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| Volume 17, Issue 1 | Spring 2005 |
Dakota Transit Association 2005 MembershipThe 2005 transit membership dues are due. Please complete the online application at: www.dakotatransit.org/join/. If you complete the online application you still have to mail the dues check. Explanation of membership categories:1. Regular Membership - composed of any governmental agency that provides transportation service and/or non-profit specialized transportation providers. 2. Associate Membership - composed of any governmental or professional agency that is indirectly involved with public transportation and any commercial public transportation agency or other individuals interested in public transit. No Flies on This CatBismarck-Mandan's new scheduled, fixed-route bus service, Capital Area Transit, is not doing just well. It is doing better than twice as well in the early going as a consultant told us to expect when CAT was being pitched to Bismarck voters three years ago. Then, we were told to look for 34,000 new rides a year, to start, on top of Bis-Man's existing taxi-style, "demand-response" service for the elderly and disabled. That worked out to only 93 rides a day over 365 days, but was represented as something to build on. CAT is for the public at large at the same price as for the elderly and disabled. Instead, as parent Bis-Man Transit Director Robin Werre told the Bismarck City Commission last week, CAT has hauled 43,252 riders in its first seven months of revenue service, July 2004 through January 2005. That's an average of 6,178 a month, which projects to 74,146 a year - 203 rides a day. That may sound like no great shakes in the greater transportation scheme of things. But it shows that CAT has been embraced by the niche market for which it is intended and - extremely important - should have no trouble living within its means. Only about one-third of CAT's support has to be made out of the farebox. The rest comes from modest mill levies in Bismarck (3 mills) and Mandan (2.5 mills) and from state and federal grants. Congratulations are due Bis-Man Transit and its partner in development of the new service, the Metropolitan Planning Organization, for designing a product that has been a hit right out of the chute. There were always two selling points for CAT. The first and most obvious was public need. (The constituency may be small, but you still do what you can for it, within your means.) The other was, frankly, bus envy on the part of city and economic-development officials. Bismarck-Mandan sized cities are expected, by the kind of companies being courted by those officials, to have public transportation - almost whether they need it or not. Indeed, the MPO's consultant said Bismarck was the only one of eight "peer" cities in four Upper Midwest states to be doing without. So, now our officials don't have to sneak around or apologize any longer about our lack of public transportation. If that puts an additional spring in their step, so much the better. The Tribune is proud of CAT, too, and wishes it continued success. (It shows no sign of flagging - January was its second-best month.) More of us who think we are married to our cars should give it a try. (Editorial reprinted from the Feb. 16, 2005, Bismarck Tribune) Calendar of Events
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