Finally Something We Can Do about Transit Funding

We all know the Port Authority doesn’t have the funding needed for adequate service. We’ve been complaining about that for months – for years.
Finally, something has happened in Harrisburg which may be a step to solving the problem of adequate funding statewide, for bridges and roads as well as public transportation. Now we can DO something.

Governor Corbett has created a Transportation Funding Advisory Commission that is supposed to put forward a solution to the transportation funding problem by the end of July.
We have been told that it would be helpful for individuals to contact this commission and encourage them to do the job – to recommend a real solution to Pennsylvania’s transportation funding problem. A real solution includes funding for PAAC that is dedicated, inflation-responsive, and adequate. ‘Adequate’ means enough money to make it possible to restore the system recommended by PAAC’s TDP, before the 15% cut.


Please send an e-mail to the Transportation Funding Advisory Commission, TFAC@state.pa.us. We suggest that you e-mail a copy to Ken Zapinsky, kzapinski@alleghenyconference.org, who is knowledgeable and sympathetic and represents Dennis Yablonsky of the Pittsburgh Chamber of Commerce on the Commission. Please cc us as well actransitcouncil@gmail.com. This could be a real step for the Port Authority of Allegheny County to get the essential funds by early 2012.

Let’s do what we can. Keep hope alive. Keep transit alive.

Any real solution will need active support for implementation. I think that all we can do now is be ready to give active support for a real solution to the funding problem. But please send an e-mail of encouragement to TFAC@state.pa.us today.

Jonathan Robison, President, Allegheny County Transit Council

March 27 Service Changes & Potential Alternatives via TransitGuru

Port Authority recently released changes to the routes scheduled for March 27, 2011. While Port Authority did their best to minimize damage, these changes are a net 15% reduction in service hours from current service and some areas do have major reductions or route eliminations. This post will summarize the changes and show alternatives where applicable. While it may be more difficult, I believe many alternatives are valid alternatives that would be doable for a majority of people affected by the reductions. Nonetheless, this situation is not ideal and you should contact your legislators and governor. The idea of the Transit Development Plan (TDP) was to match ridership demand with existing service hours. While nearly all routes will assume TDP route numbers and names, this round of service changes is not the best way to serve the region due to the reduced service levels due to reduced funding. Port Authority is discussing with elected officials and hopes this would be a temporary measure until dedicated, growing, and sustainable funding is secure. I encourage you to do the same and express your concerns. Be specific and explain why you need your bus route, evening or weekend service and that you support a sustainable, growing, and predicable funding stream for Port Authority.

This list will be a route by route summary of what will be happening regarding the March service changes. Italic text shows an alternative means to access an area where a route has been discontinued or reduced. It will also be noted if any of the alternative transportation options are not open to the public and only serves a segment of riders (such as employees, etc.). The reason I wanted to write this is to not only help riders to find alternatives to getting to locations where service is impacted, but also to encourage support for our transit system among our choice riders, despite service reductions due to the transit funding crisis. Hopefully as people are aware of the importance of our transit system, more will want increased funding so that Port Authority (and other transit agencies in the state) can reverse these cuts and even plan for expansion beyond the full Transit Development Plan.

Read the details here.

A rider's Story. Prospect Park TDP. Story 6

My roommate and I moved to Pittsburgh, Pa. from Altoona, Pa. in 2008 [1] when she took a job in Canonsburg. We choose the Prospect Park area of Brentwood/Whitehall because it was close to Route 51 and it HAD great bus service. After moving here I found a job at the HotelInn in Oakland. As any other employee in the travel industry to be able to work Saturday and Sunday shifts is very important for me.

Pre TDP

Prospect Park had bus service from 4:00Am - 12:15AM almost 7 days a week with no need to change buses and within one zone fare service to West Mifflin Wal-Mart, Century Plaza (Kohls/ GiantEagle) Target, Leland Point, Caste Village and Curry Hollow Road Shopping Plaza.

