Public Transport In Israel: Networks, Modes, Efficiency (2023)
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- With almost four million cars on its roads and one of the worst rates of traffic congestion in the OECD, Israel is working quickly to upgrade its public transport infrastructure to find a sustainable solution against gridlock. This video looks at the different modes and methods of public transport in Israel and recent developments.
== Timestamps ==
Intro - 00:00
Traffic in Israel - 00:50
Population projections - 01:00
Kiryat Shmoneh train idea - 01:30
Bus transport in Israel - 03:30
Egged - 03:35
Egged Europe - 04:07
Buses in Jerusalem - 04:20
Jerusalem's two bus networks - 04:40
Rav Kav transport card - 04:50
Transport on Shabbat - 05:00
Sheruts - shared taxis - 05:28
Bus operators in Israel - 05:50
Trains in Israel - 06:30
Jerusalem Tel Aviv high speed train - 06:30
Jerusalem Light Rail - 08:00
Tel Aviv Metro - 08:40
Haifa Carmelit - 09:20
Domestic aviation in Israel - 09:45
Criticisms of public transport in Israel - 11:00
#publictransport #publictransportation #trains
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By: Daniel Rosehill
== Contact Information ===
For latest contact information:
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== Licensing / syndication / reproduction ==
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For the full license, see: bit.ly/ncnd4bycc.
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I have lived in Israel for almost 18 months after living in a big city in Germany for two years and before that in Canada. I find the Israeli system as you described. To be honest, many immigrants take into account proximity to a train station when determining where to live, I know I did and that is one reason why I settled in Nahariyah. Two things you did not mention: 1) When one gets to retirement age, public transportation rates are reduced so that for men at age 67 it is 50% off and at 75 one rides for free. Women get the same discounts at a little earlier. 2) You did not mention the cable car system in Haifa that is also part of the public transportation system and a very cool ride for the price of a bus ticket. Thank you.
Thanks for sharing, Chuck. Pity indeed that I neglected to include those important details. But find this topic very engaging (and important) so will continue covering it
Nicely done video. I live way up north, with the closest train station being Achihud. Only way to get there from where I live is by car and there isn't anywhere to park if you get there later than 7am, making the whole huge investment in the train a waste of money. If they would make getting to and from the train station possible via public transport, the usage of the train in my area would grow 50x.
I have used several forms of public transit in Israel during my travels. As a non Hebrew speaker (I am currently learning), I had trouble knowing where and when the lines were going. Where I live in the US, there are only 3 bus lines in the city of about 90,000. I am quite pleased with Israel's public transit.
Thanks for sharing your experience. Hope you had a great trip here!
Mostly when a cluless bon hebrew speaker asks for help someone will help them out and make sure they know their way to get where they are going.
Asking for help is encouraged
My criticisms of the Israeli PT.
Lack of orbital routes - I work in Raanana, living right now in Petach Tikva and I need to take 3-5 buses to get to work, some of which fill up and skip my stop, others that have long waiting times in between rides. It takes over an hour at least only on a good day while driving would take about half an hour. Raanana and Petach Tikva are both major destinations that are quite close to each other, so this is a major short coming. And the main risk involved is the bizarre lack of frequent connectivity from Raanana's main transport interchange to the rest of Raanana. Other annoyances that aren't risks are the amount of incontiguous destinations that require so many transfers. And that is within Gush Dan. I don't even need to start talking about peripheral places, even some bigger ones. Getting from Modiin or Bet Shemesh to anywhere that isn't Tel Aviv, Bnei Brak or Jerusalem is an absolute pain.
Train routes to nowhere - most train stations for historical reasons or for lazy planning, funding or NIMBY reasons don't go to where people actually need to go and end up in a giant car park in the middle of nowhere with a lousy bus line to take you to the city. Modiin, Binyamina, the Krayot, Nahariya and Akko are the only minor destinations where the train station is actually well placed.
