Examination of Transit Agency Coordination with Electric Utilities
Report Number: S-175
Publication Date: 07/22/2024
Public transit agencies across the United States are transitioning conventional bus fleets to battery electric buses (BEBs). This transition requires large investments in charging infrastructure as well as new demands on the power grid, which provides opportunities for partnership with electric utilities to upgrade grid supply and energy loads, and also to reduce costs during peak load.
This report provides practitioners and operational staff at public transit bus agencies and electric utilities with the state of current practices by agencies and utilities that are collaborating on BEB planning and deployments.
Mental Health, Wellness, and Resilience for Transit System Workers
Report Number: R-245
Publication Date: 07/11/2024
Transit agency leadership must make a real and concerted effort to take the mental health and overall wellness of frontline workers more seriously. Leadership can play an important role by making a clear commitment and dedicating resources to address mental health, wellness, and resiliency at their agencies. Ultimately, this means that more funding and staff resources are needed to address barriers and to develop, implement, and support programs aimed at improving mental health, wellness, and resiliency. This includes staff dedicated to implementing and monitoring holistic wellness programs.
This report provides a detailed summary of common factors that influence the mental health, well-being, and resiliency of frontline transit workers and includes a range of solutions that transit agencies can implement to address them. Findings were determined using a mix of research methods, including multiple interviews and focus groups with frontline employees, transit agency management, and union leadership at two different points in the project.
Supplemental to the report are a research brief and an implementation plan.
Transit Agencies Providing or Subsidizing Innovative Micromobility Projects
Report Number: LRD-61
Publication Date: 07/02/2024
The use of scooters, bicycles, e-bikes, and other forms of micromobility has accelerated due to the COVID-19 pandemic, urban congestion, and parking restrictions. Some transit agencies provide or subsidize micromobility to bridge the gap between transit stops and destinations beyond a comfortable walking distance. While bikes and scooters are not new, micromobility has only recently been used in public transit.
This report, presents practices for transit agencies to consider when implementing shared-use micromobility systems to provide and support public transit, including accessibility, safety, regulation, jurisdiction, service quality, theft, insurance, liability, security, tracking, licensing, permitting, franchising, billing, maintenance, environmental justice, and compliance with civil rights laws. It also provides examples of cities regulating bike and scooter share programs and transit agencies participating in such programs.
Assessing Lifecycle and Human Costs of Bus Operator Workstation Design and Components
Report Number: R-247
Publication Date: 06/18/2024
Driving trucks and buses is a physically demanding occupation that carries one of the highest injury rates of major occupational categories in the United States. Drivers often work in postures that increase risk of low back pain and other musculoskeletal disorders, slow their response time, and put them at increased risk for acute injuries due to crashes.
This report creates an easy-to-use toolkit for predicting the long-term safety of and promoting a healthy environment in bus operator workstations.
Supplemental to the report is a spreadsheet tool.
Tactile Wayfinding in Transportation Settings for Travelers Who Are Blind or Visually Impaired
Report Number: R-248
Publication Date: 04/12/2024
Travelers who are blind or visually impaired use a variety of cues and strategies to orient themselves within their surroundings and move through space to where they want to go. This wayfinding process can be particularly challenging in complex urban environments where some cues, such as detectable edge treatments, the sound of surging parallel traffic, or other indicators may be inconsistent, confusing, misleading, or missing.
This report seeks to help provide consistency of tactile walking surface indicators and guidelines for their use in multimodal environments.
Paratransit Fleet Configurations
Report Number: S-174
Publication Date: 03/01/2024
The increase in the population of older adults who are ambulatory but are eligible to use paratransit has increased the demand for paratransit service delivery. This growth has, in turn, led some transit agencies to move away from standard one-vehicle type fleets in favor of a mixed fleet incorporating smaller accessible vehicles and non-accessible vehicles (generally sedans).
This report focuses on the different ways that transit agencies have configured their dedicated paratransit fleets. The first wave of fleet configuration changes has provided some expected benefits of lower operating costs and greater service delivery flexibility due to incorporating smaller vehicles into the fleet mix. These changes have also brought forward a set of service delivery issues, including increased costs, maintenace concerns, and complications in the reassignment of riders.
Mental Health, Wellness, and Resilience for Transit System Workers
Report Number: R-245
Publication Date: 02/23/2024
Transit agency leadership must make a real and concerted effort to take the mental health and overall wellness of frontline workers more seriously. Leadership can play an important role by making a clear commitment and dedicating resources to address mental health, wellness, and resiliency at their agencies. Ultimately, this means that more funding and staff resources are needed to address barriers and to develop, implement, and support programs aimed at improving mental health, wellness, and resiliency. This includes staff dedicated to implementing and monitoring holistic wellness programs.
This report provides a detailed summary of common factors that influence the mental health, well-being, and resiliency of frontline transit workers and includes a range of solutions that transit agencies can implement to address them. Findings were determined using a mix of research methods, including multiple interviews and focus groups with frontline employees, transit agency management, and union leadership at two different points in the project.
Supplemental to the report are a Research Brief and an Implementation Plan.