Pre TDP there were 4 routes providing Monday to Friday inbound service from as early as 4:07AM to as late as 11:09PM to the Prospect Park area at Parkline/Radford. The outbound service started as early as 4:33am, with a last bus leaving at 12:15AM from 6th/Smithfield. Those routes were 51C Ext, 51B Limited, 46A/F and 35A.

On Saturday we had buses for direct inbound service starting at 4:07AM to as late as 10:48PM from Parkline/Radford. Outbound service from 6th/Smithfield started at 4:45AM with the last bus at 8:30PM. The only direct route to downtown used to be 51C ext that did not provide inbound service after 6:43AM before restarting at 9:48PM. Therefore we had to take a 35A to RTE51/Streets Run Road or RTE51/Stilley to catch a regular 51C or 46G to go downtown. And we had to take a 46G or 51C to Rte 51/Brownsville to catch a 35A since there was no outbound service from 6th/Smithfield between the 4:45AM bus and 8:30PM bus Nor was there any direct outbound service after 8:30PM.

On Sunday there were two routes providing service to Prospect Park riders. Inbound service started at 4:41AM and run as late as 9:44PM (Parkline/Radford). Outbound service from 6th/Smithfield started 5:30AM with the last bus at 10:30PM. Those routes were 51C ext. and 35A. Since 51C ext only ran every 2 hours, in order to get downtown when there was no 51Cext service we had to take a 35A to RTE51/Streets Run or RTE51/Stiley to catch a regular 51C or 46G to go downtown. On our way back we had to take a 46G or 51C from 6th/Smithfield to Rte 51/Brownsville to catch a 35A to Prospect Park between the timepoints covered by 51C ext. But most important I was able to get to work on Sunday.


After TDP

It is very hard for me to work on Sundays since there are no early buses to Prospect Park and I find hard to walk on Willock Road to Brownsville at 5:00am. And if I do go to work when the Y49 starts I find difficult to return home since there are no late buses to Prospect Park and walking Willock Road in the dark can be dangerous.I tried to walk the beam on Lebanon Church Rd from Applebees to Target and almost got hit both to and from.


When shopping, I tried to go to CasteVillage and the connections were very hard to make. I tried to go to Curry Hollow Shopping Plaza and wasn't able to make the transfer from WalMart or the busway. I tried to go to Century III (Kohls, Giant Eagle etc,) and found hard to find a connection from WalMart.

So for me without the 35A I can no longer shop when or where I want to and without the 51C's early Sunday service I can no longer work on Sundays.

Contributed by Robert H. ( @BobbyOBobby)

[1] On a short note, Altoona's bus service had an overhaul just before we moved. They have a transit center where all of their buses started/ended at and where I lived was a 15 minute bus ride before the changes is now a 75 minute ride.

A rider’s story : From Glassport to RMU

These are fragments from the story of Matt and Michael - a young couple like many other couples hoping to build a new future together. Matt is a 24 year old gay, tech enthusiast living in Pittsburgh with his partner Michael who works for Robert Morris University.
Matt was generous enough to give us permission to publish a couple paragraphs from his last blog post and so we did. We selected the paragraphs that are most representative for their experience as bus riders (though we enjoyed reading the full story on his blog “The life of a small town boy in a big city” ) . You could also follow him on twitter @flamingblue8z

