Policies and Practices for Effectively and Efficiently Meeting ADA Paratransit Demand (2008)

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5INTRODUCTION To determine the state of the practice of effective and efficient paratransit service, the initial task was the literature review. The search included a comprehensive study of information published through the Transportation Research Information Service (TRIS), conference proceedings, and consultant and agency publications. Several relevant documents were identi- fied. Of these, 12 publications were selected for review. SELECTED PUBLICATIONS Eligibility Policies Thatcher, R.H., Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) Paratransit Eligibility Manual, Federal Transit Adminis- tration, Washington, D.C., Sept. 1993. This manual provides guidance to transit providers in the devel- opment and implementation of ADA paratransit eligibility determination processes. It starts with the basics of the regu- latory definitions of the three categories of eligibility. It dis- cusses all the elements of the determination process, including the application form, review of applications, making the deter- minations, appeal process, and relevant timelines for each step. The manual also provides sample application forms and dis- cusses optional elements of the determination process. Since the publication of this manual, the paratransit com- munity has many more tools available to make eligibility determinations. However, the manual’s clear explanation of the requirements and suggestions for good policies continue to make this document the single best source for understand- ing and carrying out the eligibility determination process for ADA paratransit. Weiner, R., N. Poultney, and B. Perrone, “King County Keeps Moving: Evaluating Best Practices in ADA Para- transit Eligibility,” Proceedings of the American Public Transit Association Bus & Paratransit Conference, Den- ver, Colo., May 2–6, 2004, 7 pp. King County Metro in Seattle, Washington, has been seen as a leader in the evolution of paratransit practices and proce- dures. Faced with dramatic projected increases in paratransit demand and costs, the agency implemented significant refine- ments to their paratransit eligibility procedures in November 2000. Because of these changes, it was estimated that new applicants were being added to the registration rolls at half the rate they would have been under the previous process, and the agency is estimated to have saved $1.5 million in trip reductions in 2002. In 2003, Metro conducted a comprehen- sive evaluation of the effectiveness of all aspects of the pro- gram, which is the core of this paper. Highlights of the eligibility program evaluation include: effectiveness of a unique pre-application process; phone inter- views with 100% of the applicants; use of a team of eligibility analysts with varying degrees of expertise in the field; pro- vision of a costly but very effective travel training program (and how referrals to the program occur); and effective col- lection of information to allow implementation of trip-by-trip eligibility screening. Since this study took place, King County Metro has con- tinued to refine its eligibility determination process. Chap- ter 5 discusses its current policies and procedures for applying conditional and trip-by-trip eligibility determinations to daily operations. Operating Policies and Practices Multisystems, Inc., Innovative Practices in Paratransit Services, Easter Seals Project ACTION, Washington, D.C., 2002, 50 pp. This report is organized into four main sections representing elements deemed critical to the successful operation of para- transit systems including: 1. Paratransit Service Operations—techniques and strate- gies for achieving greater efficiency in day-to-day operations. 2. Paratransit Service Management—methods for deter- mining quality and performance standards and mea- suring all aspects of daily operations. 3. Paratransit System Design—structures for organization and management, types of services provided by para- transit systems, procurement options and strategies and a quick-reference troubleshooting guide for maximiz- ing service quality and productivity. 4. Supplementary and Associated Programs—programs that can be developed and implemented in existing CHAPTER TWO LITERATURE REVIEW

