New Transportation Plan
The District implemented a new transportation plan this year, one just as complicated as the new student assignment plan. It promised shorter bus rides, better driver retention, reduced carbon emissions and $4 million in savings. It also involved tiered bell times, reduced transportation zones, and lots of community stops. This new Transportation Plan was full of promise (or, at least, full of promises).
There were a few comments about kids with long waits and long rides on the First Day thread. I know that some families make a practice of skipping the bus for the first week to avoid the inevitable shake out of transportation issues.
What has been people's experience?
There were a few comments about kids with long waits and long rides on the First Day thread. I know that some families make a practice of skipping the bus for the first week to avoid the inevitable shake out of transportation issues.
What has been people's experience?
Comments
-- Still waiting
mom of 4 in sps
I know that transportation is a big financial challenge for SPS, but they do seem to have trouble figuring out how many students they have, don't they? This whole thing sounds depressingly familiar.
(I was told that last year's cards would not be reloaded when I called Transportation this summer to see about replacing my daughter's card which had split in half.)
One huge problem with the buses is the tight timelines to deliver a route then turn around and get to the next school for the later route. The district staggered school times to allow one bus to handle multiple schools, but particularly in the beginning of the year, if they don't pay the drivers to practice the route a few times, there is no way for things to go well on Day 1. Any delays on an earlier route mean delays on every route thereafter, which is what we saw yesterday.
I feel lucky after hearing all the stories that our afternoon bus was *only* an hour late yesterday. It didn't arrive at Lincoln until 440PM (school gets out at 335PM). Another bus, however, failed to show up at Lincoln by 525PM, and parents were called to come pick up their kids. No idea if the bus was just totally lost or forgot or what.
Yesterday morning, one route to Lincoln just didn't show up at all. A family was later told that they "forgot" to schedule a driver for it! Another bus made some stops but then got lost, stopped making subsequent stops, and eventually made it to Lincoln (as reported by a parent who rode with her child on that one). Yet another route drove right past a group of kids on Queen Anne, and still another never made it to Laurelhurst to pick up that community stop's kids. So that is five different routes just to Lincoln that had pretty major problems yesterday (and doesn't count my own, which was *only* an hour late).
My concern is also how crowded some of these community stops are. My child is one of 32 kids (!) assigned to Bryant for pick up. The bus leaves 1 minute before the Bryant bell rings. If you haven't been there in the morning, it's worth knowing that our Lowell/Lincoln kids will be congregating outside the school right at the busiest corner for Bryant walkers and bike riders, who are also trying to get where they need to be before the bell rings.
I'm pretty sure that no one from Transportation has ever visited one of these sites to see how their logistics actually work out. Cars are going up and down every nearby side street to deliver the 600 or so Bryant kids to school. Throw in the pedestrians, cyclists, dogs, strollers, you name it, and it's a little chaotic. Adding another 30+ kids to the mix seems imprudent at least to me.
Our walk to our community stop is 2/3 of a mile, but others families got an even worse deal, having to walk 0.9 miles, just under the cut-off. We left our house one hour before the Lincoln bell to account for the long walk, which crosses an arterial, plus the ride. The bus ride is only 20 minutes, but the walk really adds to the trip time.
I'm not personally opposed to community stops, but it seems that these routes could use a few more to make each stop more manageable. Our bus picks up 22 kids at Wedgwood and 32 at Bryant, then there are only 4 or 5 other stops on the entire route. Moving a handful of kids away from WW and Bryant to other nearby community stops (the library, grocery stores, wherever else it's safe to congregate) would not slow things down dramatically, might even speed things up by making each stop less chaotic.
That time may not "count" in the district's analysis, but time is precious to families. Adding a 20- or 30-minute walk to a community stop, two times per day, is a big deal to me. Lincoln is closer to our home than Lowell was, yet our overall commute time is now longer.
Mr. Ed
I'm hearing rumblings that this new plan was not well thought out and they had hire some drivers from out of the city (who don't know Seattle) and again, some confusion over what routes they are actually supposed to be driving.
Also - one poor kindergartner got on the bus to QAE when it should have been to John Hay. Her mom finally found her at QAE and took her to John Hay but poor girl was beside herself while it all got worked out. She's in all of our Opening Day celebration pictures, though ;-)
parent at Queen Anne
another incredulous parent
L@L dad
Why don't you ask the question again in a month to see how this shakes out? Of course the first day was going to be rough...
Trying to be positive.
-- what a mess
All it takes is one road construction project, one icy street, one misdelivered child and every other school on the route is behind. Not just the first day, but everyday.
--ridiculous
That is a purely personal, anecdotal observation -- I don't know if in the long term fewer kids will be riding the busses -- but I wonder. And, as Lori said, the back-to-back routes make their own issues; my daughter's bus was an hour late picking her up because there was a problem on the preceeding route. I will say that one thing I had not thought of was that the community stop means that unless I want my kid to walk home alone, I cannot be home waiting for my child when her bus is running late. Since I have three other kids, all very young, that is a real issue, as I discovered yesterday.
-slp
15th Ave Northbound is a mess with a road project; busses lined up sitting in traffic to get over Ballard bridge. This would account for late busses for schools north of the ship canal yesterday. Not sure if it is one day or ongoing project.
I know some parents are piecing together their bus routes with the help of other parents, and creating Google maps showing the full route.
My son was put on the correct bus (I was there to make sure of it). Then I followed this bus and several buses that went to West Seattle Elem. to pick up and drop off.
My son was eventually dropped off at Pathfinder about 30 minutes after the scheduled time (75 minutes after school out), not too bad.
What I don't like is the scheduled time of 40 minutes on the bus from Gatewood to Pathfinder. That makes for a cranky, hungry kid.
