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City and County of San Francisco
Municipal Transportation Agency
Citizens’ Advisory Council
Operations & Customer Service Committee (OCSC)
FINAL MINUTES
of
Regular Meeting
Monday, May 16, 2005 at 3:00 p.m.
401 Van Ness Avenue, Room 308 (Main Conference Room 312)
San Francisco, California
1. Call to Order / Roll Call (Agenda Item 1). The regular meeting of the Operations & Customer Service Committee (OCSC) was called to order at 3:30 p.m., Monday, May 16, 2005. Joan Downey (Chair) presided. A quorum was present including the following:
OCSC Members Present at Roll Call: Joan Downey (Chair), Daniel Murphy, and Norman Rolfe.
OCSC Members absent at Roll Call: Sue Cauthen (arrived at 4:05 p.m.)
OCSC Members absent: Mary Burns.
MTA CAC Members, not on this committee, but also present: Steve Ferrario.
MTA Staff (San Francisco Municipal Railway [Muni] and Department of Parking and Traffic [DPT]) Present: Henry Kim (MUNI Project Manager - WAFER), Mary Travis-Allen (MUNI Trolley Superintendent), and Debra Reed (MTA CAC Secretary).
Community Representatives Present: Rosie West
2. Adopt Minutes of March 21, 2005:
Motion to adopt the February minutes by Sue Cauthen, with spelling corrections.
2nd by Daniel Murphy
MTA CAC “OCSC” passed unanimously (Ayes - Downey [Chair], Murphy, and Rolfe)
3. Public Comment – Concerning any issue within the jurisdiction of the Committee and not noted on the agenda:
Rosie West brought with her a record of dates and times for transit problems:
May 5, 2005, the supervisor told her that there would be no outbound Ms due to trouble at the Embarcadero station until 1:45 p.m. Substitute buses never came.
May 11, 2005, at St. Francis Woods from 10:30 a.m. to 11:45 a.m. there were no outbound 23 Monterey buses.
May 12, 2005, reported that a cleaning patrol started cleaning the handicap thing at 6:30 a.m. when residents would be sleep. Joan Downey and Bruce Oka responded that that would be a DPW issue.
4. Report of the Chair: Joan Downey (OCSC Chair)
No report of the Chair was presented.
5. Passenger Service Report (PSR) Update – Implementation, Statistics and Intake: [Attachment] (Discussion/Action) Mary Travis-Allen (MUNI Trolley Superintendent)
PSRs have increased in areas such as service availability complaints and operator conduct complaints due to anticipated lack of service. Runs had been held due to equipment problems. Operators have been affected by a number of things, including layoffs, heavier passenger loads and equipment issues. Video cameras equipped with sound have often redeemed operator complaints as passenger frustration vented towards operators.
Questions and Comments from the OCSC
a) Daniel Murphy commented that reviewing videos would take a lot of time.
Mr. Murphy noted that some divisions have less PSRs than others but on the other hand, some of those divisions are smaller divisions and may even provide less service. Rather than PSRs by division, has consideration been given to measuring PSRs per passenger mile or something similar? MUNI has some measurements on runs, boarding, service hours, passenger mile, etc. Answer: Ms. Travis-Allen will speak with Debbie and Maria to see if such formulas can be worked out.
b) Steve Ferrario questioned the miscellaneous category noted on the PSR report. Answer: Miscellaneous would include graffiti tags on bus shelters, dirty subway, etc.
c) Norman Rolfe asked what are the provisions for minimal service in view of no overtime, cutbacks on maintenance, runs missed due to maintenance? Answer: Dispatchers trade operators between runs to provide anticipated coverage, however there exists a dollar amount whenever runs are traded. The extra-board of 2 or 3 operators available to cover runs can bid for these runs that have been opened for long term.
The 49 Van Ness-Mission lines seem to have problems. Answer: Articulated buses have been experiencing problems. Fortunately MUNI held on to the 40 foot Flyers, but their passenger capacity does not compared to the 60 foot buses. MUNI still uses what equipment it can to fulfill ADA requirements, as much as possible as equipment is available.
d) Joan Downey asked could the lack of service be attributed to lack of discernment on the part of Street Inspectors? Answer: Street Operations had experienced a number of hits, including retirements, no General Signup for 9139s to compensate, along the limitations on overtime availability. Presently, coordination of service has been based on anticipated problems. Where there are shortages in Street Inspectors who would usually make these adjustments, Central Control has taken on the task, being notified of runs not going out, to make adjustment based on rotation. Also mobile units have been utilized in “real time” situations to compensate by covering 2 to 3 districts as problems arises, such as, street blockage, equipment breakdown, etc.
When will computer-tracking systems be implemented for PSRs? Answer: Trapeze was focused towards schedules and for implementation of signups. Other features were still being developed for eventual integration, however there is no estimated date for implementation at this time. Ms. Downey pointed out that in view of having fewer bodies to process PSRs, Trapeze would be a valuable tool. Answer: Layoffs have definitely impacted the department. Remaining staff has struggled to take on several vacant positions to man the PSR process.
