CyRide Signals Aug 2006


	August 14, 2006

ADMINISTRATION: Sheri Kyras started as the Transit Director on July 21. She had been a planner at the Des Moines MTA and has been assistant general manager and interim general manager for many years at the MTA. She has a wide range of experiences in obtaining and administering grants. With the transition to a new federal program in 2002, Sheri’s experiences with the federal programs will help CyRide obtain more grants for capital and expansion of operations.

Transit Feasibility Study - At the July meeting, the CyRide board approved hiring a consultant to assist staff in a Transit Feasibility Study. This study will examine up to seven corridors/areas of the city to determine if new or modified service is needed to meet the Ames community’s transit needs in the future. Potential corridors being discussed for analysis are:

    Corridor 1 – ISU Center/Parking north and east to the ISU Campus
    Corridor 2 - an east-west alignment extending from the ISU Campus to Ames downtown business district
    Corridor 3 – an east-west alignment extending from the ISU Campus and areas of Ames along 13^th Street to the proposed new mall site.
    Corridor 4 – a north-south corridor connecting Ames/ISU with Ankeny and other transit options into Des Moines
    Corridor 5– The South Duff retail area along South Duff from Lincoln Way to S. 16^th St.
    Corridor 6 – Southwest Ames along and adjacent to Mortensen Road from Haywood Avenue west
    Study Area 1 – North Grand Mall area and retail areas surrounding the Mall on North Grand Ave.

This study is anticipated to begin late this fall and take approximately 6 – 8 months to complete. (Sheri)

Transit Planner - CyRide will be seeking a new Transit Planner whose main job responsibilities will include preparation of documents to meet state and federal regulations and development of service plans. State and federal requirements have grown substantially in the last several years and a planner will assist CyRide in maintaining compliance with these new regulations and help to aggressively seek new grant funding to expand services and modernize the fleet. It is anticipated that a new Planner can be hired and begin work in November. (Sheri)

OPERATIONS:

Service Changes for Fall: There will be changes to the S. 16^th Orange and Saturday Yellow and the addition of Saturday Brown route service effective August18.

#4 Gray – The S. 16^th Orange route will be renamed #4 Gray route and will be extended to SE 16^th & S. Dayton. Since SE 16^th is not paved yet, the route will use Hwy. 30 between D. Duff and S. Dayton until next summer at least. The bus will turn around in the dead end section of Dayton south of SE 16th. When a bus turnaround is built near DMAAC (summer 2007 or 2008), the route will be extended to Bell Ave.

#5 Yellow – Saturday Yellow will run every 30 minutes all day.

#6 Brown – Saturday Brown route will operate every 40 minutes between North Grand Mall and the ISU campus from 8:30am to 6:23pm.

#23 Orange - The route at Vet Med will change due to the expansion of the building. The bus will turn around in the lot behind the child care center instead of going behind Vet Med.

SAFETY: Kids Crossing in Front of the Bus: Please ensure that when children depart your bus that they do not cross in front of your vehicle (especially when transferring from one bus to another across a street). Children should move to the rear of the bus so they can see oncoming traffic. If necessary, have small children exit the bus through the front doors in order for you to better determine where they are. With school starting this month, we will have many new and unfamiliar "little riders." Please be careful! (Tom and George)

Time Off Reminder: This is just a reminder that we do not guarantee time off for the first two weeks of the fall semester (Monday, August 21 through Friday, September 1, 2006). We will have some open runs during this time so it would be a good time to pick up extra hours. (Karen)

HIRING AND TRAINING:

Training: Thanks to everyone’s hard work helping to get all of our new drivers through training and ready for Fall. We really appreciate all of the work that the instructors have done to help with our additional drivers. (Tom and George)

New Faces: Seeing unfamiliar faces in the break-room lately? Since the end of the spring semester, CyRide has started 19 new drivers. When meeting these new drivers, give them a warm welcome! (Tom and George)

SHOP: Unit 999 (2006 F450) arrived in June twenty months after it was ordered. The new Ford shop truck replaces unit 854. It is equipped with an engine mounted air compressor, joy stick controlled snow plow, and other cool gadgets that make shop employees smirk. Unit 854 will be disposed of via Ebay sometime in August.

Please join us in welcoming Brian Stalzer and Quentin Toresdahl to the shop. Brian is a recent technical college graduate. Quentin brings a wealth of auto repair experience from a local business. We are extremely pleased to have them join our talented staff of mechanics.

You might have noticed that four trees have been removed from the property. A tree specialist from ISU examined the trees earlier this summer. The two large hardwoods in the parking lot were rotten and hollow inside. The two pine trees were removed because they were trimmed too aggressively and were sick. The trees will be replaced after the office is remodeled and expanded in late 2007 or early 2008.

Four new Orion lowfloors are scheduled to be delivered in late September. (Rich)

MARKETING: "A Smile . . . Brightens The Entire Day" is the fall marketing theme. The Mall issue and various school district issues polarize many people in Ames. The "Smile" theme is a lightweight attempt to brighten the sometimes pessimistic attitude of some people in Ames. Interior ad cards are being installed in buses with this theme with translations from China, Poland, Germany, Turkey, Columbia, Indonesia, and Italy. If people from additional countries would like to translate for us, we can make additional car cards.

The electronic destination signs have this theme in English, Spanish, Italian, Polish, and German. New electronic signs will be retrofitted into the Gilligs and new Orion V’s later this summer. So lighten up and smile!