TO: AC Transit Board of Directors
FROM: Michael A. Hursh, General Manager/Chief Executive Officer
SUBJECT: August 2024 Service Changes
BRIEFING ITEM
AGENDA PLANNING REQUEST: ☐
RECOMMENDED ACTION(S):
Title
Consider receiving a report on the District’s planned service changes associated with the August 2024 Sign-up.
Staff Contact:
Ramakrishna Pochiraju, Executive Director of Planning & Engineering
Body
STRATEGIC IMPORTANCE:
Goal - Convenient and Reliable Service
Initiative - Service Quality
In addition to the return of Supplementary Service operated during the school year, the service changes going into effect on August 11, 2024 include a number of schedule reliability improvements developed in conjunction with feedback from Amalgamated Transit Union #192 (ATU) leadership. These improvements should improve reliability for AC Transit riders and improve schedules and layovers for bus operators.
BUDGETARY/FISCAL IMPACT:
Total daily vehicle platform hours will increase from the June 2024 service change by 296.2 on weekdays, by .9 hours on Saturdays and by 2.7 on Sundays. In total, these changes will yield an annual increase of 75,422 platform hours, resulting in an annualized estimated cost of $11,531,254, assuming a rate of $152 per hour. Parsing the estimated costs further, the resumption of Supplementary Service will increase costs by $8,759,588, while the remaining $2,771,666 covers the addition of operator resources for line improvements. The planned August service change incorporate eight more operators than the June headcount, for a total of 899 signed positions. The calculated cost for these service improvements falls within the District’s operating budget as the number of operators required falls within the District’s available operator headcount.
(Note: Revenue hours are a more accurate reflection of what service is provided to the District’s bus riders, while platform hours are used to reflect the District’s cost of providing such service.)
Total daily revenue hours will increase from the June 2024 service change by 141 on weekdays, and by 4 hours on Saturdays. In total, these changes yield an annual increase of 36,163 revenue hours. The resumption of Supplementary Service represents 22,348 of the total annual revenue hours. The remainder of the changes (to lines identified through analysis of peak period performance for runtime and layover improvements) amount to a net increase of 13,815 revenue hours.
BACKGROUND/RATIONALE:
AC Transit typically conducts four Sign-ups each year as required by the Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) with the ATU. These occur in March, June, August and December.
Below is a summary of the service changes included in the August Sign-up:
• Noteworthy Supplementary Service changes this fall will occur on lines 33 and 76 to better serve schools.
o A series of weekday Line 33 trips - an eastbound AM trip, a westbound PM trip (Monday through Friday, excluding Wednesdays) and a westbound PM Wednesday early release trip - will operate from Harrison Street & MacArthur Boulevard to Park Boulevard at MacArthur Boulevard. This is a direct request from ATU leadership to address the needs of Oakland High School ridership.
o On Line 76, the weekday 3:46 p.m. trip departing Hilltop Mall en route to Richmond BART will convert to two shorter Line 676 trips. This conversion provides extra capacity for Summit and Tamalpais schools.
• Please refer to attachment SR 24-354 Attachment 2 Fall 2024 Supplementary Service Adjustments for a comprehensive view of all Supplementary Service changes.
• In accordance with the ATU and based on the findings in the route analysis, staff pinpointed five routes per division to adjust for better running times, layovers, and reliability. To improve operator comfort, meal breaks are being increased on many runs while simultaneously minimizing operator travel to get to the next piece of work during meal breaks. Almost all runs are scheduled to have meal breaks greater than 20 minutes, with the vast majority over 25 minutes, exceeding the 15-minute meal-break minimum outlined in the Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA).
• To address reliability issues on Line 6, additional time and resources will be added in the afternoon. Additionally, the downtown Berkeley terminal will be relocated closer to the Residence Inn in downtown Berkeley, which will be used as an operator restroom facility.
• To improve bathroom access on Line 51B at the Berkeley Marina, the end of line is being moved to University Avenue and the Bait Shop, which has already been used as an operator restroom in practice. This will improve restroom access proximity at the Berkeley Marina while improving the District’s CAD-AVL and real-time predictions on the route to reflect field conditions.
• At the request of the ATU, staff runtime on Line 18 is being added with no change in headways. Additional running and layover time will improve reliability and provide better restroom access for the operators.
• New student housing and streetscape reconfiguration necessitated a change in the layover locations on Line 52. At all times of day, the bus will now lay over on the southside of Monroe Street and 10th Street. The northside of Monroe and 10th Street will be used for a Line 18 layover.
• To address overload/standee issues, additional trips are being added to Transbay lines G, P, V and W. Line P westbound trips will depart at 6:20 am and 6:50 am. Line V westbound trips will depart at 7:20 am and 8:30 am. A Line W westbound trip will depart at 6:25 am to the Salesforce Transit Center. A Line G 6:40 pm trip is being added in the eastbound direction. These additional Transbay trips were created to relieve overcrowding and will not require additional bus operators.
