Signals March 2002


	March 4, 2002

ALUMNI NOTES:

David and Heather (Verwers) Karolus are the proud parents of a baby girl. Dannah Mae was born on January 21, 2002. She weighed in at 7 pounds, 10 ounces, and was 21 inches long. Congratulations! (Brent)

OPERATIONS:

Extra Moonlight Express Session: During Spring Break (March 18-22), CyRide will operate Moonlight Express (MLX) on Saturday, March 23^rd. During this period, the NCAA Women’s Regional Basketball Tournament will take place in Ames. Those drivers interested in driving this extra MLX shift, please contact the dispatchers. (George)

Bus Window Destination Signs: Drivers, when your run has ended, please remove any window destination signs from your bus and return them to the file cabinet in George’s office. Doing so will lessen confusion wlth other drivers and passengers. (George)

Time Off Stats: Looking for some time off? Consider these statistics. If you ask off using paid vacation time and give ten days notice (not including the day of submission or the day you want off), statistically you will get the time off 98.4% of the time. If you ask for time off with no pay (Request), you will get the time you want 86.4% of the time. If you ask for time off either with or without pay and you give less than ten days notice (Late Request), you still get the time you want 69.7% of the time. Bottom line: If you plan ahead, you stand a better chance of getting the time off you need. (George)

Time Off Over Spring Break: If you have requested time off during Spring Break be sure to check with the scheduling dispatchers (Jen or Jason) to see if your request has been covered. If any days or shifts have not been covered you are responsible for them. Don’t forget that you can ask other drivers to fill shifts for you but they will not be able to sign up until the OWD drivers have been assigned hours for the week. It is possible that you will not know for sure if your runs are covered until just before you want to leave so "don’t go until you know". (Karen)

Summer Changes: There will be a few changes to the summer schedules this May:

· The weeknight "Lone Red" won’t be alone anymore. A second bus on Green and Blue will operate on weeknights giving 40 minute headways on Green until about 10:00pm and Blue until about 11:0pm.

· An Orange route shuttle from ISC will run from 7:22am to 9:50am to ease the overcrowding we experienced last summer.

· Purple route will operate every 40 minutes all day long so that it can go out to Mortensen/Miller. (Tom D.)

Fall 2002 Changes: I’ll list the changes for next fall here the next couple months. Hopefully I can remember them all:

· ISU students will be able to ride all routes for free just by showing their fee card (no fee card necessary on the Campus Circulator routes).

· All passengers boarding stops at ISU will ride free without showing anything. Hopefully, this will speed up the boarding process and help keep buses on time.

· Orange route will run at 6-7 minute intervals from ISC all day long instead of the current 5-10 minute intervals.

· Gold route will operate every 10 minutes during parts of the day (to be determined) and will run from 6:00pm to 10:00pm Monday-Thursday nights.

· A new Cardinal route will operate between the Towers and Frederiksen (Hawthorn) Court every 8-16 minutes from 7:30am to 6:00pm Monday-Friday, and every 30 minutes from 6:00pm to 10:00pm Monday-Thursday night.

· The Orange, Gold, and Cardinal routes will be renumbered 21, 22, and 23 to differentiate the Campus Circulator routes from the other routes.

· The Brown and Gray routes will combine into the Brown route running from the ISU Research Park to North Grand Mall (and back). It will run every 20 minutes in the rush hours and every 30 minutes during the midday. With the Cardinal route serving the Towers, we were able to reassign the hours from the old Brown and Gray routes into the new Brown route and give more frequent service to both the north and south ends of town.

· Purple route will run every 30 minutes in the morning and every 60 minutes the rest of the day.

· A shuttle bus to the Des Moines Airport will operate everyday over semester break except Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, and New Years Day. (Tom D.)

Driver Run Picks: Summer and Fall run picks will be on the following dates:

· Summer Full Time – April 5 to April 10

· Fall Full Time – April 17 to April 22

· Summer Part Time – April 15 to April 22

· Fall Part Time – April 25 to May 3

There will be handouts for the newer drivers in April about how the run pick works and what to expect. (Tom D.)

HIRING AND TRAINING: As you may have already seen, we conducted another recruitment. We are anticipating the need for more drivers with fare-free for this fall. (Brent

MARKETING

Dial-A-Ride: We will be offering Dial-A-Ride service as a contract to local transportation providers. CyRide will provide the two new buses (960 and 961) and the contractor will provide drivers, maintenance, and supervision of the service. Bids will be opened in May or June. If the bids are low enough, Dial-A-Ride will be operated by the lowest, responsible bidder starting in mid-August. We did this in 1994 and did not receive bids that were lower than our cost of operation. If bid prices are too high, we will continue to operate Dial-A-Ride. If the private sector can operate it with less cost, then we will contract it out for at least three years. This is another way to save taxpayer's money and help minimize the effects of the $70,000 shortage of money from the State of Iowa that is occurring this year. We expect another $30,000 to $50,000 reduction next year. (Bob

SHOP

Unit 859 Five buses were purchased when the City of Ames created CyRide in 1976. We are in the process of rebuilding Unit 859, the last one still on the road. We are fixing the body and going to paint this bus in its original colors. The windows will be replaced and the interior cleaned up. New seats will be added. Sporting new colors and looking good, this bus will be used in maintenance and for switching out drivers. Look for 859 to be on the road in a month or so. (Terry

New Buses Bids were opened on February 19 for eight new 40-foot high floor buses. The award will be made to Orion at a cost of $265,198 per bus. These buses will be identical to the Orions that we received last year, except that they will have the traditional red padded passenger seats. Delivery is expected some time before April, 2004. (Bob

Garage: The architect has prepared preliminary plans for the building addition. It will be located to the north of doors 8 - 11 and will hold 14 buses and a new wash bay and bus washer. ISU and various city departments are now reviewing the plans. In a perfect world, bids will be opened in August and construction will start in the fall. Construction will last 12 to 15 months. (Bob)