IA: SRTS hoping vanpools catch on with area employers, workers

Everyone needs a dependable ride to work. Local transit leaders believe they have a cost-effective answer.

A statewide vanpool program that's been around for two years, has been well-received in other parts of Iowa but has yet to catch on in Siouxland Regional Transit System's seven-county service region provides the vehicle that workers take turns diving to pick up co-workers on their way to work.

It can be an ideal situation for workers who have no vehicle or lack dependable transportation, and it helps ensure employers their employees will make it to work.

"It would be a good opportunity if one employer in the tri-state area would lead the efforts to start a vanpool here. We would like to get one on the road, even if it's just one," said Brian Pearson, facility director/transit director for Siouxland Interstate Metropolitan Planing Council, which manages SRTS, a separate entity that provides public transportation services to Woodbury, Plymouth, Monona, Ida and Cherokee counties in Iowa, Dakota County in Nebraska and southern Union County in South Dakota.

Brian Pearson, SRTS vanpools

Brian Pearson, facility director/transit director for SIMPCO, which manages Siouxland Regional Transit System, stands next to a van similar to those provided in a vanpool program SRTS is hoping to establish in its seven-county service region. The vanpools provide a vehicle that workers drive to pick up co-workers to take them to work.

With SRTS leading the effort to establish the program in May 2023, 10 transit systems across the state participate under a master agreement with Commute with Enterprise, a national company that provides vehicles for vanpooling.

Enterprise, which has a hub in Omaha, contracts with employers to provide a van or SUV to groups of five workers or more. The workers drive the vehicle, and Enterprise pays for maintenance. The monthly cost is up to $2,000, but can be reduced with more riders. SRTS has agreed to pay $500 per month for each vanpool locally. It's up to employers and workers to determine how to split the remaining cost, plus gas expenses. Pearson said some companies elsewhere pick up the remainder of the costs and leave employees to cover gas. Some split the costs, and it can average out to less than $10 per day to take part. That cost can be lowered the higher the number of riders in the pool.

Pearson said it's a good arrangement for workers who don't have dependable transportation, but anyone can join a vanpool to save wear and tear on their personal vehicle. Plus it reduces the number of vehicles on the road, reducing carbon emissions.

It's an effort to increase use of public transit, which Pearson said decreased since the 2020 COVID pandemic and hasn't returned to pre-pandemic levels. Without subways or light rail systems in the state, vanpools are another option for people seeking public transit to get them to work.

"It provides another alternative to public transportation we didn't have in Iowa before," Pearson said.

Though SRTS led the effort to establish the statewide program, no vanpools have been established in Siouxland, although some companies continue to explore the possibilities.

It's been a big hit in southwest Iowa, where three companies have created 10 vanpools.

"It's been really successful. Employers like it. Employees like it," said Mark Lander, transit director for Southwest Iowa Transit Agency, based in Atlantic, which covers an eight-county area that includes Council Bluffs.

Lander said the vanpools include both blue-collar and white-collar workers who find it easier to share a ride rather than drive their own vehicles. It's a convenient service, Lander said, that picks workers up at their homes, and participants can pay a smaller share if they only ride two or three times a week.

"There's a little bit of something for everybody," Lander said. "It fits in with our goal of providing safe and dependable transportation for everybody. It's about as easy as it gets for us."

Pearson said 37 vanpools including 195 riders are active in Iowa, though he doesn't know why no one's gotten on board locally.

"It's good to see others are using it," Pearson said.

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