The MT Position

Posted by Fred Jandt
Mass Transit magazine editor

Bus stops vary wildly in the transit industry. They can range from little more than a simple sign — and sometimes less than that — to elaborate designs showcasing local flair and artistic talent. Everyone has their favorite, but do they help increase ridership or bring in other revenue to an agency? Or are they just a novelty?

I recently read an article about a bus stop in Oslo, Norway, that utilized an interesting promotion with a local ski resort. The shelter’s end wall had a window in it you could see through with a tag line under it that said, “If it’s snowing in here, it’s snowing up at Tryvann.”

If it snowed up at the resort, the staff could just send an SMS text message that would activate fans causing snow to fall in the window. A second message could be sent to stop the falling snow. The report I read said the resort loved the advertisement and saw crowd increases as a result.

After seeing this I searched around the Web for more unique bus stops and saw a plethora of photos ranging from the massive bus stop statue in Ventura, Calif., to swings, light sabers, a stop painted like the Simpsons’ living room and a selection of fruit-themed (and shaped) bus stops in Japan. I have to wonder, though, have any of these added value — beyond tourist attractions — to a bus system?

In San Francisco’s Got Milk? ads at several Muni stops had cookie-scented strips attached to them. The idea being the smell of hot, fresh chocolate chip cookies would make people want milk. Complaints resulted in the promotion being taken down in less than two days.

I’m interested to hear what are some of the best bus stop designs/promotions you’ve seen at transit agencies and how successful were they. I know being successful for the advertiser is different than the agency, so I’d like to hear from both sides on this. And were any of these promotions potentially detrimental to the agency, even publicity-wise, as in San Francisco?

And don’t think I am looking at bus stops exclusively. I know there are just as many train stations out there with great designs, but bus stops are a much more finite space than most train stations. That said, if you know of a great platform design let’s hear about that, too.

And include links to photos if possible. We all want to see what you’ve seen.

Check out Mass Transit’s new Top 40 Under 40 promotion on our Web site. We’re looking to recognize transit’s best and brightest under the age of 40 in an upcoming issue. Click on the link and you can read more about it and nominate yourself or any of your colleagues.

Thanks for reading the MT Position updated every Friday,

Fred
fred.jandt@cygnusb2b.com
Check out our LinkedIn page!

Posted by Fred Jandt
Mass Transit magazine editor

As Houston Metro’s president, Frank Wilson, told me, transit buses are the most advanced vehicles you can find on the road today. And no wonder, with the hefty price tag that comes with each of them. But these paragons of high tech can quickly get left behind. For every advanced vehicle on the road, there are probably several more out of date or way past their retirement age. The question then becomes what’s the technology level at your agency beyond your fleet?

Cubic announced its new Tri-Reader this week — an all-in-one reader that will process bank cards, pre-paid cards and smart card-enabled cell phones. This got me to thinking about the technology level of transit and how some agencies compare to others. How advanced is your agency?

Does your agency still accept paper transfers? Does it use paper fare cards? Does it have smart cards? Has it installed a unified fare card system for a variety of local systems? Does it have tap payment capability?

The gamut from low tech to leading- (even bleeding) edge tech is getting wider every year. While some agencies are leading the way, continually upgrading their systems, others are mired in the past. And this is just fare collection!

Of course, it seems transit will always have an albatross around its neck. In this case it probably is cash. Have you seen those Visa commercials where the shopping Nirvana comes to a screeching halt when someone pulls out some cash? Anyone who is filing onto a bus and the guy ahead of them can’t get his crumpled dollars into the farebox knows this all to well. But cash just won’t go away. I’ve spoken to several agencies who would gladly give up cash as a means of payment if they could.

Now think about that for a minute. While transit has to accommodate the most basic form of payment, it is always striving to adapt to the most advanced. Now it looks like tap payment is the next big thing — which for a fleeting moment seemed to be accepting credit and debit cards.

But that may not be the leading-edge tech for long. Already transit agencies are experimenting with cell phones being used for payment. Sure, it’s basically another form of tap, but it’s still a new process and who knows if the various phone manufacturers, let alone service providers, will adapt a standard for the technology.

Transit agencies need to stay on top of this situation to get the best bang for their buck when they do decide to make a technology upgrade. With budgets as tight as they are, transit agencies just don’t have the money to upgrade a system and have to upgrade it again within the next five years.

I guess that’s why transit buses are the most advanced vehicles on the road — they have to be just to keep up.

Check out Mass Transit’s new Top 40 Under 40 promotion on our Web site. We’re looking to recognize transit’s best and brightest under the age of 40 in an upcoming issue. Click on the link and you can read more about it and nominate yourself or any of your colleagues.

Thanks for reading the MT Position updated every Friday,

Fred
fred.jandt@cygnusb2b.com
Check out our LinkedIn page!

