
conventional bus and intermediate forms of public transportation
lines further avoided vehicular chaos around the bus stops and
arbitrary stops of such minibuses at restricted areas (Fig. 2).
The original highway had three lanes. Metrobüs was designed
as a dedicated median lane BRT. In the planning process, the local
authorities sought ways to design median lanes without losing any
mixed traffic lanes on the main road. Consequently, three lanes per
direction were maintained through taking advantage of the central
 P. Alpkokin, M. Ergun / Journal of Transport Geography 24 (2012) 58–66
Fig. 3. Metrobüs corridor, current cross-section.
reservation, service roads and the emergency lanes despite some
concerns about safety issues (Fig. 3).
The Istanbul BRT is an example of low construction cost system
as the average construction cost for the whole system approxi-
mates 5.5 million USD per km (Wright, 2003). The construction
contains lanes, junctions, either re-designed or newly built pedes-
trian overpasses and stations as well as electro-mechanic works.
Some pedestrian facilities remain problematic as they were un-
der-designed to meet the high demand which gives rise to very
high in-vehicle and on-station congestion. This out-of-vehicle situ-
ation has been a major concern amongst Metrobüs users, and
accordingly, some re-arrangements at stations and improvements
at overpasses are currently being undertaken. The stations were
mainly designed to accommodate three buses and there is no exist-
ing or planned implementation of a double lane for overtaking at
stations. This is possible by an allocation of a lane that can only
be taken from the main road traffic.
Whilst there was no initial overall plan for a BRT network, the
local governments planned a further three stages of extension
where the last stage is under construction. By the opening of fourth
phase (2012), the total length of Istanbul BRT would reach 50 km in
6 years time.
3. Overview of Metrobüs
Before proceeding to explore how to position Istanbul and its
BRT system within a framework of sustainable mobility, opera-
tional issues and ridership patterns are summarized below. The
sources of data are the Istanbul Public Transportation Authority
and the user surveys with 1000 Metrobüs passengers traveling in
peak hours and GPS observations that were conducted by the
Istanbul Technical University in 2009 and 2012.
Metrobüs is operated through an important urban transporta-
tion arterial (the D-100 expressway) which lies from east to west
connecting the Asian and European sides of the city, as well as
the Istanbul International Airport and the city center. The whole
corridor within the Istanbul Metropolitan area is highly urbanized.
The average number of vehicles through this 3-lane expressway is
around 5000 vehicle/h in one direction.
After Metrobüs, 1536 vehicles of intermediate forms of public
transportation, partly or fully using the Metrobüs corridor, were
removed. Most of them were shifted to the re-organized lines that
serve as feeder routes. Hence, daily travelled distances of these
vehicles have reduced by 116,261 vehicle-km (Fig. 2). Similarly,
after Metrobüs, 250 conventional buses, partly or fully using the
Metrobüs corridor, were removed to operate either in other parts
of the city or on feeder routes. The total daily vehicle-km saving
from the buses was 95,554 vehicle-km. In other words, the re-
organization of unnecessarily long and parallel lines along the
61
European side section of the corridor has reduced the buses vehi-
cle-km for 1000 passengers from 517 km to 190 km.
Whilst there is no extra lane for overtaking, Metrobüs has re-
corded very high directional capacity. In peak hours, the frequen-
cies are as high as one bus per 45 s for the Istanbul Strait
crossing and 30 s for the European side section only. High frequen-
cies together with the use of high capacity buses (three design
types of buses for which the capacity ranges from 140 to 200 pas-
sengers) generate a maximum directional capacity of 24,000 pas-
sengers per hour and recently even higher frequency and
directional capacity has been observed. The long corridor of the
Metrobüs along an expressway where there is no signaling stops
or intersections which would evidently reduce the capacity of
the system (except for the merging into the mixed traffic on the
Bridge section) is one of the important reasons for such a high
capacity.
The recent GPS observations have revealed that Metrobüses of-
ten reach 50 km/h between the stops and even a maximum speed
of 78 km/h through the dedicated lanes of its first two phases. On
this section, the average operating speed, including the dwell times
at the bus stations, is 41 km/h (where the average dwell time at
bus stations is 22 s). From the start to the end point of Metrobüs
(42 km) the total travel time is around 1 h which includes transfers
for the Istanbul Strait crossings, unless waited for the next buses
because of the high demand and queuing up at the bus stations.
