Why are buses arranged so randomly at terminals?

OneWithTheForce SG

Have you ever noticed how buses are always arranged with very different numbered buses in 3's next to each other at terminals?

I thought it might be to avoid confusion you'd get on wrong but closely numbered bus, but sometimes that happens- eg Bedok 32 and 33 and next to each other.

I mean, sometimes you'll see 15, 55, 180 grouped together

And then there'll be 10, 20, 34, which are all much closer together in number

So confusing! I mean, If I just want to go to a particular street and there's several different buses going there, instead of being grouped together, often they'll be on opposite ends of the terminal. So it's quite a walk to get to the one you might want, or to work out which one you need.

Why do they do this, instead of arranging buses which go to similar destinations together, or grouping by numbers?

Bus Stopping SG

It might seem random, but this is done to allow services with higher demand to have more time for boarding at each berth. These services are generally staggered at different berths.

Imagine three services all with high demand packed into 1 berth, that would have caused chaos in the interchange as buses would have to wait longer to pick up passengers.

Lower demand services are then slotted in to make full use of the berths.

^tamago^ SG

interestingly there is a reason why services are grouped like this, and some are very easy to guess, for e.g. why 25 & 73 are at the furthest end from AMK MRT side of AMK Int.

SBS 9631X SG

interestingly there is a reason why services are grouped like this, and some are very easy to guess, for e.g. why 25 & 73 are at the furthest end from AMK MRT side of AMK Int.

Care to share to refresh my memory for 25 & 73?

lemon1974 SG

interestingly there is a reason why services are grouped like this, and some are very easy to guess, for e.g. why 25 & 73 are at the furthest end from AMK MRT side of AMK Int.

then why sv86/130/138 are at the furthest end? can understand why sv25/73 is there, but wat about 86/130/138?

105090 SG

shouldnt the queues be based on the area of travel?

eg services going the same places should be grouped together.
eg. 157 with 174 and 198 etc
then people going to JW ave 1 can board the first one that comes, instead of betting on one particular service

sbst275 SG

Supposed to be.. But what happens if 2/3 are pretty frequent and you dun have enough berths to go around?

watson374 SG

Supposed to be.. But what happens if 2/3 are pretty frequent and you dun have enough berths to go around?

Two should still be okay. Three frequents might start to strain it, but you can always hold the bus in the drop-off bays first.

Four per berth is when the thing really falls apart.