Walla Walla Valley Traction Company
Posted: August 29, 2012 Filed under: History, Transit 2 Comments(The following was originally written by Blair E. Kooistra for his website “The Virtual Walla Walla Valley Railway.” The site is no longer active, and is only accessible via web crawlers.)
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Walla Walla Valley Traction trolley car 12 on the streets of Walla Walla.
Incorporated on May 17, 1905, the Walla Walla Valley Traction Company was franchised by Walla Walla to operate trolleys in city limits. Despite Walla Walla’s small size, it was blessed with an extensive street railroad system. Within a year, the WWTC had begun expanding southward 14 miles through the apple and cherry orchards along the Walla Walla River toward the twin Oregon towns of Freewater and Milton. Grading on the extension to Oregon began on March 20, 1906. The first rails were laid on September 6 the same year, and within five days, limited operations began. Regular operations to Milton began in April, 1907. The yellow cars made the 45-minute run hourly between 6 a.m. and midnight, meeting at a spring-switch equipped siding just south of the Walla Walla River.
Tribal Transit – Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation
Posted: August 27, 2012 Filed under: Transit Leave a commentIn the northeast corner of Oregon lies the Umatilla Indian Reservation. It’s here where the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation operates a transit system. Originally, the system only served destinations within the actual reservation boundaries with a few routes. Since that time, the system has greatly expanded it’s service range, and now operates with 7 routes covering a span from the Tri-Cities WA to La Grande OR and from Walla Walla WA to Pilot Rock OR.
The system is primarily catered towards members of the tribe, but any member of the general public is able to ride. There are no fares charged for the service either. Most routes run 3 times a day Monday-Friday, with limited Saturday service on a few.
Ever since I first learned about the system several years ago, I’ve noticed that the tribe always does a good job with their published schedules. Maps are another story however. As the system is primarily catered to members of the tribe who live on the reservation, it seems that the planners have an assumption that riders are already familiar with the destinations served. This isn’t always the case though. In the last few years, people living in Pendleton have started using the system more, as the city only has a demand-response system operated by a local cab company.
Transit Tourism – St. Petersburg/Clearwater FL
Posted: July 2, 2012 Filed under: Epic Transit Journey, Fun, Transit, Transit Tourism 4 Comments(This is the first in a semi-regular series I will start posting here at TransitZac. Soon, I will have the long promised posts about my transit adventures from early March ’12.)
On Thursday, June 28th, I had the chance to go west across Tampa Bay to the other side of the metro area, in Pinellas County, to ride the local transit agency, Pinellas Suncoast Transit Authority (PSTA) and see how things operate over there. Joining me (or rather, leading the journey) was fellow transit nerd and HART bus driver Jason Eames, aka @yobusdriver3507.
PSTA MCI #2308
Photo Credit: RidePSTA
Starting our journey at Marion Transit Center in downtown Tampa, we boarded PSTA’s Route 100X. This route, along with PSTA’s other express route, 300X, are operated with a fleet of 10 2003 MCI D4500’s. My memory fails me a bit on this detail, but I believe we rode on unit #2307. While enroute to the western terminus, Gateway Mall, I mainly just watched the road and enjoyed the scenery, as this was the first time I’d ever been across the Gandy Bridge. Jason chatted with the driver about bus driver stuff (for lack of a better term) in the meantime. Other than us, there was just one passenger onboard the bus. (While the bus runs in both directions, the peak emphasis is on Tampa during AM and Pinellas County during PM). At Gateway Mall that other passenger disembarked, while we remained onboard, as the bus driver had kindly offered to let us remain on while he deadheaded back to PSTA’s base.
A Ride on Route 41
Posted: June 25, 2012 Filed under: Fun, Transit 7 CommentsWhen I first arrived in Tampa back in March, one of the goals I gave myself was to see just how much of the HART system I could cover. Having been here for almost 4 months now (quite a few weeks more than I’d originally intended), I’ve been able to ride on just about every single route in the local system and a few express routes as well. Having only two local routes left to ride and finding myself with enough free time on my hands (in part thanks to Tropical Storm Debbie), I decided to check another route off my list today: Route 41.
Brandon Open House (November ’12 Service/Fare Changes)
Posted: June 14, 2012 Filed under: Fun, Transit 3 Comments(Note to my readers: The last time I had a new post here, which was way too long ago, I was living in the Tri-Cities WA and talking mostly about Ben Franklin Transit [BFT]. Since then, I’ve moved to the complete opposite end of the country, and now reside in Tampa FL, home to Hillsborough Area Regional Transit [commonly referred to as HART]. I’ve been promising for a while that I would have several new posts ready asap, but that’s still on the back burner right now. In the mean time, I thought I would just go ahead and jump right ahead into talking about transit here in my new locale. I hope you enjoy, and once again I thank you for continuing to read TransitZac.)