Concerning the mixed traffic on the Bridge, the maximum ob-
served speed in an off peak hour is 58 km/h which reduces to
31 km/h during the peak hours. The average operating speed
throughout the whole Metrobüs corridor is 40 km/h (including
bus stations) which is twice as great as the peak hour mixed traffic
average speed which may even be as low as 10 km/h at highly con-
gested sections of the road network. Therefore, it is one of the fast-
est operating BRT systems.
Initially, unless the journey crossed the Istanbul Strait Bridge,
there was a flat fare system allowing the use of 28.9 km of transit
way for a fare of approximately 1 USD. For the Bridge crossings
there is a compulsory transfer just before the entrance of the
Bridge on the European side. This doubles the fare. However,
3 years after the opening of Metrobüs, the fare system has been al-
tered to a simple distance based system, where less than three
stops still cost the same. More than three stops have increased
by 20% amounting to approximately 1.2 USD but have not caused
any reduction in ridership.
The ridership data in Fig. 4 demonstrates the utilization of high
capacity and the achievement of high patronage short after the
opening of the bridge section. For example, in November 2011,
where the maximum observed ridership reached 620,000 passen-
gers/day, the maximum peak hour ridership exceeded 62,000 pas-
sengers/h/two-way, between 8:00 and 9:00 in the morning.
Analysis shows that the shift to Metrobüs overwhelmingly comes
62
1000 x ridership / hr / two-way
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
2396 819 316 303
200
0 1 2 3 4 5
from buses (70%) and is followed by intermediate forms of public
transportation (9%) and private cars (9%) and commuters and stu-
dents dominate peak hour trips (90%).
4. Policy assessment: has Istanbul Metrobüs achieved policy
aims?
Urban planning, in its long history, is an area in which frame-
works have been developed for policy design, evaluation, applica-
tion and monitoring. Within this general context, the authors
find it appropriate to create a framework that better demonstrates
how effectively Metrobüs has contributed to sustainable mobility
aims in Istanbul. The proposed framework connects up four core
elements (or indicators) of sustainable development: transporta-
tion performance; environmental sustainability; financial sustain-
ability; and social and political dimensions.
4.1. Transportation performance
4.1.1. Service level
In 2007, before the opening of Metrobüs, the conventional bus
network and intermediate forms of public transportation carried
4.7 million daily passengers – that is approximately 45% of the
motorized trips – on 1149 routes in total (4900 buses and 5800
minibuses). At its present length of 42 km, Metrobüs delivers ser-
vice approximately to 13% of the total bus and minibus riders.
The very high frequency, achieved by managing the simultaneous
running and stopping of two or three buses in line further en-
hances the service level.
However, high demand exceeding the capacity of the system
aggravates in-vehicle congestion and queuing up at the BRT sta-
tions that obviously reduce the level of service and any system per-
formance evaluation. Questionnaires investigating the users‘
perception have revealed that 90% of the passengers have chosen
the fast means to demonstrate their satisfaction. However, 85% of
the respondents have complained about the very crowded stations
and buses which is not unexpected as the survey results indicate
that in peak hours, the passengers can get onto the third bus on
average.
Istanbul is one of the examples further adding to the studies on
LRT and BRT comparisons (i.e. Stusman, 2002) to prove that BRT
systems may well compete with the LRT systems. On a local com-
parison, the current LRT system in Istanbul (on the European side
and partly uses the same corridor of Metrobüs) falls far behind
the Metrobüs system patronage as LRT in Istanbul has a daily rid-
ership of around 200,000 passengers and a directional capacity of
P. Alpkokin, M. Ergun / Journal of Transport Geography 24 (2012) 58–66
62423 61522
58183
49861 49475
40472
35373
30107
27334 29489
25585 27490
33666
16387 17514
26315
13978
1585
8436
6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23
Hours
Fig. 4. Ridership in a weekday.
10,000 passengers per hour which leads to discussions that the
LRT system in Istanbul operates more like a BRT and vice versa.
