[Transit] Metro announcing 4% service cut in fall service change due to staffing shortage

[Katie Wilson]

Does anyone have capacity to start drafting a statement that we can consider on Thursday? I’m happy to review/edit/add to something.

> On May 11, 2023, at 12:39 PM, Katie Wilson <katie at transitriders.org> wrote:
> 
> Thanks for the heads up, Doug. Just wanted to point out that we have our Membership Meeting next Thursday, so if we want TRU to put out some kind of public statement or press release, that would be a good time to discuss and approve one.
> 
> - Katie
> 
>> On May 11, 2023, at 9:27 AM, Doug Trumm <doug at theurbanist.org> wrote:
>> 
>> Hi TRU friends,
>> 
>> Metro just announced a 4% service cut (which include suspending 20 routes, mostly suburban commuter runs) entirely attribued to the operator and mechanic shortage apparently. Mike Lindblom got an early look for a Seattle Times story <https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/transportation/king-county-metro-to-reduce-bus-trips-this-fall-not-enough-drivers/> but they're doing a virtual press briefing this morning to fill the rest of us in and take questions. The Urbanist will attend, but I wanted to flag so we can start thinking about an advocacy response. Also if a TRU member wants to submit a quote for The Urbanist story that would be most welcome. Email me or call 320.237.4771.
>> 
>> Here's the Seattle Times story in case you don't have access:
>> 
>> Short on drivers, King County Metro to reduce bus trips in fall
>> King County Metro Transit proposes to suspend 20 low-ridership bus routes this September because it doesn’t have enough drivers and mechanics to keep the entire fleet running.
>> 
>> To some extent, the reductions formalize what people already see on the street, that certain trips get routinely canceled on short notice. The cuts mainly affect peak-only lines where other buses travel the same roads or a few blocks away.
>> 
>> Hundreds of travelers could find themselves making an extra transfer to buses or light rail, instead of enjoying a direct one-seat ride. For instance, Metro is abandoning its Route 320, just established in October 2021, from Kenmore to South Lake Union via Northgate.
>> 
>> The agency will announce its proposal late Thursday morning, for changes effective Sept. 2. In-person and online meetings for public education and feedback haven’t been scheduled yet.
>> 
>> Metro General Manager Michelle Allison said her goal is to replace “ad hoc” schedules with dependable service. Her agency struggles with the same problems as peers across the U.S., she said.
>> 
>> “We want to really calm that down, and create that predictability, and communicate that in the schedules so people have that assurance,” she said. “So if it’s bad news, people have that guarantee, of what your experience is going to be like.”
>> 
>> Sound familiar? It’s the same rationale Washington State Ferries announced October 2021 for its “alternate schedules,” in response to a shortage of mariners, a situation finally starting to improve in 2023.
>> 
>> In contrast to ferries, which cut service to one boat on busy routes, Metro says it can still run 96% of full service and that 125 of 156 routes are unaffected.
>> 
>> Besides the 20 suspended routes, 12 others will operate with fewer daily trips.
>> 
>> Some would be drastically cut, such as Route 73 through Jackson Park and Maple Leaf to half-hour frequency instead of 15 minutes at peak. Others keep abundant service, such as the Route 36 trolley bus across Beacon Hill, still 10 minutes apart most hours and as often as seven minutes during afternoon peaks.
>> 
>> Allison can’t completely explain staff shortages, but said Metro has an older workforce that’s retiring, and that service industries from retail to health care lost as much as 30% of staff. Metro’s maintenance teams also lost skilled workers who left instead of complying with government vaccination mandates, which King County recently ended, she said. (Gov. Jay Inslee repealed the mandate for state employees Wednesday.)
>> 
>> “We have heard interest from operators, and mechanics in particular, that they’re interested in coming back,” Allison said. Specifics are being worked out with Amalgamated Transit Union Local 587, she said.
>> 
>> Local 587 President Kenneth Price said Metro’s wages are lower than other Western Washington transit agencies, and there’s been little movement by the county in bargaining. Operators are “also working overtimes to fill these shortages,” he said. Contract pay scales include a top rate of $37.96 per hour for experienced bus drivers, and much less for new hires, and $43.46 per hour for mechanics.
>> 
>> The inability to restore neighborhood and downtown service is eroding public confidence, especially with more commuters returning to work, Price said.
>> 
>> County Councilmember Rod Dembowski, of North Seattle, called the reductions painful but needed, to get Metro on a reliable footing before more changes hit in 2024 to sculpt bus lines around Sound Transit’s new Northgate-to-Lynnwood train extension.
>> 
>> “We’ve received too many concerns from riders who are out waiting for a bus that doesn’t come,” he said.
>> 
>> A slow supply chain hinders local service, said Dembowski, who chairs the council committee overseeing transportation. “It takes nine months to get a radiator. The pandemic really shook the system, and I think we tried to come back too quickly.”
>> 
>> Money isn’t the problem.
>> 
>> Metro rode out the pandemic with at least $937 million in federal relief funds. The agency plans to spend $2.47 billion on transit operations in 2023-24, an increase from $1.98 billion the past biennium, plus additional capital grants and spending. King County carries $1.2 billion in transit reserve funds and remains on course to spend $220 million for rechargeable electric buses by 2034.
>> 
>> This spring Metro converted Route 120, which serves Delridge, White Center and Burien, into the RapidRide H Line with electronic information signs, pockets of bus lanes and head-start traffic signals. Travelers glimpsed the spectacle of tulips in planted medians of Delridge Way. The H Line averages 6,635 daily riders compared to around 4,300 a year ago, said spokesperson Jeff Switzer.
>> 
>> The MetroFlex van service, where customers use an app to request personal rides, increased in March so people can choose any destination within Tukwila, Renton Highlands, northern Kent, Rainier Beach/Skyway, Othello, Sammamish/Issaquah Highlands and Juanita.
>> 
>> The suspended routes provided about four or five trips per commute period, usually in corridors with other buses available, Metro says.
>> 
>> The demand for peak-only routes is lower than pre-pandemic, Allison said. In fact, bus ridership as a whole is “flattening” into an all-day stream.
>> 
>> “Cities are going to come back, people are going to move around, mobility needs to be there. We want to be the option of choice for riders in the system, so we have a lot of service out there,” Allison said.
>> 
>> Metro carried 6.5 million passengers in March, predominantly on buses but also Seattle streetcars, MetroFlex, paratransit, county water taxis and van pools, totaling 60% of March 2019 counts, says the National Transit Database. In the roaring 2010s Metro buses carried 400,000 weekday passengers; they hit 240,000 a few days last month.
>> 
>> Metro to suspend 20 routes in September
>> 
>> Seattle/Shoreline: Routes 15, 16, 18, 29, 55, 64, 301, 304, 320
>> 
>> Eastside: Routes 214, 216, 217, 232, 237, 268, 342
>> 
>> South King County: Routes 114, 121, 167, 190
>> 
>> Other routes will provide fewer daily trips: 7, 10, 20, 28, 36, 73, 79, 225, 230, 231, 255, 345
>> 
>> Thanks all,
>> 
>> Douglas Trumm, Executive Director 
>> Pronouns: he, him
>> The Urbanist <http://theurbanist.org/> | 320.237.4771
>> 
>> 
> 

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