"It's 1-11-2011. Today, I feel like elaborating a bit on an issue/discussion that started on Twitter between @TransitGuru, @bus15237 and myself.
Port Authority has had a rough year, having a major 50+ million dollar deficit in funding for this fiscal year. In the fall they began threatening to cut 35% of their routes, which included the 55 (runs through Glassport, where I live), along with the 25 (which goes to Robert Morris University, where I briefly attended classes, and where my partner Michael has worked for 2 years now).
........................................................................................................................................
Enter 2010. I was registered as a student for spring semester at Robert Morris, and began classes. The snow storm snowed us in up at RMU, even, but Michael volunteered as the only one to work cashier that day, from 10am to 9pm in the cafeteria. He's devoted to his job, he LOVES his job. In March, my car suffered a horribly catastrophic death, the piston rod blew through the cylinder wall. We were officially screwed, confined to public transit. We began learning the routes, finding how long it would take, etc.I dropped out of classes mid-semester, as it was too expensive (at 2.00 for Zone 1, 2.75 for Zone 2) to afford the both of us going out to Robert Morris. Summer hit, and his hours were 11am-6pm. Perfect for taking the bus both out and back.
As the new school year approached, he wasn't as lucky. Back to the 4p-close shift, and the last bus out at the time was 9:00 or so. Finally, in September, the Port Authority changed routes, and the 25A became the 25, which only ran Mon-Fri until 7:30pm or so, and Saturdays only runs every 2 hours. Sundays, it would no longer run. Michael said he'd be okay, but I had to watch as he would go to work, then when he got off, walked nearly an hour to Sheetz on University Blvd., and waited out there until the G3's first inbound run at 5:03am. He'd be home around 7:30am every weekday morning. G3 doesn't run Saturdays, so he began either walking to Robinson, or Coraopolis, to catch a bus in either community. Sundays, he'd walk from Coraopolis to get to work, but was able to get a G3 on Monday morning after work."

A rider's story.‏ Brookline TDP. Story 4

The Two Sides of Brookline

The eastern side has the Port Authority South Busway running alongside SR 51/Saw Mill Run Blvd.

Prior to TDP, we had two primary routes along the entire length of the South Busway. The 46F Baldwin Highlands and the 46G Elizabeth. The first ran every 50 minutes during the day, and the other ran every 40...so there were times they would run on top of each other, and then you'd have to wait 40 minutes for the next set to ride through. There was also the Overbrook line, and East Brookline has a stop called South Bank. During the day, the 47L Library via Overbrook would come through every 30 minutes or so, and the 47S South Hills Village via Overbrook would operate during rush hour. The Port Authority did play around here and there and made the 47S run more, but it seemed like every year or so, there was a major overhaul.
After the TDP, the 46F was changed into the Y49 Prospect Flyer and the 46G became the Y46 Elizabeth Flyer in June 2010. The Y46 runs every half hour, and the Y49 runs hourly and was scheduled half way between two Y46. In September, the Port Authority changed the 46D in to the Y47, and the BR Brentwood Flyer along with the 46B Baldwin Manor and the BM Baldwin Manor into the Y45. With the addition of the Y47, riders along the South Busway now have an even 15 minute headway. It is something that I was working on for quite some time to have such a standard headway. The 47L and 47S Light Rail (aka The "T") was renamed Blue Line - Library and Blue Line - South Hills Village, both running once every half hour...15 minutes apart from one another. The Library acts as a shuttle only between Library, PA and Washington Jct, and numerous riders are unhappy about it.

On the other side of Brookline we had the 41B Bower Hill, 41D Brookline, 41G Dormont and 44U Mt. Lebanon-Oakland.

After the TDP ,the 41B Bower Hill is now the 41 Bower Hill, the 41D is still the 41D but will be changed into the 39 Brookline, the 41G has become a feeder route called the 35 and does not service the northern part of Dormont nor Brookline at all. And the 44U became the 42.

When you hear of Brookline, most people think about the 41D and 41G, which both serviced a primary residential thoroughfare, Pioneer Avenue. The Port Authority yanked the 41G and made the southernmost portion into the 35 Sunset Hills, a feeder route for the Y45, Blue Line, 41/42 and Red Line. Sadly, they didn't take into consideration that the 41G handled half the peak ridership of Pioneer Avenue and by yanking it, it was going to cause the overcrowding on the 41D as it has. This has made the news... http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/10252/1086294-100.stm
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/10253/1086435-147.stm

However, a lot of neighbors are telling me they are still getting passed up.
Also, the 41D and 41G use to combine as the 41D/G Brookline-Dormont route in the evenings. A skeleton evening service left downtown Pittsburgh as late as 11:40 to help those get home during the evenings. I have always been an outspoken advocate for those who work the 3p-11p shift, and unfortunately after the TDP changes, without the 11:40p trip, people who work those shifts aren't able to get home.

