While the author's credited as a "transit planner", I feel suspicious of his actual expertise. A bus route can have far more "stops" than it actually stops at - on a given loop through the route - by skipping ones where nobody is waiting, and no rider wants to get off. Across just a modest-size transit system, even basic-looking improvements at each stop add up to a lot of money. Depending on rider trip patterns, longer routes may benefit the most by having an "Express" bus added - which speeds the longest trips by skipping all stops in (say) the middle 2/3 of the route. Payment options which aren't reliably fast at the Fare Box will make everything damned slow. Etc. Etc.