4.1.2. Station ridership and access/egress
There is an obvious relationship between the land-use patterns
around stations and the number of station boardings (Nicolas and
Rodriguez, 2008), and, similarly, the Metrobüs corridor which is
highly urbanised generates a high level of ridership. However,
the real peak station boardings are observed at the first and the last
stations (of a total 33 stations) and the two last stops on the Euro-
pean side before the entrance of the Bridge. The busiest station is
the last station before the Bridge and it has a daily ridership of
62,000 passengers which is twice as much as the average of busy
stations along the highest density part of the corridor.
The ease of station access/egress is an important factor that
determines the level of service for any transit system. For Metro-
büs, walking dominates the way of access to the stations (40%)
where the average walking time is 10 min. Due to the re-organized
feeder bus and minibus, where 45% of the riders transfer either
from bus or minibus, and high share of walking, 65% of the Metro-
büs riders reach the stations in less than 20 min. However, some
pedestrian overpasses and stairs, which have not been designed
to meet the high demand, further add to the peak-hour problems.
Currently, Metrobüs riders can transfer from/to six LRT and me-
tro stations, and four street tram stations on the European side. On
the Asian side they can only transfer from/to one commuter rail
station. The percentage of passengers transferring from/to the rail-
way network is low (9%), but is likely to increase with the integra-
tion with the planned railway system. Any parallel railway
development would obviously help to reduce the current crucial
load on the system. Nonetheless, the role of Metrobüs to provide
mass rapid transit through the Istanbul Strait bottleneck should re-
main an important indicator of public transportation planning in
the city.
4.1.3. Modal shifts
The Istanbul BRT system has achieved a 9% shift from the car
users within 3 years (compared with a 14% shift from car on the Ja-
karta BRT network) and the car ownership ratio among the Metro-
büs users is 10%. In the earlier survey conducted in 2009, almost
half of the users have stated that under the same conditions, of tra-
vel time and fares, they would have again preferred Metrobüs over
an underground system.
If the whole corridor, in particular the Bridge and its express-
way entrances/exits, is better equipped with park-and-ride facili-
ties, an additional shift from the car users is possible. In
 P. Alpkokin, M. Ergun / Journal of Transport Geography 24 (2012) 58–66
Fig. 5. Population densities along the Metrobüs corridor.
understanding the users’ potential changes with their choices in
the case of a park-and-ride system, another user preference survey
was conducted in 2012. In this survey, 12% of the captive car users
crossing the two Bridge (on an every-day, regular basis) responded
by choosing the answer that when the congestion gets even worse
by 2015, they may prefer Metrobüs if park-and-ride systems are
provided. Whilst indicating that park-and-ride systems are
acknowledged by the car users, a considerable number of respon-
dents have expressed their concerns that if their final destination
is not within a walking distance from a Metrobüs station, they
might still not prefer Metrobüs as they would not like to transfer
to another public transport system.
In consideration of any changes in transfer penalties in terms of
fare costs as a result of re-organized feeder routes and longer trunk
service, for short trips there is approximately 20% reduction in total
travel (fare) costs, and for longer trips there is almost 50% reduc-
tion, including the incentives provided for transfers within the
newly provided fare system.4 For example, before Metrobüs from
its start point on the European side to its end point on the Asian side,
the total fare was 3 USD which was reduced to 1.2 USD with Metro-
büs crossing the Bridge. This further adds to the discussions of any
benefits that are likely to arise from re-organizing the feeder routes
to facilitate longer and higher capacity systems.
4.1.4. Accidents
Accident reduction has been a positive impact of Metrobüs. The
statistics of the Istanbul Public Transportation Authority show that
an accident occurs every day on the conventional bus network.
With Metrobüs, this has been substantially reduced and only five
accidents (without injury) were recorded in 2010 (two were
caused by the vehicles in the mixed traffic lane). However, there
still exits safety problems arising from the design limitation of
maintaining the number of lanes along the corridor which was also
the cause of these two accidents.
4.1.5. Istanbul Strait crossings (bottleneck)
The Istanbul Strait crossings, serve as one of the best examples
of additional bridge induced demand which is likely to arise for any
4
Source: Istanbul Public Transport Authority.
63
crossing that creates a transportation bottleneck. The two highway
Bridges mainly serve private vehicles. The share of car trips for the
Istanbul Strait trips is 50% which is twice as much as the metropol-
itan area average car patronage. Between 1974 and 2009, the pop-
ulation in Istanbul increased by 3.5 times and a similar increase of
3.6 was observed for motorized trips. However, the increase in the
number of private vehicles crossing the Bridges was by a factor of
12.1.
