> Busses are a lot more flexible in terms of routing - normal gasoline busses can be rerouted at will, and the cost of changing routes for electric busses (like

> Busses are a lot more flexible in terms of routing - normal gasoline busses can be rerouted at will, and the cost of changing routes for electric busses (like the ones in Seattle) are much lower than street cars, where you basically have to lay new track. YAGNI. In Boston, not only are many of the bus lines following the exact route of older trolley lines, but those trolley lines follow routes taken by horse-drawn street car lines, and the tracks laid down for those matches, block for block, the routes of older omnibus stagecoach services. You really don't need to reroute bus lines very often. But what about something blocking a track, you might ask? Well, streetcar cities deal with the prospect of an incident blocking a streetcar track by being very, very intolerant of things that might make that happen. And it works. But... since a bus can reroute easily, it can also be rerouted very easily by politicians for their own ends. Which means real estate investors ignore bus lines. They don't ignore streetcar tracks.