So, for East Brookline riders who use the South Busway (now also called the Yellow Line), the TDP made positive changes. However, a lot of people in the main part of Brookline have had some pretty negative results from the TDP. People who are misfortunate enough to board outbound at either Station Square or South Hills Jct have found themselves waiting a while for a bus with an open seat. And, many riders of the 41D and former 41G are getting stranded and find themselves walking a lot more. Either to/from West Liberty Avenue up and down hills that are about 45 degrees or to the Red Line Trolley Line, sometimes a half mile or more hike.

Samuel J Hurst, a Brookline Resident and Republican Committeeman, has worked with ACTC since 2002. A long time supporter of Family and Transit, he has worked with such groups as Save Our Transit and Fathers 4 Justice. He remains very passionate about the importance of family...and a comprehensive transit/transportation system.

Stu's TDP before and after story‏. Story 3

I might not have the most dramatic pre- and post-TDP story to tell, as it has not yet been fully implemented near me yet. At this writing, neither the McKnight nor Mount Royal corridors has gone under the TDP knife. However, Perry Highway has, and this has most definitely affected my riding experience.

My house lies near CCAC North between the Perry and McKnight corridors, a little over a mile west of Vincentian Academy and McIntyre Square, a long but do-able walk from the 1D Mount Royal. Prior to the TDP changes, Perry Highway's 11C and 13C Express had very sporadic service. Some trips were bunched together, while at other times headways were very long, upwards of 75 minutes. North of my house, both 11C and 13C took very different paths, many trips using a particular path only once. This made it hard to ride a bus outbound to Northland Library, for instance, as it might take 4 minutes, or 15, to go that mile, or not go there at all. I could walk it faster and more reliably.

Headed toward Downtown, mid-day trips required a bus change in West View to a Perrysville or 500, making a 20-minute car trip a 75-minute bus trip. I often did it on a bicycle in much less time than the bus took, from 10 miles north of the city, less than an hour.

With TDP, commuting is different, but I don't know about better. Yes, the bus does come at very regular intervals, but it's only once an hour. I still have to transfer buses, sometimes with a zero wait, others 20 minutes. I have no service at all after 6 p.m., though I do have a new,
super-early 4:55 a.m. option.

What this has meant is that I hardly use the #9 Perry Highway, instead hiking the mile to or from McKnight for the un-TDP'd 12A and 13A, or the 1D Mount Royal. My road has no sidewalk, no lights, no shoulders, and poor sight lines. Yet I walk it 7 or 8 times a week, always in the dark. I get to see frogs and birds, but also potentially skunk, fox and large deer. You don't want a deer mad at you. They're big.

The bicycle is regularly becoming a viable alternative, even from 10 miles out. Not only can I beat the bus going inbound, outbound 12A trips with the bike on the rack on the front of the bus allow me to get home much faster than the 12A and a walk does, even faster than the old 11C used to.

I highly recommend combining a bike ride and the bus to get from place to place. While TDP's changes make the buses more efficient from the point of view of operating expenses, the bicycle reduces travel time to get to the bus. I refuse to be cowed by traffic on bike, any more than I refuse to be cowed by traffic on foot. Mostly I refuse to succumb to driving as the
only alternative.

The TDP is doing good, in general. For me, personally? The jury is still out.

Stuart Strickland
McCandless Twp.

About Stuart:

Stu had been a transit advocate for over 20 years. You can follow him on Twitter @bus15237 and you may want to visit his blog : Unicycle in Transit . He is living in McCandless Township with his wife and children, a typical white collar middle class family .

31DE/33DE TDP. Story 2

" I have had to go to the Foster Plaza area (near Westwood-Noblestown Rd.) several times before and after the transit changes for work related errands. Before the changes, it was rather an adventure to ride home later in the evening as I had to walk to Greentree Road for the next available trip to avoid waiting almost two hours in the evening to return to Downtown. "

writes Michael Sypolt on his blog, Pittsburgh Transit Guide, as he covers the third round of TDP changes.

about Michael:

In spite of owning a car, Michael remains a convinced public transportation supporter for reasons such as sustainability which he discusses on his blog. He had recently completed a two-way car free trip to a location outside Ellwood City.

