SMART policies regarding pick-up and drop-off in Detroit

[professorscott]

I'm surprised I'm the first one to comment on this, but anyhow... from the Detroit News article and other conversations I have formed the opinion that a good many people believe SMART just doesn't want to provide local service in Detroit and that the Ordinance that Mr. Hertel refers to is a "ghost ordinance"; that is, it doesn't really exist.

The problem is, it does. Whether or not Mr. Hertel would like to operate full service within Detroit, the fact is that he legally cannot. Any SMART driver that picks up inbound passengers or drops off outbound passengers within the City is violating a city ordinance. I know this is a little bit difficult to believe nowadays, but there was a time when the City did not want competition in public transportation and so prohibited it.

First, from Sec. 58-4-1: "Inter-city bus means a bus which transports passengers for a prescribed fare either from a point or terminus outside the corporate limits of the city to any point or terminus within the corporate limits of the city, or from any point or terminus within the corporate limits of the city to any point or terminus outside the corporate limits of the city."

Now that we know what an inter-city bus is, we come to Sec. 58-4-76: "No person operating an inter-city bus shall transport passengers locally within the city or do what is commonly called a local business."

So there it is, verbatim. If you want SMART to assist with local transport in Detroit, the first thing you have to do is get 58-4-76 repealed. Then we can start to deal with any remaining issues.

[Eric_c]

Fuckin' nailed it.

[animatedmartian]

I personally don't want SMART to 'assist' with local transport, I just want there to be one goddamn system. It's so much more inefficient the way things are setup currently, even if SMART could operate full service on its routes. Are they just here to fill the gap until DDOT gets itself together and then will be prohibited from operating in the city afterwards? Why even bother allowing SMART in the first place if that's all it comes down to? It makes no damn sense.

[Hypestyles]

it's a horrible disjointed mess of multiple systems. shameful.

[chicagoforlife]

I take it that SMART is the suburban bus system and I know DDOT is the city bus system. It's not any different here, there are two bus systems, PACE and CTA then Metra and CTA trains.

What my question though is, if they are coming inbound into the city of Detroit where are they picking up or dropping off passengers if there is an ordinance? Same question for outbound trips.

Wouldn't they do their loop at the city limits and then head back to the other end of the route?

[Dexlin]

Professorscott,

I thought the same thing about the article. The whole thing was just bizarre; even Hertel didn't seem to be able to dispell the myth despite being a transit executive in the area. SMART is not allowed to pick up people along the route just at the ends. The whole point is that SMART is a commuter supplement to DDOT; it was always meant that way. The organizations would have to rewrite both their bylaws

Since DDOT is not going to be fixed in awhile, my idea would be to farm the major thoroughfare "spoke" routes to SMART. They could run both local and commuter/express/limited service leaving Detroit to operate "local" neighborhood routes off the major avenues [[DDOT could do neighborhood and the "Mile" road routes). I'd imagine DDOT wouldn't be up for this, though, because the even though they operate at a pretty major loss, without the avenue routes they'd basically be giving the service away for free. There is no way the fares could cover much of anything.

What needs to happen with DDOT and SMART is what happened with the bankruptcy, and I was kind of surprised the bankruptcy didn't involve merging the systems and writing off DDOT's legacy and maintenance cost. Short of this, there is absolutely no hope for the system, I don't care how much the RTA tries to "coordinate" services. Again, the truth of that matter is that letting SMART compete along the avenues in Detroit would collapse DDOT, and SMART has neither the manpower nor the technical expertise as a commuter system to pick up the local neighborhood routes which operate within the city.

It blows my mind you have a city in which a full third or more of households basically have no regular access to a reliable car, yet the region doesn't want to make mass transit work. That huge captive audience and DDOT and SMART has bleed ridership and cut services even as the demand has grown to ridiculous proportions. It takes a lot to fuck that up. The RTA can help fix this when they are able to get the regional transit tax on the ballot, but that's still at least a year off just for the vote and then years before they are able to do anything. Things are going to get better, but they are going to continue to be shitty for the next few years.

[animatedmartian]

I take it that SMART is the suburban bus system and I know DDOT is the city bus system. It's not any different here, there are two bus systems, PACE and CTA then Metra and CTA trains.