Having been in the district for years, I've learned it can be best to wait 1 week to put the kids on the bus while the routes are smoothed out. I did see a bus come through our neighborhood this week prior to the start of school, so there were some dry runs of the routes.
How was communication handled with parents of those kids stranded at school? On the rare occasions that my childrens' buses have been excessively late in the past, we received calls from Transportation to notify us and they always arrived safely (perhaps sad and tired, but safe).
another parent
And also, since I have friends who work in transportation, I can categorically state that the line staff DOES care about your child's safety and DOES care about whether they are on the right bus.
This plan wasn't the staff's idea, the execution, and decisions about community stops was not done by the line staff who actually are very familiar with various issue on routes citywide. This was entirely management decision. Staff tried to point out some of the obvious problems that would arise and were ignored.
- in the know
This. The community bus stop we've been assigned to is a half mile away, and includes a walk through Ravenna-Cowen park, which sometimes gets a little creepy at dusk. My 2nd grader needs to have me there every morning until the bus comes, plus every afternoon until the bus arrives.
Last year, the bus stop was just outside our house, which was far more manageable, and my kid knew all the adults at the stop since they were all our direct neighbors. This year, if we were to take the bus, I would need to plan on an extra 45-60 minutes each morning and evening to get to the stop, wait, then get home. There are simply too many adults unknown to us at this stop for me to feel comfortable leaving before the bus arrives, or letting my 7 year old walk alone through the park for a half a mile. I won't even go into my bum knee, which makes a two mile daily walk a dicey proposition when it is acting up.
I also have two kids at two schools, one of which is not eligible for bus service, so even if the buses were running on time, there is simply no way I can be in two places at once, given the extra time it now takes for us to get the youngest there and back. I was truly shocked at the assigned stop when it arrived in the mail. I don't know how other families with kids at multiple schools are going to cope, or those with tight time schedules.
Since this new plan is untenable for us, we have no choice but to drive every day. Since I will need to park the car for drop off and pick up, we'll be adding to the daily congestion around the school, plus the extra air pollution with the single car. We really, truly did want to make this bus service work, but this new plan seems deliberately designed to turn families away.
- reluctant driver
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Well, golly! A tech issue in techy land? Why not use some of that Gates Foundation money they have been handing out for a phone system that works? Or maybe the new "technology" QA elementary school can help.(Geesh. Do I have to think of everything?)
-JC.
What's the over/under on how long that will take? Longer than the VAX migration?
What surprises me is that apparently over 3,500 kids (?!? really?) who lost bus service. That's over 5% of the kids in the district losing bus service. Those are pretty enormous cuts.
That number makes me want to see the details of the transportation budget - how much is it? How much is state money designated for transportation and can't be used for anything else? How much was saved with all the start time jiggering? How much have changes in fuel costs affected transportation spending?
Lori observed that current community stops may be problematic, which is interesting. It's hard not to wonder if anyone from transportation sat and compared school start times to bus pick-up times.
On a personal note, our community stop doesn't give us a shorter ride time and extends our total commute time. However, we have long been at just about the end of our line, so a still-pretty-lousy-transit-time may just be the breaks of being at the end of the route.
Our trip time ended up about the same as last year but it's better than the alternative. And to the Transportation Dept's credit, they were very responsive to issues we raised about our proposed community stop and moved it to a safer area.
Gern
I seem to recall Duggan Harmon's non-transparent incremental budgeting presentation where they actually are getting MORE money for transportation.
Not sure what drove the change in the funding formula... Was it some kind of Green initiative? Steaming and frustration due to long walks and waits at community stops contributes to global warming.
I would have to dig to find the previous year information to see trends. I do believe that some of the changes in transportation are being driven by the state changing its funding formula, but I do not recall how or how much.
GENERAL FUND BUDGET - REVENUES AND OTHER FINANCING SOURCES
4199 Transportation-Operations
2009-10 Actual - $ 17,736,364
2010-2011 Proj. - $ 18,348,971
2011-2012 Proj. - $ 18,116,638 up by 2.1% from 2009 levels.
Pg 333 of same
EXPENDITURE BY PROGRAM
99 Pupil Transportation
2009-10 Actual - $ 31,270,199
2010-2011 Proj. - $ 29,414,721
2011-2012 Proj. - $ 28,202,892 down 9.8% from 2009 levels
I remember now, Harmon said that the change in the transportation funding formula impacted Seattle less than other districts.
So, where is the savings being spent? Here and there on pet projects perhaps? Did the board ever get an answer to their question on June 8th regarding savings? Somehow, I doubt it.
If they identify savings, then where does it go? To cover the gap?
Has anyone heard of any issues with Option Schools and Orca cards for Middle Schoolers outside their reference area?
The 2011 Service Standards state that 6th-8th graders assigned to Option Schools get yellow bus if they are inside the service area and Orca cards if elsewhere in the city. But a few people I know have been told that they aren't issuing cards to these kids anymore because of budget cuts. I don't see how they can violate the terms of the Service Standards without a vote of the Board. Did I miss something?
Also, I understand why Transportation wouldn't send letters to people who have never had a bus and won't again this year, but was it really a good idea not to spend a few cents to let people know they were losing transportation? It seems to me that the increased phone/email/angst/screaming and yelling cost had to outweigh whatever monetary savings they realized.
I entirely understand if this was cut for budget reasons, but it would have been nice to know.
Yes, and that triggered the SAO to audit bus headcounts. Look for a finding or at least a management letter next June. Or else our district has kept awesomely good and well documented bus counts and the SAO will find nothing wrong.
I'm sure it was disconcerting for you both though!