The short range planning study was an opportunity to build upon BCRTA’s recent success with the BGo county-wide microtransit service and focus on near-term, implementable changes to the fixed-route system. With county-wide microtransit service in place, fixed-route service needed to be streamlined and targeted to serve corridors and destinations with the greatest potential for ridership and productivity.
Foursquare ITP led the market and service analyses to determine the strengths and weaknesses of the existing network, and to identify opportunities for service improvement. BCRTA recently installed APC/AVL technology through their bus fleet, which enabled a fresh data-driven assessment of the system’s ridership, productivity, and on-time performance. The technical analysis and input from BCRTA staff and stakeholders was used to develop two preliminary service improvement scenarios that were used to inform collaborative planning of a final recommended service improvement scenario, incorporating fixed-route and microtransit services.
In addition to developing service recommendations, the Foursquare ITP team developed a new naming convention for BCRTA routes that will make the network easier for riders to understand.
Solutions and Outcomes
- Developed a new fixed-route and on-demand bus network plan that accounted for new agency data and recently implemented microtransit service.
- Created a new, more legible route naming convention.