By Todd McDaniel

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA) is making $8.4 billion available for public transportation. This is in addition to the $10.4 billion proposed in the FY2009 budget for a total of $18.8 billion for public transportation capital projects. The ARRA funds do not require a local match from state or operating funds so $1 of ARRA funds is the equivalent of $1.25 of annual appropriation funds. To put this in perspective, The American Public Transportation Association recorded 10.7 billion public transportation boardings, including buses, rail and other modes in 2008. This number includes every time a passenger boarded public transportation, including multiple boardings for transfers in a single trip. The ARRA and the FY2009 appropriation will provide an estimated $1.76 for every public transportation boarding in the United States.

ARRA funds have an important distinction from other federal funding of public transportation. The money appropriated to each agency must be spent within one year. In fact, 50 percent must be committed within the first 180 days or the Secretary of Transportation will withdraw the money and redistribute to agencies that have committed 50 percent of the funds. The remaining 50 percent must be committed by March 5, 2010 or the same withdrawal rules apply. Many states began amending their five year Transportation Improvement Plans before the bill was passed to add or move projects up to the current year to take advantage of ARRA funds before the time limit expired.

ARRA funds must be spent on capital projects. In other words, they cannot be spent on the day-to-day operations providing public transportation like fuel or driver payroll. The funds can be spent on buses, new facilities, planning, preventative maintenance, property acquisition or information technology projects. ARRA funds will not address operating budget crises that many U.S. transit authorities are currently experiencing due to decreases in other tax-based revenue sources.

In addition to time limits, the ARRA funding comes with a new set of reporting and certification requirements. The Obama administration has stressed that stimulus funds will be “subject to unprecedented levels of transparency and accountability.” On the recovery.gov Web site there are five objectives listed for the spending of ARRA funds:

• Recovery funds are awarded and distributed in a prompt, fair and reasonable manner.
• The recipients and uses of all recovery funds are transparent to the public, and that the public benefits of these funds are reported clearly, accurately and in a timely manner.
• Recovery funds are used for authorized purposes and every step is taken to prevent instances of fraud, waste, error and abuse.
• Projects funded under the recovery legislation avoid unnecessary delays and cost overruns.
• Programs meet specific goals and target, and contribute to improved performance on broad economic indicators.

To help meet these objectives, under Section 1511 of the ARRA, transit chief executives will be required to certify in writing that all investments have received the full review and vetting required by law and accept responsibility that the investment is an appropriate use of taxpayer dollars. Transit agencies are also required to segregate ARRA funds from all other funding and report sources and uses separately.

So what does this all mean for transit authorities? First the good news, the rapid infusion of large capital amounts to support the long-term goals of public transportation has the potential to change the future of public transit in the United States. New services and routes and more convenient facilities could make public transportation available to the large percentage of U.S. households that do not currently have access.

The time limits imposed by the ARRA will put new pressure on transit to identify the projects to fund with recovery funds and issue purchase orders quickly to avoid losing funding. Project managers and purchasing staff will still need to meet all the regulatory requirements including EPA approval, disadvantaged business participation and bidding processes but may not have the same amount of time available.

Adding to the pressure of time limits, transit authority executives are coming to grips with personal certifications to taxpayers. These certifications will be posted on the recovery.gov Web site for review by all taxpayers and constituents.  This certification process is reminiscent of the Sarbanes Oxley Act that radically changed private sector financial reporting. Transit executives will be forced to both spend money quicker than normal and report and account for that spending at a higher level than ever before. The easiest way to meet the time requirements may be the hardest thing to certify and explain to taxpayers and the easiest expenditures to explain to taxpayers may be the hardest way to meet the time requirements.

Overall, public transit is being pushed into a brighter spotlight than ever before with the American public. More and more people are relying on public transportation, the government is spending more and more of taxpayers’ money to build a public transportation infrastructure, and the taxpayers are requiring more and more information on how their money is being spent. American public transportation is at a crossroads that could lead to a radically different reality a decade from now.

Todd McDaniel CPA, PMP is a senior consultant with Capital Ledger Inc. and blogs at www.transitstimulus.blogspot.com.

Posted by Fred Jandt
Mass Transit magazine editor

Transit is flush with new federal funding, much of which is being spent on hybrid energy solutions. But what if I told you that you could be running your same hybrid buses far cheaper with an almost inexhaustible energy supply — one that wouldn’t mean a complete system overhaul. Sounds interesting doesn’t it?

The numbers are out and as a nation we’re driving less, which comes as no surprise since the vehicle miles traveled (VMT) has been on the decline for more than a year now. Of course, with gas prices dipping down less than $2 a gallon in most places it is interesting that VMT are still on the decline. And transit continues to rise with a four percent increase in ridership throughout 2008.

People are riding transit more than ever before and — surprise, surprise — they are finding out that once they have a taste for it they like it. Is it really low gas prices sustaining America’s “car culture” or is it simply the lack of available transit?

