I say:
Bus terminals are fine. Central bus terminals are problematic. Using a central location for for end-of-line 'terminal' functions means you need space to store a lot of buses, which means you need a lot of real estate, which means 'central' bus terminals are never central. More successful are transit malls, where many buses load and unload, but without having a huge array of idling buses, noises and belching exhaust. One of the things that made Fung Wa so so successful was that their use of curb-space was illegal, so they had to be FAST in loading and unloading, so they couldn't afford to 'store' buses.