Mr. Murphy suggested distributing copies of the 3rd Quarter PSR report at the full MTA CAC meeting on June 2, 2005.
6. WAFER Update: (Discussion/Action) Henry Kim (MUNI Service Planner)
Mr. Kim announced that implementation of the conceptional engineering has already began.
Questions and Comments from the OCSC
a) Joan Downey:
What is “alternative A?” Answer: Replacing all of the entry/exit fare gates with a validating system that would read Translink Smartcard media as well as cash, single fare tickets, etc. The plans are to have a tri-pod turn style at the entry as well as a bi-parting leaf for the ADA accessible gates. Originally there was no intention to replace swing gates with ADA validating fare gates, however due to ADA accessibility requirements as well as emergency egress requirements from the subway, those swing gates need to remain. The gate array will be modified to have one or more ADA accessible gate(s) in addition to the entry/exit gates noted for replacement. Ticket vending machines will be installed at all the subway stations for single ride cash fare tickets.
How will transfers be handled? Answer: Both single fare media/tickets and Translink should have the ability to produce transfers.
Would the machines sell tokens or other multiple fare media? Answer: The maintenance group is adamant about avoiding tokens due to the potential for maintenance problems, however Mr. Kim offered to look into the possibility of magnetic media for 1-day pass, 3-day pass, 7-day pass, and tokens.
If the vending machines only sell 1-way fares, how will the machines apply Senior and Youth discounts? Answer: There is no way for the machines to verify and process the discount fares. Currently discount fares are processed by agents.
b) Dan Murphy:
Will the tickets be engineered to be the same size as fast passes? Answer: The Magnetic Striped Media technology will also be applied to single fare tickets similar to fast passes.
What is the implementation date for WAFER? Answer: Mr. Kim’s guess was for the end of 2007.
In view of multi lingual ADA requirements what audio components are being considered for the visually impaired? Answer: WAFER fully intends to fulfill ADA accessibility requirements including verbal. However, multi lingual provisions to address the different languages spoken in the City would not apply under ADA requirements.
Of the three different turnstiles, bi folding, tri-pod, swing-gates, why would WAFER choose tri-pod for non-ADA? Answer: Durability, Tri-pods required less maintenance.
Should Translink not be rolled out in time, will the vending machines accept tokens? Answer: Translink will be available in 2006, at least a year before the completion of the WAFER project.
c) Steve Ferrario:
BART’s fare gate systems were engineered to accept both MUNI’s Magnetic Striped tickets as well as their own. MUNI could further benefit on volume purchases of parts and service transactions. Had consideration been given to purchasing the same BART style machines? Answer: BART was experiencing problems and cost overruns with the Translink capability, however MUNI is hoping to take advantage of BART’s recent procurement experience and not experience some of their same problems and overruns.
Although they are not a magnetic strip producer, CalTrans ticket vending machines sells a good variety of transit fare media, also it has audible messaging in different languages for the visually impaired.
Motion: The MTA CAC recommends that the ticket vending machines proposed as part of the new MUNI Wayside collection system sell Senior, Youth, and Disabled tickets as well as 1-day, 3-day, 7-day and Token fares.
2nd by Norman Rolfe
MTA CAC “OCSC” passed unanimously (see roll for Ayes)
Motion: The MTA CAC recommends that as part of the WAFAR project the ticket vending machines should take advantage of the economy of scale for other locations that are identified as high volume surface stops in the Metro system for the top 8 to 10 locations.
2nd by Norman Rolfe
MTA CAC “OCSC” passed unanimously (see roll for Ayes)
7. 39 Coit Update: (Discussion/Action) Sue Cauthen
There was a hearing today, May 16, 2005, before the City Operations and Neighborhood Services Committee with Supervisor Jake McGoldrick as Chair, also present was Supervisor Bevan Dufty, Supervisor Fiona Ma, Jack Fleck, Bill Seelinger, Howard Wong and Joe Speaks – MUNI Senior Administrative Analyst. Supervisor Jake McGoldrick expressed dismay that MTA had no plan for the trial to limit parking at Coit Tower. He asked MUNI/DPT to come up with a plan immediately. A continuation hearing is scheduled for May 31, 2005. Ms. Cauthen urges members of the MTA CAC to attend showing full CAC support. She asked that members be prepared to share ideas as well as speak on behalf of the MTA CAC.
8. Committee Members’ Questions/Information Requests: (Discussion/Action)
9. Schedule Upcoming Meetings and Agenda Items: [Attachments] (Discussion/Action) Next regular meeting: June 20, 2005, at 401 Van Ness Avenue, Room 308 (Conference Room 312), at 3:00 p.m.
a) Are Street Inspectors using the NextBus real time information in planning route and how do they plan on using it? Mr. Murphy responded that at this time there is a shortage on Street Inspectors due to retirements. Replacement is a year process. He suggests waiting until NextBus rolls out for Trolleys, etc.
b) Topics for the next OCSC meeting will be considered at the next full MTA CAC on June 2, 2005.
10. Adjournment: 5:35 p.m.
Atachment:
Item 5 3rd Quarter PSR report
Accessible meeting policy – One South Van Ness Avenue
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