Misleading train station names - in addition, when you're trying to get somewhere by train, you literally have to check if the name written is actually where the train station is, which is beyond stupid. The train stations insist on putting the largest city in the area in the name for purely political reasons even if it's nowhere close. Like Kiryat Malach-Yoav which is actually Kfar Menachem, or Yokneam-Kfar Yehoshua, which is barely even close to Kfar Yehoshua, the closest place, let alone Yokneam which is barely accessible. What bothers me, less so but still is the insistence to use the name of a city for political reasons. So the Bat Yam and Holon stations are actually both Bat Yam and Holon, but they just want a grab at it, so their name appears on the train map.
Horrible local bus lines - In some places like Modiin, where you have a train station and a coach terminal that are so well located, but people insist on using their cars to get there and complain about the lack of parking which fills up a huge space that should be used for development to house enough people to only fill up one train, instead of using the bus to get there because of how badly it's designed.
Not enough trains - using buses as the main means of transport means that in many places, you can't schedule enough buses to supplement the people using it. In some urban routes, they need to use coaches just so enough people can fit in. In addition, getting too many people on and off rather than a single digit number of passengers is something that slows down the bus and in those places, they should really build railways, but they won't. This is a huge problem in places like Bet Shemesh that very much need an actual good route to Jerusalem but have to settle for about 5 frequent buses to Jerusalem from different parts of Bet Shemesh, and the company can't keep up.
Bad railway design where the train exists - building a light rail instead of a train with higher capacity for the red line in Gush Dan was a stupid decision. The Jerusalem light rail also has this problem. The route used there is also a zig zag route that makes it a pain to get to the Pisga from the city.
Lack of prioritisation and bad planning where it exists - as a result, with all the existing shortcomings of the bus, you also have to wait more time in traffic with cars.
Incompetent drivers or companies - self explanatory. Although, in SOME cases, this isn't their fault, since they're overworked and the infrastructure sucks.
In some places, the PT barely exists anyway even if the conditions for it are good.
An excellent list!
Im from brazil but i stayed in modiin for a few weeks in july of 2023, and i took the train many times going to Tel Aviv. The train was actually really great, clean and modern, but the frequency was a bit of an issue for me, in some other countries the trains are so frequent that u dont need to look at the schedule. And another point was to get a bus from Tel Aviv Hashlom to the beach or the carmel market, was really hard for me because of the huge number of bus stops arond the area ( Menchem Begun etc).
Public transport is very good sustainable.
Fully agree it's the best and most sustainable way forward!
Great video!
I love public transport and i think ours has so much good going for it.
The new app is also a life changer.
I lived in many different places in the country including in the far south and once i got the rhythm of an area's public transport i could reliable (moet of the time) get around by train or bus.
Last week i used Haifa's Rakevel for the first time! It was so so cool!!
You tube just suggested this video, as a public transport fan (mostly trains and I liked it.
I just wanted to add and clarify a few things.
-First, a bit of politics. The "new" plan introduced by Netanyahu and transport minister Miri Regev is more of a publicity stunt. Not that it's not good or planned but it's not new.
Most of it is is for things that are either under construction or part of the next construction plan, like the line to Kiryat Shmon, which is an extenshion of the line to Carmiel, or the one To Tiberius, wich will branch from the "Valley" line in Afula. Those, and others, are part of the 2040 rail plan, and were approved by the government a few years ago. The line to Eilat was approved, by a past Netanyahu government, in 2011 but nothing happened due to the cost. The current estimate is about 40B NIS (anout 11B USD) which is not viable, certainly not to connect a city of 50,000 people and a few sparsely populated settlements.
-No one calls the rail line to Jerusalem "high speed". Most people call it, unofficially, the fast line because it takes about 30 minutes (from the last stop In Tel Aviv - Hahagana) while the old line, that followed the old Ottoman line from 1892 rout, took about 1h20.
