Metro Magazine, August 2018

erated the duty cycles are heavy and the vehicles that go out can put on 300 to 350 miles a day so really its all about balancing cost and demand says Spraul He adds that the success of the agencys paratransit system can be contributed to both choosing a good contractor First Transit operates the service but MTS owns the fleet and having a dependable fleet To that end MTS has been purchasing Forest Rivers Starcraft All Star bus built on the Ford E450 chassis since 2008 from its dealer Creative Bus Sales In this service where we provide transit service to people with disabilities the vehicles we operate have to be dependable and reliable and the Starcraft product has been both of those things for us Spraul says With a seating capacity of 16 ambulatory and four wheelchair positions the entire 170 vehicle MTS paratransit fleet now consists exclusively of Starcraft buses All told Spraul says that the agencys Starcraft fleet has traveled 42 million miles and carried 45 million passengers since making their debut in 2008 He adds that MTS originally started purchasing Starcraft buses as part of a competitive procurement process but now purchases the buses off of a CalACT state contract because MTS has been satisfied with the performance and cost effectiveness of the bus as well as the partnership with Creative Bus Sales and Forest River Starcrafts parent company Spraul says that having one vehicle type in use across its entire paratransit fleet has also brought continuity for its maintenance and bus operators Another reason MTS has remained faithful to the Starcraft brand is the vehicles adaptability Weve installed fire suppression systems onboard mobile display terminals so we can do real time CAD AVL Apollo Video Technology camera and audio systems and back up cameras explains Spraul Of course the fleet is also being converted to propane autogas as well and through it all we have never had an issue doing any of those things to the Starcraft bus It really remains to be a workhorse for our system BOOSTING RIDERSHIP With 53 miles of rail track and 125 railcars 95 bus routes serviced by 630 fixed route buses and 170 paratransit vehicles MTS moves more than 300000 passenger trips in 10 cities and the county every day In fact in FY 2017 the agency served more than 88 million riders Even with those impressive numbers though MTS like many agencies around the nation is seeing a dip in ridership and fare revenue To that end the agencys board unanimously approved changes to the bus network last September adding 2 million in new service The Transit Optimization Plan TOP which includes significant additions to the agencys network of high frequency services and shorter wait times is being implemented in three phases with the first two phases occurring in January and June and the final phase launching this September Our Transit Optimization Plan is sort of like the old comprehensive analysis and is a combination of changes in frequency of service as well adding in some new service and shortening some routes that werent performing well Spraul explains All told we are making adjustments to over 60 percent of our routes and making adjustments to our light rail system as well to better meet market demands and ridership patterns The TOP process included nearly 6000 surveys more than 50 outreach events across the region and a public hearing It also incorporated data that MTS has been accumulating over the years When our CEO Paul Jablonski arrived in San Diego part of the redesign of MTS as a transit system was to implement what we call a market based approach says Spraul So we put in key performance standards that every bus route in the system has to meet and about every two years or so we go through and look at those standards to see which routes are continuing to perform Using that information as well as the feedback we received we developed the TOP plan Spraul explains that MTS serves a diverse area that not only includes the traditional Central Business District but also several edge cities that have developed successful employment centers He adds that the TOP plan also focused on the unique ridership growth the agency sees to and from the citys downtown area south to the border with Mexico a 15 mile distance We continue to see that ridership from our southern area up into San Diego is increasing and with TOP we attempted to reshift and continue to meet ridership demands where our employment education and medical centers are so we reallocated resources for that Spraul says 26 mETRO mAGAZINE AUGUST 2018 metro magazine com SAN DIEGO MTS MTS began using the StarCraft product for its paratransit services in 2008 Pictured from L to R Jay Washburn MTS manager of paratransit and minibus Vassilena Lerinska MTS transit operations specialist Paul Jablonski MTS CEO and Bill Spraul MTS Bus COO San Diego MTS