The public passenger ferries and conventional buses (plus a few
intermediate forms of public transportation lines as well) were the
only ways of crossing the Istanbul Strait by public transportation
until the extension of Metrobüs over the First Bridge. Metrobüs
is the only means of rapid transit system since the construction
of the Bridge in 1973, despite the crucial traffic problems gener-
ated since then. In one of the recent traffic counts in the evening
peak hour, ninety Metrobüs vehicles/direction-h were observed.
On a simple computation, this means, approximately 15,000 Met-
robüs passengers. If they are transported by automobiles, this
would require additional four lanes which is an additional bridge
over the Istanbul Strait.
4.1.6. Regional accessibility impacts
Each mass transit system potentially affects the land develop-
ment patterns as a result of improved regional accessibility and
therefore such longer term impacts should necessarily be consid-
ered (Giuliano, 2004; Cervero and Kang, 2011). There are several
studies which examine the effects of BRT on urban or regional
accessibility (Rodriguez and Targa, 2004; Daganzo, 2010). In terms
of the relationship with increased land values and increased acces-
sibility along the BRT corridor, Istanbul Metrobüs is different, be-
cause the first three phases were along a densely urbanized
corridor where it is difficult to expect much more land intensifica-
tion even in the long term. Nevertheless, the fourth phase which is
extended towards the newly developed residential areas is likely to
have considerable impacts on land development and accordingly
land prices. Yet, there is no such longer term planning attempts
by the local authorities to combine such land use issues in spatial
plans to promote transit oriented development (Curtis et al., 2009).
The average trip time on the Metrobüs network is 40 min com-
pared with 90 min before Metrobüs (from the user surveys with
64 P. Alpkokin, M. Ergun / Journal of Transport Geography 24 (2012) 58–66
1000 Metrobüs passengers). Such a 50 min travel time saving at
average is not an unexpected result as the observed peak-hour
mixed traffic speed for the conventional buses is less than
20 km/h. Fig. 5 shows the population density (in 2008) over 937
analysis zones and the location of the Metrobüs stations. The BRT
corridor serves more than 1.1 million population – that is 10% of
metropolitan area population within a corridor of 300 m from
the Metrobüs line that is less than 10 min walking access on aver-
age, despite the lower population density nearby the Bridge and its
expressway section on the Asian side. In the recent survey (with
500 users), the results indicate the population residing along the
300 m corridor generate 260,000 daily ridership.
Obviously, the system has accessibility impacts further than the
population along the corridor mainly on the European side, as it
provides the only fast means of transport across this major water
barrier and severe transportation bottleneck between both sides
of the city where 36% of the population resides on the Asian side
and the remainder on the European side. The results of a survey
conducted by the Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation
(2008) on the social needs of Istanbul residents show the crucial
traffic problem in Istanbul as 22% of residents spends 2–3 h and
23% spend more than 3 h on transport in a day and the share of
those crossing the Istanbul Strait on such long trips is very high.
4.2. Environmental sustainability
CO2 emission changes and energy savings from the introduction
of BRT systems, is an important environmental issue (Schipper
et al., 2009). In this globally important context, a preliminary anal-
ysis has been conducted by the Istanbul Public Transport Authority
to estimate the CO2 emission and fuel consumption reduction
achieved by the Metrobüs system as listed below.
 Reduced vehicle-km by the removal and re-organization of the
conventional buses amounts to 125 ton CO2/day.
 Reduced vehicle-km by the removal and re-organization of the
intermediate forms of public transportation amounts to 42 ton
CO2/day.
 The average daily fuel consumption saving amounts to 242 ton -
liter/day.
As yet Turkey has no overall target for CO2 reductions. Substan-
tial increases in environmental load from the increasing vehicle-
km of travel are expected unless urgent targets are set and actions
are taken accordingly.5 On the basis of above preliminary results,
the Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality reports that Metrobüs has
contributed well to environmental discussions in the country.
4.3. Financial sustainability
Previous studies have provided various results for the invest-
ment and operating costs of BRT systems and discussed about their
funding mechanisms (e.g. Levinson et al., 2003; Lindau et al., 2008).