-The planned extension of the line into the city is in early stages and currently it's to the area of the old city and from there to the old Jerusalem station, which is the original one and served the line until it's closure in 1998, when the line to Jerusalem was closed due to low usage. The Malha is relatively new and was built when they renew the line in 2005. The renewal was controversial as it was made together with the construction of the new line, which was considered by many as a waste of money. The line had low usage and it was closed when the pandemic started and never reopened again.
-The most southern station is the on in Dimona, a line that branches from the Beer Sheva North/Univercity station. It is a single slow line for freight and has very low usage and only a handful of train each day and the station is located out of the city near a loco rail yard. There is an approved plan to replace it with a faster, more direct, double track with a more central station.
-There are no buses in Shabat due to the famous "status quo" promised by Ben Gurion to the religions people before the establishment of Israel. With public transport it reflected the state of it before the declaration of independence, and in most of the country there was no bus service in Shabat (by the Jewish operators), with a few exceptions, like Haifa, which is why they have public transport on Shabat (and not because there are Arabs in Haifa).
There also Buses on Shabat in Eilat (including to the airport).
That said, In Tel Aviv the city offers a free bus service on weekends and holidays, and a few other municipalities joined this initiativeת ךןלק Modi'in/ Shoham, Ramat Hasharon, Givatayim, Hod Hasharon and more added. They operate on Fridays late afternoon/night and Saturdays morning until late afternoon.
-For lIght Rail.
As metioned, the LRT in Jerusalem opened in 2011 with the red line/ It is 13.8km but there are trial runs on the extension on both sides, that should start service in the near future. This will exdend the line to 22km When the extension opens it will start at Neve Ya'akov North abd end at Hadassah Ein Kerem Hospital. As mentioned the Green line is under construction and also the Blue line. The 3 lines will serve as the backbone of the total system that will include 10 lines.
The Tel Aviv LRT red line will open this Friday (August 18th) at 05:40am. This is a 24km line, 22km is the main line with a 10km underground section and a small 2km branch with 2 stations. This line is divided into 3 service lines. R1 from Petah Tikva to Bat Yam, R2 (won't work at the start but will join later) from Bat Yam to the Petah Tikva Branch (Kiryat Aryeh, where the line's depot is)and the R3 that only circulate in the underground station between the Branch in Kiryat Aryeh and the Elifelet station.
2 more lines, the purple and the green lines, are currently under construction (when they'll open the red line on Friday the rest of Allenby street will be closed to car traffic for the construction of the purple line, once finished it will remain closed for cars as a pedestrian/bikes/LRT zone.
The future also includes another 3 metro (subway) lines with construction planned to start in 2025/26.
-The city of Haifa is a unique transport city. The Carmelit was mentioned in the video (although with old images, there are new, blue, train sets). but they also have a BRT system called Metronit with 5 lines (6th under construction).
They also have plenty of rail services, from most parts of Israel and connections to the area, including Nahariya and Acre (Akko), Carmiel and the Vali train (Beit Shean/Afula) with more connections on the way and even a real high speed train to Tel Aviv (250kmh) and freight serving the Port and they have a small airport near the poet.
They also have 2 cable card, one is part of the regular public transport system and connects the main transit hub Merkazit HaMifratz, with buses and BRT buses, rail and under construction an LRT line to Nazareth, with the Technion and Haifa University. The other is mostly touristic.
-As for Ben Gurion. From Jerusalem there is, as mentioned, a train every 30 minutes, but to Tel Aviv there are 4 trains, as there is also the line from Modi'in to Nahariya that passes through Tel Aviv (and other northern cities, including Haifa). There is also a night train that, currently, start at Binyamina and ends in Jerusalem. This service does not work between Fridays and Saturdays and start/end in Ben Gurion Airpot on nights between Tuesdays and Wednesdays due to a weekly maintenance work on the line's tunnels.
As for the future, two new rail lines under construction will connect to this line and traffic will increase in both directions so the current Ben Gurion station will be extended.