He is also very knowledgeable when it comes to trip planning and helping other bus riders figure out route alternatives. He has developed a very useful map and public transit guide for Allegheny County that are available to the public on: http://www.publictransitguide.info/. You can also ask him about the best route alternatives on twitter : @TransitGuru

Y49 TDP. Story 1

Born and raised in Europe, scared of driving, each year I tell myself : next year I am going to apply for the driver license …

The thing is that I never had to consider driving a car before I came to live in Pittsburgh. And now , that my family is here and I became a long-term resident of the city , I am still trying to postpone the day when I will get my driver’s license and really get behind a car’s wheel …but it is hard to tell how long I will be able to use public transportation instead. Even though I do not have to work past 8pm; I can negotiate my start time and I can find a travel alternatives (read: car) for weekend mornings and late evenings when there is no bus service.

While I was postponing the day when I would finally have to go through with the exam for the driver’s license, I tried to choose wisely the area to call home. A few years ago when I moved in, whilst it had the advantages of nice suburbia, it still offered several public transportation options . But things got worse, and I hope to be able to say one day that they only got worse before they got better. After all this is what the Transit Development Plan is for. It is supposed to improve the public transportation system in Pittsburgh.

How did the TDP work out for me? This is my story.

BEFORE TDP:

To get from the South Side Works, where my work is, to the intersection of Prospect and E Willock Rd, where home is, on an Saturday morning or a week day’s evening used to be quite an adventure.

I had to change three buses. After 8 pm on a weekday, it used to be 51A, 51C and 35A and, if I missed the 51A, I had to sprint down to the 18^th to catch the 51C. If a got there just a few minutes late and I missed my 35A connection, I had to add another mile to my walk home. A pleasant, healthy exercise except for those months when the weather reports are "frost and snow". And, of course, it was during those snowy cold months when bus real timetables varied most and the chance that I miss my connection to the next ride increased ...

IT was during one of those snowy days that I got to ride in a vehicle that, I hope, I’ll never get to ride in again. It was a dog day evening with freezing snow hitting the ground and the 35A never made it to the bottom of Stilley road, so I decided to walk. By the time I got one quarter mile up the road I could already feel frost in my bone marrows as I started stumbling against the wind. This is when the police car stopped in front of me. It was not a patrol car but a prisoner transportation and containment police unit – a Jeep with a protection glass screen between the front and back seats and some cool safety features. One guy in, the driver, asked me something along the lines " Where are you coming from & have you been drinking?". I guess I looked like one that just tried some johnny walker swing…

“Coming from work & going home. Not drunk, but frozen. That 35A did not show” I said. “Now I am walking home”

I do not know if he just felt bad about leaving me behind to walk myself into becoming Mrs. Frosty or he did not want to take a chance, but he replied:”get in. It is dangerous to walk down here at night; you could get hit by a car”. So I got in the back seat, got a ride home and was told that he cannot open the car from the inside while I was on the back seat – smart security lock. He had to get out, unlock the door from the outside so I can exit the car. Since I wasn’t asked any questions to raise my suspicion that it was an attempted arrest, I was left to wonder if it was another automatic feature. Or I live in such a posh neighborhood that, after all, whomever tries walking himself/herself into Mr./ Mrs. Frosty one cold winter night is automatically suspect.

As for the Saturday trips, the irony was that the faster trips (a mere two hours) were not the simpler. I had to take a 35A down to Route 51, a 46 G to Station Square, a 51C to 18^th and in the end walk. For some strange reason the quasi- direct route 35A to Brownsville and 51C to 18^th took longer…

POST TDP:

In short, for me, the TDP changes worked well to improve my bus riding experience in the week end as well as in the evening.

The added weekend and evening trips for the new Prospect Park Flyer make my weekend and evening trips much easier to schedule. Having to take only two buses, instead of three, I worry less about missing my connection. I also get home a half an hour, 45 minutes earlier in the evening. Boring , and if I get another ride in a prisoner transportation and containment police unit , this time I'll know that I am in real trouble.

And given 51’s increased weekend frequency, my trips are a lot shorter too – even with Y49’s constant delay issues it takes me about an hour to get to work on a Saturday morning.