The wheels on the bus

I’ll have to admit it: I drank the Kool-Aid.

I’m not a big gulper, though—well, except for beer. Probably wine. I’ll draw the line at Underbergs. And Jameson. Just forget I said anything.

I started from a place of skepticism. When the public information person for the Regional Transportation Commission refused to provide me with any factual information regarding those huge, empty bus stops on Virginia Street before I interviewed David Jickling, director of public transportation for the agency, I knew what was going on.

The only reason flacks refuse hard information but promote an interview is because they want to manipulate the coverage that results. Simple as that. They want the reporter unable to prepare pointed questions. Interviews then become more like conversations, friendlier and much, much longer. In fact, often they’ll take all the time a reporter has budgeted for a story, so other views are less likely to be aired. And that results in one-sided information making the paper.

But, like I said, I overcame the initial offense. It’s just how the game is played these days.

Here are the facts. Each of those humongous, unpopulated bus stops cost a quarter-million dollars. There are six of those stations right now, and there are two more, plus six smaller ones, to be built in the second wave of construction, which is proceeding now. RTC calls the big ones, full stations. There are several major transportation corridors that will be built up after the Virginia Street one. They were 100 percent funded by federal dollars from the Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality Improvement (CMAQ) Program, which Renoites couldn’t have spent on school books, parks or bribes. CMAQ funds are only to be used in urban areas to mitigate air pollution.

And since Nevadans get so few of our tax dollars back from Washington, D.C., perhaps we should be a little grateful that some economic benefit was gained, future congestion in our aortal arteries is planned for, and the money wasn’t used to kill civilians in foreign countries or given to home thieves.

The idea behind the megastations and the megabuses that service them is this: Virginia Street can’t be widened in a practical manner. Our civic leaders want and expect increased foot traffic on the thoroughfare between downtown and Meadowood Mall. The Virginia Street corridor is already the busiest line, accounting for about 25 percent—5-6,000 rides a day—of all transit trips taken in the Truckee Meadows. If Northern Nevada returns to the economic forecast of five or six years ago, in 15 years, we’re going to need efficient mass transit on Virginia Street. And if we wait until we need it, it will be too late.

The reason those huge bus stops are so empty is because the bus line works efficiently. It comes through about every 10 minutes during the busiest times of day, Monday-Friday, 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. At other times, the frequency is less, and the Rapid bus (the express) doesn’t run between 8 p.m. and 6 a.m., but the RTC Connect bus (the local) is there to pick up the slack. With the seven diesel-electric hybrid, super-sized buses, which at 3.5 mpg get better gas mileage than the old 40-footers’ 2.5 mpg, the bus stops should be empty. In a decade or so, if the economy recovers, we’ll see people waiting.

Can I simplify this? The money was available, we could imagine a unmet need, we built the bus stops.

“That’s our future, and that’s what we’re hoping through these better buses, these better stations and amenities, with other things we’re doing in the corridor, that people will start to say, ‘You know what? Riding transit up and down the corridor works really well for me, and it’s as convenient as or even more convenient than using my automobile,’” Jickling said.

Even now, it’s not like nobody is using the bus system. In total trips in 2011, the RTC Rapid and Connect provided 1.8 million rides.

Preparing for the future makes sense to me.

Get on the bus

It was Saturday, and I was in the mood for adventure. The weather had been so beautiful, and it had been a long time since I’d taken a bus ride so I decided to check out the new amenities. Even though I live within the McCarran Loop, I’m 2.1 miles from the nearest bus stop. That meant the only intelligent solution was to drive the five miles to the 4th Street Station. A few minutes before our planned departure time, 1 p.m., I grabbed my 14-year-old son, and we drove my 1998 Jeep Grand Cherokee Laredo down to pick up my girlfriend. Forty minutes later, she was ready to go, and we were off.

Tickets for a full day of riding were only $4 for each adult, $2 for the kid. A one-way pass with transfer for adults is $2, so it behooves riders to buy for the day. We were able to use a debit card at the machine inside the swanky 4th Street Station, and there was a bus waiting for us.

Plainly, the bus runs on a more regular schedule than I do. There were seven people on the bus that pulled out of the station at 2 p.m., one of whom was pacing up and down the center aisle making me a bit uncertain. He turned out to be an all right guy, though, offering various anecdotes about the bus, complaints about the range of service, and tips about purchasing long-term tickets. His complaint about the service was that he had to grab a cab from the terminus of this route, Meadowood Mall, to his final destination, which would cost him some $20.

One person got on, two people got off at the Peckham Lane Station. Several people looked mournfully at the bus from the RTC Connect stations, which the Rapids don’t stop at. The idea is speed. Easy loading, fewer stops, the 4.6 mile ride to Meadowood Mall took a bit short of 30 minutes. There’s a lot more to see from a seat on the bus than from behind a steering wheel.

And after spending several hours wandering the mall, we returned to the bus, stuck our tickets in the scanner, and rode back to Fourth Street. Easy peasy. Even though it was Saturday, a lot of day shifts end about five, so the bus filled up. Thirteen people started with us at Meadowood, nine got on at Peckham, another 20 got on at the Peppermill, five more at Plumb Lane. We arrived at the station with an almost full bus, handed our all-day passes to the first person we saw who needed a ticket and headed back to our car.

I get it. It’s easy to see why many members of the community have questioned the wisdom of spending this money in this way at this time. But despite my snotty tone, taking a sip of the magic Kool-Aid on RTC Rapid may be just the way to envision a future where there is efficient mass transit on the major corridors in the Truckee Meadows. We’ve got to start somewhere, and if we’d planned 15 years ahead 30 years ago, we’d be there now. Plainly, the biggest problem in Reno’s bus system is that access to the transit system can be inconvenient, and once people are in their cars or on their bicycles, they’re far more likely to eschew the bus line entirely.