Except that in Chicago, all of those are under the RTA. So at least there is coordination between systems and routes feed into each other.

In Detroit, both systems are entirely independent of each other and have no coordination. The SMART bus schedule is completely irrelevant to the DDOT bus schedule. An RTA was created in just the last year but so far nothing's really changed other than the fact that now we can get federal funding.

What my question though is, if they are coming inbound into the city of Detroit where are they picking up or dropping off passengers if there is an ordinance? Same question for outbound trips.

Wouldn't they do their loop at the city limits and then head back to the other end of the route?

SMART connects to downtown on the major radial roads during peak hours.

https://www.smartbus.org/Portals/0/D...System_Map.pdf

[mtburb]

Except that in Chicago, all of those are under the RTA. So at least there is coordination between systems and routes feed into each other.

In Detroit, both systems are entirely independent of each other and have no coordination. The SMART bus schedule is completely irrelevant to the DDOT bus schedule. An RTA was created in just the last year but so far nothing's really changed other than the fact that now we can get federal funding.

Our RTA was actually created in December 2012.

[Dexlin]

Yes, the bill was signed into law in the lame-duck in December of 2012. Of course, it you then have to build the organization [[choosing the members, hiring staff, etc...). A law doesn't birth it full formed. Anyway, the RTA has actually been doing the work required of it, even though it's had to beg for money from the legislature just to be able to hire staff. They weren't even granted the money to hire a CEO until last year. With the previous legislature [[and this will become even more with the one just elected), it was like pulling teeth to get them to pass the bills creating the RTA, and it was even more difficult to then even get them to provide the start-up money for it. The RTA is currently working on the campaign so that it can fund itself - and the multiple transit projects in the pipeline - which will take place during the general election of 2016.

People can go to SEMCOG's website to see the dozens of meetings they've had the minutes and agendas of some of those meetings.

[professorscott]

Just so everyone understands how SMART handles service in Detroit in order to comply with the City ordinance: If you are coming into Detroit from the suburbs, you can get on the bus anywhere in the suburbs, and you can get off the bus at any bus stop, suburban or city. If you are leaving Detroit, you can get on anywhere in the City, but you can't get off the bus until after it crosses the border into the suburbs. So what you can't do - what the ordinance prohibits - is get on the bus somewhere in Detroit and get back off the bus somewhere else in Detroit.

Now, so far as how to handle service in the future, there are a lot of different models that work. DDOT used to run a fine service; it has had management and funding problems over the years, but those can theoretically be fixed. SMART has had severe funding problems which led to the Detroit service cutbacks a few years ago. The most important thing is for the RTA to produce a credible vision and plan so that next year the people will vote to fund the necessary improvements; otherwise, what we have now is what we have for the foreseeable future.

[scooter]

If people in detroit want to ride SMART and get picked up and off in Detroit ask the city conusel and Mayor to join n the SMART millage, remember the mayor worked for SMART years back and also
let SMART come down town all day like years ago

[nain rouge]

The time has come to unite the bus systems. Having separate suburban and city systems can work OK if you have a relatively healthy big city with unique demands, but with what's happened in Detroit, it just doesn't make sense anymore. With many Detroiters using the buses to reverse commute out of Detroit, the current setup is woefully inefficient.

[Wesley Mouch]

I take it that SMART is the suburban bus system and I know DDOT is the city bus system. It's not any different here, there are two bus systems, PACE and CTA then Metra and CTA trains.

What my question though is, if they are coming inbound into the city of Detroit where are they picking up or dropping off passengers if there is an ordinance? Same question for outbound trips.

Wouldn't they do their loop at the city limits and then head back to the other end of the route?

If you read the ordinance quote above, the prohibition is against "... what is commonly called a local business." The suburban system thus cannot provide local service in town, but can drop off passengers from outside the system into Detroit. And can pickup in the city, but not drop off elsewhere within the city -- but must keep the passengers on the bus until they have left. Thus, they are not running a local service, but an 'express' service to the suburbs, if you will.

The suburban system [[SMART) does a decent business helping the suburban residents who want to work downtown.

[Jimaz]

Seattle dog's rush hour ride: on the bus, by herself, weekly

She would be much safer in the world if she had her owner on a leash.