In general, there are currently work on some lines as the electrification process continues (it will be finished in 2025) so there might be changes with station closure early in the evening and during the howl weekend (including Friday morning and Saturday nights). The Northern part is about to reach Haifa and the southern part is advancing on the Askelon-Beer Sheva line (onec finished they'll move to the Lod Beer Sheva line).
Thank you immensely for the comprehensive details you've provided. 🙏 I'm a bit disappointed with myself for the inaccuracies, but I truly hope the video sparks critical thinking about Israel's public transit. 🚌🇮🇱 I'm committed to staying up-to-date with rapid developments, like Beer Sheva's new transit system today. 🚉🌟 Your input has motivated me to keep learning and sharing. Thanks again!
@@DanielSRosehill You shouldn't be disappointed with yourself, your video is a good explanation video about public transit in Israel, and, unfortunately, there are very few of them.
Since there are very few resources you just need to look for bits of information from different sources.
There is a good urbanism site, that is on hiatus (he had a one year planned vacation with friends but he'll be back) calld Livable City (עיר לחיות בה), in Hebrew with English subs)
www.youtube.com/@livablecity
and for transit I just do searches from time to time to see if there is something new (in TH-cam, Google - general and news- and official site of the different agencies).
There is a lot on the subject of public transport and urbanism in general.
BTW, I was trying to figure out your accent and I've settled on Irish, am I correct or way off?
I love that TH-cam channel! I wish he added more English subtitles although I understand how incredibly time consuming it is. Yes, I'm originally from Ireland!
The only day we had an issue was a thursday at the cinema complex @ Yes Planet, Rishon Letzion, when they had an offer on for 10 Shekels for any movie. Thursdays seem to be the worst days, we went to JLM from TLV and left at 2pm, it only took an hour or so, but my friend left at 2.30pm and it took him 3 hours lol. Our time in TLV we never had any issues parking at all, Pango is fantastic and Celllo didn't work, even with customer services trying to help. We didn't try public transport as the boss uses a wheelchair and hates buses and trains. We could do with a video on how to get to the Kotel if you have mobility issues and or use a wheelchair. Great Video Daniel.
i used it in summr of 68
This is an impressively structured description of a system with implications for international viewers interested in comparing transit systems. You position the topic in the broader context of Israel's relatively high driving congestion, but of course there are also considerations regarding climate change and the harms of car exhaust on health and urban liveability.
Thanks for the feedback! And yes of course sustainability is the main requirement with pragmatism second!
One big problem with city busses in Israel is that drivers take sharp turns going way too fast, causing the elderly to avoid taking the bus in fear of having a bad fall. My elderly dad had a bad fall on a bus that didn't wait for him to be seated before taking one of those roller-coaster turns, and he refused to take a bus after that.
Sorry to hear about your dad! I've heard similar stories from here in Jerusalem. It's like all the bus drivers were rejected tryouts from Formula 1!
@@DanielSRosehill or got most of their driving experience playing Need for Speed.
@@banto1 lol
I can assure you it is definitely not that hard to go to metula from Jerusalem, you could say take a train to tel aviv which takes 40 minutes and then take a bus from there all the way to qiryat shmona and then from there to metula, that's 3 transfers and tbh probably not much slower than a car given traffic, I live in tel aviv and I commute pretty often to random shitholes and I think that improving the reliability and speed of transit between medium sized cities and tel aviv is much more important
The accuracy of the lines up north is surprisingly good as well. I used to go a lot from Haifa to zfat and carmiel and the buses were always on time. I also don't remember being in too much traffic
Israel needs underground metro or subway systems in all its major towns. Above ground tram lines should NOT share the streets with auto traffic. Tram lines should be run on exclusively pedestrian streets, as is the case on Yafo street in Jerusalem. To mix the two is big mistake. The bus fleet should be all electric, but should be eventually completely replaced by trams. All public transport stations/stops should have guarded and monitored storage areas for personal bikes/e-scooters. Lastly, hopefully soon, car/robotaxi sharing services will become a reality, so that ownership of a personal car becomes largely an unnecessary waste of personal funds.