systems and community resources to provide trans- portation to entire communities. Follow-on work, including the development of a national paratransit database, is described featuring the input of 28 sur- vey participants representing the large urban, small urban, and rural transit systems. This document offers many simple, practical tips for paratransit operations and management—whether ADA service or more general paratransit service. It would be very helpful for an operations manager as well as paratransit staff such as dispatchers, schedulers, and street supervisors. “Solving ADA Paratransit Problems; How to Cope With Reality,” Proceedings of a Transportation Research Board Conference, Committee on Paratransit and Committee on Specialized Transportation, Phoenix, Ariz., May 27–29, 1993, 162 pp. This conference focused directly on the range of operational problems and opportunities created by the complementary paratransit requirements of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). The conference was designed to identify the best practices and state-of-the-art solutions to some of the most pressing problems facing communities struggling to provide complementary paratransit services. In particular, the con- ference focused on the following themes: • Establishing appropriate eligibility criteria—and sticking to them; • Ensuring community participation and avoiding litigation; • Organizing cost-effective and equitable certification methods; • Developing practical ways to achieve the “no-refusal” standard; • Dealing with client displacement; • Establishing and monitoring service standards; • Using the private sector to increase cost-effectiveness; • Finding new and creative financing mechanisms; • Achieving meaningful coordination—with the human service sector, other public agencies, and other jurisdic- tions; and • Shifting demand from paratransit to fixed-route service. The proceedings contain a conference overview, work- shop reports, papers presented at the conference, the confer- ence program, and a list of participants. This conference took place during the early stage of the establishment of ADA-complementary paratransit service across the country. There was an emphasis in the presenta- tions on attracting persons with disabilities to fixed-route ser- vice (eight papers) and “raising revenue and reducing costs” (five papers). Overall, the conference focused on policy and administrative issues over operations. One of the interesting 6 paper topics was a study of the potential impact the ADA reg- ulations on non-disabled seniors; the paper concluded that a portion of senior transportation services would be eliminated because of the need to fund ADA-complementary paratransit service. Taxis and Other Flexible Capacity Dalton, D. and K. Wolf-Branigan, Moving Forward Together: A Workbook for Initiating and Increasing Acces- sible Taxi Services in Your Community, Easter Seals Proj- ect ACTION, Washington, D.C., 2005. In this document, Easter Seal Project ACTION acquired as much information as possible from practicing taxi systems about their real experiences and arrangements in a variety of communities. This workbook is “a compilation of the gath- ered information presented in a form useful to communities pursuing improving and/or expanding the provision of acces- sible taxi service to people with disabilities.” The workbook is organized into nine sections as follows: 1. Public Policy provides information on the ADA sec- tions that pertain to taxi services. Information on several local taxi industry regulations is also included. 2. Motivation and Market Demand offers ideas for assess- ing the potential of accessible taxis in your community and encouraging a common drive to improving services. 3. Vehicle Design and Costs discusses the various design options and financial implications that should be con- sidered when determining vehicles for use in providing accessible taxi services. 4. Incentives provides assistance with developing strate- gies that can make accessible taxi services profitable and sustainable and therefore more appealing. 5. Contracts and Operating Agreements presents ideas for developing arrangements that may meet human service transportation needs more efficiently and provide the taxi industry with potential financial resources to expand accessible services. 6. Successful Partnerships provides ideas for identifying stakeholders, building relationships, and developing col- laborative strategies to improve accessible taxi services. 7. Training offers guidance for identifying, developing, and implementing training programs to support imple- mentation of accessible taxi services. 8. Information Sharing provides help with educating your community about the benefits of accessible taxi ser- vices, marketing services to the public, and informing other community leaders and organizations about your efforts to improve accessible taxi services. 9. Licensing, Voluntary Standards, Evaluation, and Recog- nition offers assistance regarding options that customers, taxi companies, drivers, and government personnel can consider.