For those of you out there looking to spend your stimulus dollars wisely to increase transit in your area, you may want to keep your eye on the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Researchers there may have found the solution to putting hybrid buses in every fleet in the country — batteries that recharge in seconds.

A recent report in the scientific journal Nature discusses a new application of an existing material that makes lithium ion batteries much more efficient. What the researchers found was that the ions traveling through standard lithium and cobalt rechargeable batteries travel through “channels” in the material and must be lined up properly to be transferred.

By switching to a lithium iron phosphate compound, they found the ions were guided to the channels much quicker than in standard batteries. In a test they were able to charge a lithium iron phosphate battery in 20 seconds, the same amount it took a standard battery six minutes to charge.

The lithium iron phosphate batteries didn’t store as much energy as lithium cobalt batteries, but they retained the ability to charge longer, which means lithium iron phosphate batteries could be made smaller and lighter than existing lithium ion ones.

Spin this out to your buses for a second. Now you have lighter, smaller, quicker-charging batteries in your hybrid vehicles. Combine this with the regenerative shocks I talked about a few weeks ago and you have a whole new paradigm for hybrid vehicles.

Transit is the perfect place for this technology. And now is the time when we need to impress upon our government officials to spend some money making sure this research gets funded and into the hands of the general public. Now that’s a real stimulus!

Check out Mass Transit’s new Top 40 Under 40 promotion on our Web site. We’re looking to recognize transit’s best and brightest under the age of 40 in an upcoming issue. Click on the link and you can read more about it and nominate yourself or any of your colleagues.

Thanks for reading the MT Position updated every Friday,

Fred
fred.jandt@cygnusb2b.com
Check out our LinkedIn page!

Posted by Fred Jandt
Mass Transit magazine editor

I spent some time on the road this week and I have to say, I can’t wait for whatever plans the White House has for a high-speed rail network to come to fruition. Going to the airport is never a welcome task. It’s like playing a game show, where you get bonus points if you can figure out a set of flights that will get you where you want to go when you want to get there for a reasonable amount of money and without any serious delays. Now think about that a minute and consider the transit authority in your area. Would this be anywhere near an acceptable situation for public transit?

As I went through airport security earlier this week and dutifully removed my laptop from its case, every ounce of metal from my body, my liquids in their 3-oz.-or-less bag, my belt and my shoes, I looked around for a minute and took stock of my situation. It was late morning on Tuesday and there were maybe a half dozen people going through security. And I counted 19 TSA personnel standing at the two checkpoints with several more in a nearby office with its door open. In transit, we hear about it when a couple agency employees are together talking where a commuter can see them as they walk by. And here where nearly two dozen airport employees were essentially standing around, no one raised a question. No one thought twice about it.

As I waited for my plane, I read an article in the latest Scientific American that said the ban on liquids was going to cease by the end of 2009. That’s great. Does it mean I’ll get my shoes back? I understand the nature of being safe, but since the individual who tried to blow up a plane with bombs in his shoes was caught, how many millions of us have had to remove our shoes to go through security for … well, nothing? Couldn’t a couple years of safety prove we don’t need to continue doing this?

And, of course, my return flight was delayed. Before you stop reading because this is beginning to sound like an anti-airline rant, bear with me a minute. My flight was delayed a little more than an hour. After about 45 minutes waiting for some mysterious mechanical malfunction to be fixed, I overheard one airline employee ask the two others standing at the podium whether or not he should go out and ask the mechanics for an ETA on the situation. Her response was to tell him he could if he felt like he needed to. They’d be told when the plane was fixed — basically, not my problem.

Think again about the transit authority in your area. If the buses or trains are running more than 10 minutes behind, commuters are calling for somebody’s head. And yet, airlines are consistently delayed for numerous reasons and most of the general public just shrugs its shoulders. I guess we’ve just been desensitized to the whole situation. We take it for granted that we have to strip to enter an airport and will be relying on luck more than a schedule for our planes to arrive on time.

You know the old adage, “as long as you keep the trains running on time”? That has been ingrained into the public consciousness to the degree we in transit take credit for making sure the trains are on time and how long buses can last between breakdowns. Transit is on time personified. It is setting a schedule and sticking to it. It is making things flow like clockwork. And we move millions upon millions of people a day largely without missing a beat. As people head to Capitol Hill for next week’s APTA Legislative Conference, let’s keep that in our back pocket when talking to our elected officials about our importance in the scheme of things.

Please check out Mass Transit’s Top 40 Under 40 promotion on our Web site. We’re looking to recognize transit’s best and brightest under the age of 40 in an upcoming issue.

Click on the link and you can read more about it and nominate yourself or any of your colleagues.

Thanks for reading the MT Position updated every Friday,

Fred
fred.jandt@cygnusb2b.com
Check out our LinkedIn page!