• Operator feedback regarding current construction and new roadway design informed a minor routing change on Line 71 to maintain safe operating conditions. Using boarding and deboarding data, staff selected the College Lane & Mission Bell Drive stop to be put into service in place of the Mission Bell Drive & El Portal Drive stop.
• Line 72/72M will receive additional operator resources, with added run time bringing the total number of blocks (or buses) on the route to seventeen. Weekend service will have runtime adjustments without blocks added. In the southbound direction, the San Pablo Avenue & Marin Avenue timepoint moved to San Pablo Avenue & Monroe Street. In the northbound direction, the timepoint remains at San Pablo Avenue & Marin Avenue. This timepoint was moved closer to the Line 52 operator relief point at UC Village to better facilitate operator travels. The northbound direction will move to Monroe at a future date, pending improvements to the bus stop.
• Postponed in June, Early Bird Express lines 706 and 707 will now been discontinued at the request of BART as the service sponsor. To compensate for this service reduction, Line 703 has new stops at Bay Fair BART and Fruitvale BART stations.
• To increase layovers and restroom access, the weekday Line 1T schedule is adding an operator resource.
• Line 51A is receiving an additional weekday block and operator resource. This block will be in service during the PM peak commute hour to improve running times and layover compliance.
• Due to bridge congestion and subsequent on-time performance issues, runtime is increasing on Line O eastbound trips in the peak period between 3 pm and 6:30 pm.
• To improve service reliability on Line 93, an all-day block and operator resources will be added, bringing the total to four all-day blocks, which is one more than pre-pandemic levels.
• Minor schedule changes will be made on lines 7, 12, 20, 21, 29, 39, 51B, 56, 57, 70, 71, 72R, 73, 74, 76, 95, 96, 97, 200, 217, 232, 376, F, G, LA, and L.
To provide more information and transparency for the August service changes, staff has included three attachments:
1. Service Adjustments Summary Report that includes the estimated cost of service changes
2. Fall 2024 Supplementary Service Adjustments that summarizes changes to service to schools, primarily to respond to school bell time adjustments for the coming school year
3. Fall 2024 Stop Difference Report that lists all of the bus stop changes for the August service changes, with changes categorized as add stop (AS), remove stop (RS), add line (AL), remove line (RL) and combine line (CL).
Long-term Detour Update
Lastly, to improve staff communications with the Board on long-term service detours, staff will include a section in the report on active and upcoming detours associated with the coming service change. As of the completion of this staff report, there are no long-term detours associated with the August service change. There are detours due to construction on Line 52 in UC Village, Line 6 on Durant and Dana Street, Line 65 on Senior Loop, and Line 96 in Alameda Point. However, these detours are expected to end before or within implementation of the August service change.
Looking ahead, staff is coordinating with the Alameda County Transportation Commission (ACTC) as the project lead, as well as the City of Oakland and the City of Alameda, on the pending construction of the Oakland Alameda Access Project. While this project will ultimately benefit traffic circulation between Oakland and Alameda through the Webster and Posey tubes, construction of this project will require ACTC to close one lane of traffic in each tube for an extended period of time. While a detour is not planned at this time, construction could result in significant delays to lines 19, 20, 51A, 96, O and W.
ADVANTAGES/DISADVANTAGES:
Advantages: The advantage of receipt of the Board receiving this report is to provide awareness of staff’s work with the ATU to make service adjustments that will improve both rider and operator experience. Implementation of the changes described above allows the District to improve operator work schedules and passenger satisfaction with service reliability and additional Transbay trips to reduce overcrowding. It also demonstrates good faith efforts on the part of the District to work in concert with the ATU to jointly address persistent reliability and working condition concerns.
Disadvantages: Staff has identified no disadvantages of the Board receiving this report, nor of staff implementing the August service changes.
ALTERNATIVES ANALYSIS:
The primary alternative to implementing these changes is making no changes, which would not be responsive to the needs of our operators or riders.
PRIOR RELEVANT BOARD ACTION/POLICIES:
SR 24-109
ATTACHMENTS:
1. Service Adjustments Summary Report
2. Fall 2024 Supplementary Service Adjustments
3. Fall 2024 Stop Difference Report
Prepared by:
Christine Eduok, Transit Schedules Administrator
In Collaboration with:
Ajay Martin, Transit Schedules Manager
Approved/Reviewed by:
Robert del Rosario, Director of Service Development and Planning
Ramakrishna Pochiraju, Executive Director of Planning & Engineering
Chris Andrichak, Chief Financial Officer
Dwain Crawley, Director of Transportation
Salvador Llamas, Chief Operating Officer
Shayna van Hoften, Interim General Counsel/Chief Legal Officer