Tuesday night, June 12th, I went out to Brandon to attend the first of several open houses HART is hosting before a public hearing and an official decision from the board on the November service and fare changes. As it was my first time attending an official HART meeting, I was a little apprehensive, but nonetheless excited and intrigued. Since I reside in downtown Tampa, just getting to the meeting itself was half the journey. Below is a bit about the different routes I used to get to/from the meeting, and everything that happened at the meeting itself.
A Map of Transit Across Washington State
Posted: February 28, 2012 Filed under: Epic Transit Journey, Fun, Transit 4 CommentsA few years ago, I was planning a trip to visit my hometown of Whitehorse, Yukon. In an effort to see how frugal I could be, I started exploring any and every option I could find to get me from the Tri-Cities to Vancouver BC. Along the way, I learned about the Airporter Shuttle and how to use transit to get from Seattle to Vancouver BC. It was also around this time when I learned about a website called Epic Transit Journeys. Just as it sounds, an Epic Transit Journey is where you see just how far you can get using only public transportation. (Check the “Epic Transit Journey” category on the right panel to see my posts on past trips.)
The one thing that I always felt was missing from the ETJ website is a map. Without a visual aid to refer to, someone unfamiliar with Washington State who looks at a schedule for Astoria to Longview won’t be able to make sense of it. Since there is quite a few schedules covering just about every inch of the state, I figured it would just be easier to have one full map showing all the different routes one could take between cities using transit.
What Might Have Been
Posted: February 22, 2012 Filed under: Transit 1 CommentBack in 1999, the voters of Washington State approved the passage of Initiative 695. By passing the initiative, the Motor Vehicle Excise Tax (MVET) on car registrations was repealed, as well as a stipulation that voters had to approve all future tax increases was made law. Though the initiative was later declared unconstitutional (largely because it violated the law of a voter initiative covering two topics), the state legislature ended up repealing the MVET themselves to prevent voter backlash.
After the MVET was repealed, many transit agencies across the state were left scrambling for funds, since the MVET had been a long-standing source of their budgets. More importantly, it was a stable source of money, which can’t be said for the volatile and economically-dependant sales taxes that also contributed funds to the budget. A good number of agencies ended up having to cut back service and raise fares as a result. With the exception of 4 transit agencies (Grant Transit Authority, Link Transit, Pacific Transit, and Yakima Transit), every agency in the state has had to raise their local sales tax rate since 1999.
A Bus Route to Connell?
Posted: February 20, 2012 Filed under: Transit 4 CommentsBack when BFT was first established in 1981, it was the first Public Transportation Benefit Area (PBTA) in Washington State to stretch across two different counties, Benton and Franklin (which led to the name of “Ben Franklin Transit” for the agency). In Benton County, the PBTA covers the majority of the county’s population centers, with the exception of Paterson and Plymouth in the south part of the county (across the river from Oregon). Over in Franklin County, it’s a different story, with only the city of Pasco and a small part of unincorporated county (including the “doughnut holes” within Pasco) being covered. Though there are several communities in the northern part of the county, the most desperate for an intercity bus link is Connell.
North Richland Revamp
Posted: February 14, 2012 Filed under: Transit Leave a commentPerhaps one of the weaker links of the BFT system is the service that is provided to the North Richland area. Currently, Route 23 and Route 26 serve the edge of the area with all day service, only going as far north as Stevens Center and the WSU Tri-Cities campus. During peak hours, Route 26 is extended to serve the Battelle/PNNL campus area, located on the southern edge of the Hanford Nuclear Reservation. For off-peak hours, there is taxi feeder service available in the area, though I don’t know how much it gets used (if at all).
Simply put, I think we can find a better way to serve this area.
There’s good reason to visit this issue too. The topic of bringing better service to this part of this city has been coming up a lot lately. Members of the CAC (Citizens Advisory Committee) have asked BFT to consider making changes to better serve North Richland, citing the need to encourage more use of transit by the local workforce. There has also been interest expressed in a worker/driver bus for Hanford, which as I explained in the February board meeting post is upsetting the driver’s union a bit. Regular bus service wouldn’t be able to serve the Hanford Reservation, but the North Richland area does have a lot of Hanford-related workers, particularly Battelle/PNNL, and so the more of those workers we can get out of cars the better.
February 2012 Board Meeting
Posted: February 10, 2012 Filed under: Transit Leave a comment(I stopped doing these specific posts on the monthly BFT board meetings a while back. However, I think last night’s meeting warrants a post about it. In the future, I’ll only do these board meeting specific posts when I feel the need to.)
If I had to summarize this month’s board meeting, I would simply say this: It is going to be an interesting year for BFT.
Ever since I started regularly attending the board meetings, the attendance has always been rather sparse. For most meetings, it was only myself, another rider and DAR driver who are also regular attendee’s, and a representative from the CAC (Citizen’s Advisory Committee). At last night’s meeting, people had to listen in from outside the meeting room, as somewhere between 60-70 fixed-route and DAR drivers had shown up to the meeting.
Transit 509 