7The primary audience for this document is leaders who want to introduce accessible taxis in their communities. It provides examples of cities that have accessible taxi service (Chicago, Austin, Las Vegas, Raleigh, Phoenix, and Berke- ley). It is formatted so that a reader could use it as a working notebook as he or she is following all the steps to establish accessible taxi service. Koffman, D., TCRP Synthesis of Transit Practice 53: Operational Experiences with Flexible Transit Services, Transportation Research Board, National Research Coun- cil, Washington, D.C., 2003, 57 pp. This synthesis was prepared for transit agency staff respon- sible for vehicle operations and planning and to those who work with them in this regard. It documents and summarizes transit agency experiences with “flexible transit services,” including all types of hybrid services that are not pure demand- responsive (including dial-a-ride and ADA paratransit) or fixed-route services, but that fall somewhere in between those traditional service models. The report documents six types of flexible transit service: request stops, flexible route segments, route deviation, point deviation, zone routes, and demand- responsive connector service. The first conclusion of the synthesis is “each flexible ser- vice is unique. There is as yet little standard practice that oper- ators can turn to in designing flexible services.” That is why this synthesis is useful, documenting the range of services and placing them into the six categories. The synthesis has three conclusions directly related to paratransit: coordination with paratransit is an important feature of most flexible services; flexible service as a complete substitute for fixed-route service removes the requirement for ADA-complementary paratransit service in that service area; and trip sharing between flexible service and paratransit has the potential to reduce dependence on paratransit. Coordination Burkhardt, J.E., D. Koffman, and G. Murray, TCRP Report 91: Economic Benefits of Coordinating Human Service Transportation and Transit Service, Transporta- tion Research Board, National Research Council, Wash- ington, D.C., 2003, 172 pp. This report demonstrates that the potential economic bene- fits of coordination are substantial (estimated at more than $700 million annually in 2003). The most cited economic benefits include the availability of additional funding, increased productivity, and increased efficiency. Coordina- tion improves mobility, which has both indirect and direct economic impacts. Other benefits include improved service quality, increased transportation options, larger service areas, centralized oversight and management, and better reporting opportunities. The report cautions that for coordination to increase in use- fulness as a management strategy for transportation services in local communities, more attention will need to be paid to how federal, state, and local governments can influence incentives for and hindrances to coordination, particularly in terms of how funds are distributed. The difference in emphasis between this report and TCRP Report 105 (the following reference), as implied by the title, is quantifying the economic benefits. One of the case studies in this report is the use of school buses for paratransit by the Mason County (Washington) Transit Authority. Chapter 5 provides an updated discussion of Mason Transit. TranSystems Corporation, Center for Urban Transporta- tion Research, Institute for Transportation Research and Education, and Planners Collaborative, TCRP Report 105: Strategies to Increase Coordination for Transportation Services for the Transportation Disadvantaged, Trans- portation Research Board, National Research Council, Washington, D.C., 2004, 76 pp. The goal of this research was to identify strategies for initiat- ing or improving coordination of publicly funded transporta- tion services for transportation-disadvantaged individuals— older adults, people with disabilities, human services agency clients, and others—that could be implemented on the regional or local level. The Resource Guide is intended for public and private transportation and human services organizations that fund, operate, purchase, or use transportation services for the transportation disadvantaged and are interested in improving coordination with other providers. Based on case studies of public and private organizations that have recently undertaken coordination activities, the Resource Guide describes current trends in the coordination of transportation services for the transportation disadvantaged and identifies several ongoing challenges that coordination partners have faced. One of the challenges in preparing this report was identi- fying recent innovative strategies and practices, and then determining the reasons for success and the potential for other organizations to adopt these strategies and policies. Most of the Resource Guide is contained on an accompanying CD, which allows for the presentation of much detailed material with numerous case studies covering political and adminis- trative issues, funding, operations, and technology. Multisystems, Inc., Transit Plus, K. Martin, T. Tull, and IBI Group, TCRP Report 56: Integrating School Bus and Public Transportation Services in Non-Urban Communi- ties, Transportation Research Board, National Research Council, Washington, D.C., 1999. This report explores the coordination of student transporta- tion and public transportation services in non-urban areas. The study included a research component and a survey to determine the scope and breadth of this type of coordination

