Bus Riders Union of Austin, Texas | El Sindicato de Pasajeros

Agency looks to increase ridership by eliminating confusing tangle of routes, offering shorter interval between trolleys.

By Ben Wear
Austin American-Statesman
Tuesday, April 15, 2008

Capital Metro officials, looking to goose flagging ridership of its free downtown Dillo buses, want to simplify the ball-of-twine, five-route system to two routes and assure that a Dillo comes along every five minutes or so.

Right now, Dillo frequencies range from every eight minutes to as many as 30. And the designations for the five routes — Red, Blue, Silver, Gold and Orange — tell a prospective rider nothing about where a particular Dillo might be headed.

Very few people get on — about 3,500 a day, or about two new riders for every mile traveled by a Dillo. And that number is down from an already unimpressive 4,400 daily boardings five years ago.

Capital Metro thinks that by having one north-south route, mostly along Congress Avenue (from Riverside Drive to 17th Street), one east-west route, on Fifth and Sixth streets (from Bowie Street to Red River Street), and short intervals between Dillos, usage of the faux streetcars will increase dramatically. The changes would occur in August.

"We think that's going to make a big difference," Meredith Highsmith, a planner at Capital Metro, said of the five-minute "headways." The agency would like to trim the interval between Dillos on weekends to 15 minutes. Both routes would run from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. weekdays, rather than the smorgasbord of times with the current five routes.

The east-west route would pass within a block of the planned commuter rail station at Fourth and Trinity streets.

As proposed, the new Dillo system would also be cheaper — $2.75 million a year, down from the current $3.75 million. But its reach would also decrease dramatically, dropping jaunts south to Live Oak Street, west to Austin High School and the Toomey park-and-ride lot, east to Pleasant Valley Road, and northeast to Manor Road. Capital Metro statistics indicate minimal ridership on most of those extensions.

"The system is not doing what it was intended to do," agency planning director Todd Hemingson said. "It's kind of grown and spread out and is trying to do too much for too many people."

The agency will hold two informational public forums on the changes April 22 at its 323 Congress Ave. office, at 11:30 a.m. and 5 p.m. A public hearing will take place at the Capital Metro board of directors meeting April 28. Hemingson said the plan is for a May board vote on Dillo changes, perhaps altered between now and then based on what the public has to say.

To mitigate the effect of some of the proposed changes, Capital Metro staff is recommending a few changes in routes of its regular buses. The No. 4 route, which runs from the Montopolis neighborhood near Austin-Bergstrom International Airport to downtown, would be extended westward to Austin High, on Cesar Chavez Street. And officials propose increasing the frequency of the No. 17 route, which runs from East Austin to downtown.

Hemingson and Highsmith said the agency would continue to run special Dillo service from City Hall to the South Congress area for First Thursday, the monthly street fair in the SoCo shopping district.

bwear@statesman.com; 445-3698