The financing of Istanbul Metrobüs is quite simple. It is publicly
owned and operated by the local government and there is no plan
or intention for any private-sector involvement either in construc-
tion or operation because politicians favor the traditional role of
the Public Transportation Authority in urban bus operation. Out
of the current 315 buses allocated for only the Metrobüs system,
250 buses were newly purchased by the local government which
constituted almost 40% of the initial investment costs. Conse-
quently, the local government has fully financed the system with-
out any need for international funding. This distinguishes it from
5
168 % increase by 2023.
some of the railway investments in the city which have required
national and/or international funding and central government ap-
proval resulting in undesirable delays.
The fare revenue of Metrobüs per kilometer is higher than its
operating costs which differ from the conventional bus network
requiring considerable subsidy from the local government. Vehicle
operating costs for the conventional buses (3.13 USD/vehicle-km)
are slightly lower than the Metrobüs system buses (3.56 USD/vehi-
cle-km). The fare revenue from Metrobüs per kilometer is 4.75 USD
– twice as much as the conventional buses (2.44 USD/km). Initially,
the flat fare system limited the fare revenue. However the in-
creased fares for trips longer than three stations, and the extension
over the Bridge have increased the monthly revenue of the BRT
system. The unit fuel cost for the Metrobüs vehicles is higher than
the conventional buses. However, when taking account of the
number of transported passengers, Metrobüs is more advanta-
geous. The daily fuel consumption by conventional buses and
intermediate forms of public transport along the Metrobüs corridor
was 310 liters per 1000 passengers which decreased to 160 liters
per 1000 passengers after Metrobüs. For the operation of a conven-
tional network, the Public Transportation Authority receives sub-
sidy amounting to 25% of its total revenue whereas Metrobüs
had already started to recover its capital cost.
As a further note, due to the already high urbanization and
physical barriers along the expressway of Metrobüs, it does not al-
low benefits from any value capture system – that is the opportu-
nities of financial gains from the land-use developments around
major stations. Nevertheless, the corridor of the fourth phase under
construction is more suited to generating land-use benefits as it is
throughout a corridor yet to densely develop and is very likely to
have impacts on land prices and land developments (i.e. Cervero,
2004; Jun, 2012). There are no such land adjustment plans or
win–win scenario schemes whereby any value created as a conse-
quence of a new transit system and increased land values could be
shared by the operator to financially reinforce the operation of
Metrobüs. This requires a full understanding of such value capture
policies by the local government and also relevant regulatory
adjustments which currently do not exist.
4.4. Social and political dimensions
4.4.1. Social acceptability
Public or social acceptability is closely linked to political accept-
ability and crucially important for the success of urban transporta-
tion planning and implementation (Banister, 2008). In the lack of
any competitive transit service, Metrobüs was well received in
Istanbul without any need for a pilot line application or fare adjust-
ments. The calls from citizens for the extension of the system were
the driving force for fast and incremental improvement. In addition
to the station and vehicle congestion issues, which are a level of
service problem, the only negative reaction was prompted by the
introduction of a distance-based fare system. In the authors’ opin-
ion, this moderate reaction which has not caused any decline in
passenger demand was not specific to the Metrobüs application,
as flat fare has traditionally been the local authority’s fare collec-
tion policy for the conventional buses. Any distance-based fare sys-
tem would require some time for social acceptance in Istanbul.
4.4.2. Social equity
Although social sustainability concepts of social equity and
mobility divide are difficult to substantiate for analytical discus-
sions, they have gained substantial interest in the urban planning
process especially for developing countries (Preston and Rajé,
2007; WBCSD, 2007). In its general definition, mobility divide re-
fers to gaps in the level of mobility between rich and poor due to
the restricted affordability of cars. The term represents close link-
 P. Alpkokin, M. Ergun / Journal of Transport Geography 24 (2012) 58–66
age to social equity aims that is in urban planning to attain mini-
mum standard of urban facilities and services for each individual.
The results of the users’ socio-economic profiles obtained from
the surveys undertaken for this paper indicate that more than 50%
of the Metrobüs users live on a household income less than
1250 USD (low income group). Similarly, more than 50% of the
users belong to households not owning personal vehicles. With
Metrobüs, the qualitative and quantitative deficiencies of the pub-
lic transportation network and the bus fleet (apart from the high
demand and in-vehicle and station congestion) have been rectified
to diminish the mobility gap and improve social stratification in
particular for the Istanbul Strait crossings which have long been
served for private vehicles.