across the country. Case studies were also conducted to obtain information about communities that have successfully coor- dinated or integrated some aspect of student and public trans- portation. Although this phenomenon is not widespread, those communities that are coordinating services are doing so using a number of different strategies. In some non-urban communities, school districts are trans- porting students—particularly in high school—by means of public transit. In other areas, the public is being transported on school buses when the buses are not in use for student trans- portation. In addition, in a few communities, students and the public are riding on school buses at the same time. Although there are success stories in the United States, there are many barriers to accomplishing coordinated ser- vices. These include legislative and institutional barriers, restrictive funding requirements, turf battles, attitudes (espe- cially with respect to safety concerns), and operational issues. TRB sponsored follow-up research to this study, which at this writing was still in progress [TCRP Project A-19A(2), “Vehicle Guide for Integrating Non-Urban School and Public Transportation Services”]. According to the TCRP website, the objectives of this new “research are to develop a selection guide for specifying requirements and features for vehicles for public and school transportation uses in non-urbanized areas, and to assess the effects of multiple- use vehicles on policies, operations, maintenance, and funding of participating riders and providers.” Improvements to Fixed-Route Service Chia, D. and H.N. Ketola, Assessment of ADA Research and Development Needs, Federal Transit Administration, Washington, D.C., 1997. FTA sponsored this study of technology and techniques used by fixed-route operators to comply with the ADA. It is full of ideas collected from 32 transit agencies (29 site visits and 3 telephone interviews) seeking to understand how transit agen- cies met the requirements, given the unique operating envi- ronments, ridership, and facilities. The ideas are organized by the activities a traveler would take to make a trip on transit (plan, find the vehicle, enter the vehicle, ride on the vehicle, alight the vehicle, leave the station/stop). In providing these practical ideas, the transit agencies answered these questions: • What was working prior to the ADA? • What are the sources for the new solutions? • What determines the balance between the use of tech- nology and labor in creating the solution? • What are the costs to install and maintain the solution? • Is the change taking place on a systemwide or as-needed basis? • What problems have proved unexpectedly difficult to resolve? 8 There are many low-cost solutions included in the report, most continuing to be valuable. Perhaps the most cited idea in the report is from Miami–Dade Transit. Its Metrorail system has a number of stations with center platforms. “MDTA has a subtle yet clear way to let waiting passengers know the direction of the incoming train: MDTA uses a male voice to announce the southbound trains that are arriv- ing at the station, and a female voice to announce the north- bound train.” Incentives to Use Fixed-Route Service Balog, J., TCRP Report 24: Guidebook for Attracting Paratransit Patrons to Fixed-Route Services, Transporta- tion Research Board, National Research Council, Wash- ington, D.C., 1997. Research was undertaken to identify the characteristics of paratransit riders with and without disabilities who could be attracted to ride fixed-route service, the features they value in fixed-route services, and the physical and institutional barri- ers that hinder such efforts. The research is based on con- sumer surveys of people with disabilities who do not use fixed-route services, as well as those who do. Survey results indicate that the top four features that can make fixed-route transit attractive to paratransit users are (1) low fares, (2) easy access (i.e., no big roads to cross) to the bus stop, (3) drivers who announce all stops, and (4) no transfers. To aid implementation, case studies were conducted of suc- cessful projects, thereby providing information on good oper- ational practices. Route design, bus stop location, budgeting, advertising, partnerships, public involvement, and market research are all discussed in detail. A chapter of the Guidebook is devoted to driver training. Many transit riders—especially passengers with disabilities—rely on the driver. The third highest factor for making passengers with disabilities com- fortable on fixed-route buses is announcing of stops. Another chapter is devoted to travel training for passengers. Knowl- edge is essential to making passengers with disabilities com- fortable on fixed-route transit. A demand forecasting methodology was developed using the survey data and peer systems. Systems with transit service were grouped by geographic location, population density, cli- mate, and topography to create peer systems. Procedures to estimate the volume of riders who might switch from para- transit to fixed-route service are provided for the peer systems. This methodology has been supplanted by recent TRB research (TCRP Project B-28, “Improving ADA Complemen- tary Paratransit Demand Estimation”). Although this report covers a wide range of important issues for attracting riders to fixed-route service, it includes only a small amount of docu- mentation of success achieved from using the techniques. Kachmar, B., “Travel Training in Indiana,” Proceed- ings of the American Public Transit Association Bus &

9Paratransit Conference, Columbus, Ohio, May 15–18, 2005, 3 pp. This paper summarizes examples of customized travel train- ing curriculum materials that were developed by Indiana transit agencies for various target audiences. An evaluation of the benefits and effectiveness of these efforts is described. The goal of travel training is to teach people to use public transportation safely and independently. Target populations include people with disabilities, older adults, youth, students, persons with low income, and those who do not drive auto- mobiles. An Indiana Community Transportation Initiative is discussed, as are the programs of Bloomington, Muncie, Indianapolis, Johnson County, Lafayette, and Fort Wayne. The program, which includes a train-the-trainer element, leads to cost savings by reducing the demand for paratransit and reserving resources for those with the greatest need for paratransit assistance.