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Muni study finds reliability top rider priority; staff outline data, outreach and alternatives timetable
Summary
MTA and Controller's Office staff told the committee the Transit Effectiveness Project’s market research and service analyses show reliability is the top rider concern and identified seven market segments; staff plan quarterly baseline data, automatic passenger counters on 10% of buses, and public workshops this fall before selecting a preferred alternative.
MTA and Controller's Office officials presented an interim report on the Transit Effectiveness Project (TEP), a comprehensive study intended to reshape San Francisco’s transit network after 25 years without a full system review.
Julie Kirschbaum, the MTA program manager for TEP, said the study combines travel‑demand modeling, a 15,000‑rider onboard survey (2004), and a 600‑person resident telephone survey (579 completed) conducted in English, Spanish and Cantonese. Market research and revealed‑preference work identified six factors shaping travel decisions — reliability, sensitivity to travel time, comfort, flexibility, cost and safety — and produced seven market segments grouped by time sensitivity, cost sensitivity and flexibility. Kirschbaum corrected an earlier error in the safety calculation and said reliability emerged as the dominant concern across segments.
Kirschbaum described technical work to produce baseline route data (on‑off activity at every stop), installation of automatic passenger counters on 10% of the fleet, and quarterly baseline reporting to permit ongoing service analysis rather than waiting decades for a comprehensive study. She said the team will combine market research and service metrics to draft two to three alternative networks and plan broad public outreach to get stakeholder and decision‑maker feedback in the fall, narrowing to a preferred alternative by winter.
Supervisors questioned outreach to specific constituencies including The Presidio, families and people with disabilities. Kirschbaum and Sally Allen (Controller's Office) said they are coordinating outreach with the Mayor’s Council on Disabilities, Lighthouse for the Blind and other partners, are conducting targeted forums for youth and families, and have an information line and an online survey. Kirschbaum estimated at least 95% of the bus fleet is accessible and said nonaccessible community lines are being phased out as low‑floor vehicles arrive.
Sally Allen described stakeholder governance: a Citizen Advisory Committee, monthly advisory meetings since June (previous year), a mailing list of roughly 3,500 contacts, multilingual information lines, and plans for three rounds of citywide workshops tied to service alternatives and consensus building. Staff said they plan a public outreach push in early fall and will hire a communications officer dedicated to TEP outreach (position funded in the current year budget). Committee members and public speakers praised the technical approach and asked staff to return in several months with service‑analysis results.