4.4.3. Political consistency
Geographical separation of the city through the Istanbul Strait
has always been the main issue within the urban transportation
planning schemes. By the beginning of the 2000s, the Istanbul Strait
railway tunnel obtained government’s priority and budget to pro-
vide a transit system for crossings. It is a railway system, a 14 km
long underground tunnel at the Strait section and a total length of
70 km, known as Marmaray Project with a directional capacity of
75,000 passengers/h. The Istanbul Strait railway tunnel, funded by
international development banks, was itinially planned to operate
by 2009, but it is still under construction and will be for a consider-
able period of time because of the substantial delays mainly caused
by the archealogical excavations. Therefore, the political decision of
Metrobüs crossing the Bridge was a timely attempt that was well
acknowledged by most planners and the society.
Despite the European side (more population and job opportuni-
ties) having developed its railway network much earlier than the
Asian side, the urgent need for a mass transit system along the
highest demand arterial of the European side prompted the gov-
ernment to provide an intermediate solution until the planned rail
transit projects along or close to Metrobüs lines were imple-
mented. The local government has well accepted the merits of
BRT as a fast and relatively cheap investment that can be nationally
financed (compared with many urban railway systems funded by
international loans), and consistently developed Metrobüs in the
short term. The only political and institutional weakness in imple-
mentation was the disapproval of bus lane dedication on the
Bridge by State Highway Department.
The Istanbul Public Transportation Authority was rewarded by
International Association of Public Transport (UITP) in 2011 and
the local government plans to present Metrobüs on some other
international stages as Metrobüs has been considered by the gov-
ernment to be the most successful application for sustainable
development aims. Preliminary plans exist to improve the BRT net-
work but the long term political success relies upon the policy
strategies which will realize the needed railway improvements
and integrate with the Metrobüs system especially for the Istanbul
Strait transportation policies as in the case of Seoul’s BRT system.
5. Concluding remarks
This paper provides an overall assessment of a BRT system and
contributes to the BRT studies. Given the widely increasing interest
in BRT systems, the question of how well Metrobüs has achieved
sustainable mobility aims in Istanbul as one of the world’s cities,
is the core discussion in this case study. Metrobüs is a corridor
implementation but with wider network impacts as a consequence
of re-organized feeder routes. All the information of improved rid-
ership and capacity proves that Istanbul Metrobüs achieves one of
the highest patronage levels amongst the similar BRT systems
which provides evidence to support the effective operation of
BRT systems in comparison with LRT systems.
65
Specific to Istanbul, it is not only a corridor BRT but also special
implementation of BRT to a transportation bottleneck – a major
water barrier of the Istanbul Strait. Currently, Metrobüs is the only
means of mass transportation for the Istanbul Strait crossings
which has come 36 years after the First Highway Bridge was built,
and provides a fast and cost-effective transit solution to the long-
standing problem of Istanbul Strait crossings.
The Istanbul BRT, Metrobüs has been developed in line with the
general consensus on the cost advantages, and an urgent need for
an improved public transport system along its corridor. It has fur-
ther speeded up the public transportation re-organization and
highway improvements along its high demand arterial which
might not have happened unless Metrobüs was implemented. De-
spite the design and high demand problems substantially reducing
the station and in-vehicle service level, Metrobüs obviously con-
tributes to sustainable aims in the city but still requires better
planning and integration in the longer term.
This case of BRT in Istanbul also provides further research
opportunities. The authors are currently undertaking studies for a
more detailed environmental evaluation that takes into account
the congestion impacts such as change in driving cycles (between
mixed traffic and Metrobüs lanes), and potential longer term im-
pacts on modal shifts (particularly for the Istanbul Strait crossings
combined with park-and-ride systems) and land value changes
along its corridor.
Acknowledgements
The authors first would like to express their gratitude to the
Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality and Istanbul Public Transpor-
tation Authority for providing all the available data and discussion
opportunities. Comments by anonymous referees helped improve
this paper. They further thank Prof. John Black (University of
New South Wales) and Dr. Lee Schipper (EMBARQ) for their very
valuable comments on an earlier draft of this paper. The authors
also would like to express their deep sorrow at the death of Dr.
Lee Schipper who contributed to this work with his special interest
in Istanbul Metrobüs.
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