Quote:
Originally Posted by Scraperdude801
@Makid, the only reason bus ridership has been dropping is because routes that were historically 15 min intervals are now 30 minute, while other routes have been done away with altogether. There are a lot of people who could still use the bus service, but don't because it is so inconvenient.
For instance, I ride the bus everyday, but to get from my apartment on 3rd E and 2nd S to 1300 E and 1700 S where I work, I still end up walking 6 blocks each way, and this is one of the better routes I've lived on in terms of reliability. Sure, I could walk less and transfer more, but then my commute goes from 35 mins to 60-90 mins depending on the synchronicity of all the transfering busses. URA has done this by design, so they can join the real estate game and beef up prices of land along the trax lines, as well as build more trax lines. I love the trains, but I don't like the dishonesty.
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I figured that it was due to bus frequency cuts. I think by restoring the frequency and increasing the frequencies on other lines to increase the number of lines with frequencies of 15 minutes better will further increase ridership for both bus and rail.
Also, I did look at previous years and it looks like Bus and Trax both see an increase of roughly 5,000 riders daily during the 4th quarter. With this, Trax will be over 72K average daily to continue to the 5+% increase Year over Year but Bus service will still be down roughly 5%.
I know that funding is being restored for some lines and frequencies and wish that it would be able to be increased without a dedicated tax increase.
With a tax increase, I would love to see something that allows the Counties to allow a vote for a tax increase for Bus frequency and expansion as well as a separate increase passed by Cities for general Transit improvements.
By this I mean that SL County could allow voting on the general frequencies and service across multiple boundaries while SLC/Sandy/West&South Jordans could all allow votes for transit improvements within their cities.
This way UTA could see passage of the general transit increase for Bus service frequency and BRT expansion while SLC could vote to expand Trax on 4th South to the Central Station, Street Car lines or a dedicated SLC Branded bus service.
Sandy would be able to vote on a connection between Trax and Frontrunner.
And so forth.
It is also possible that the cities could just ask voters to pass a general sales tax increase for transit. This would allow them to prioritize which items to do first and as each one is complete, move to the next project without needing to have it brought up for a re-vote.
I am not sure who said it but I think within SL County, we are nearly done with large scale rail expansion. 5600 West and possibly to the Cottonwood Canyons are the only real expansions left that would cross city boundaries.
This is why I am excited about bus expansion for the County. It is also why I am expecting cities to be the focus of their own transit expansions. This way Herriman, which has wanted a Trax line extension could get it without those in the rest of SL County needing to chip in for a lot of the expense as the benefits for the rest of the County are less.
Hopefully the bills to allow the increases will pass this upcoming session. If they do (and are subsequently accepted by voters), I think we will see ridership increase on all forms of transit and we start to see a fully fundamental shift in the perception of transit and its role in each community.