AUSTIN (KXAN) — After 18 months of development, CapMetro’s blueprint for the next 10 years was approved by the transit agency’s Board of Directors on Monday.
CapMetro’s Transit Plan 2035, which serves as a tool to analyze current system operations and means of updating services or infrastructure down the road, was approved by the board on Monday after a draft was presented to community members in August, then refined based on feedback.
According to CapMetro, the plan uses available resources to respond to current travel patterns while preparing for future expected regional growth and development, like new Project Connect services. The plan offers a “data-informed, fiscally responsible, and fair roadmap to improve transit access and reliability across the rapidly growing region,” CapMetro said in a press release.
The transit agency also said the plan reflects regional priorities and lived experiences, because key service decisions were shaped by feedback from riders, operators, and regional partners, and more than 10,000 community members participated in surveys, open houses, pop-ups, and digital engagement.
“Transit Plan 2035 is truly a community-built plan as nearly 40% of it changed based on the thoughtful feedback from Central Texans during the second round of engagement alone,” Dottie Watkins, CapMetro President & CEO, said in the release. “Our regional community is the reason we exist, and through Transit Plan 2035, we are committed to using the resources we have to expand a service that’s more connected, consistent, and efficient for everyone.”
Implementation
CapMetro will begin implementing the plan in 2026, with near-term improvements planned to roll out in phases. The Transit Plan is updated every five years, so the agency said its long-term recommendations (five years and beyond) will be reviewed and refined around 2030.
CapMetro listed some key highlights of the plan’s phased implementation:
- 0–5 years: Targeted bus routes improvements, deliver full implementation on Rapid 800 and 837 to fulfill the Project Connect investment, and rail enhancements, including the new North Burnet/Uptown Station and extended hours of operation.
- 5 years: Integration with Austin Light Rail, additional bus route improvements, two new Pickup Zones and modifications to five existing zones, and expanded regional connectivity.
- 10 years: Further integration of Project Connect investments, and strategic partnerships to support a connected regional express network.
The full plan is available on CapMetro’s website.
Existing conditions analysis
According to CapMetro, an analysis of existing conditions helped shape recommendations for the plan. An interactive report of the analysis is organized into seven pages on CapMetro’s website, with the key takeaways for each listed below:
Density & Growth
The CapMetro website says that the density of people and jobs is the “greatest predictor of successful transit.”
Key Takeaways:
- Existing population and job density is concentrated downtown and extends north and south along key corridors like I-35 and US 183.
- Pockets of medium-density appear on the edges of the urban area and reflect recent growth patterns.
- Population growth is projected to fill in these areas of recent development, primarily in Williamson County, north of the urban center.
- Job growth is projected to be more clustered than population density.
Travel Patterns
CapMetro noted that, after reviewing density and projected growth, it was important to review how the community travels between destinations. It also said that transit service should change with travel patterns to maximize efficiency of resources and ridership.
Key Takeaways:
- Overall regional travel has mostly returned to 2019 levels, however, commute trips are down and travel during the P.M. Peak has increased.
- Travel to Downtown Austin and the University of Texas (UT) has decreased since 2019, but these areas still remain the largest trip generators in the region and are important to serve with transit.
- Travel in Austin’s surrounding suburbs and cities is increasing, specifically in Leander, Manor and Pflugerville.
Ridership
CapMetro examined when and where riders currently use transit to help guide decision-making during the planning process because it highlights what services are most utilized today, and where the system may need to change to attract more riders in the future.
Key takeaways:
- CapMetro is recovering transit riders better than peer agencies and national averages.
- Frequent route riders make up the majority of CapMetro’s ridership.
- Areas where there are high concentrations of transit ridership include Downtown Austin, the University of Texas (UT), East Riverside, South Congress Ave., South 1st St. and North Lamar Blvd.
- Compared to 2019, ridership is down on weekdays but less so on weekends; high-ridership routes and corridors are relatively consistent between days of the week.
Transit Demand
Demand for transit service varies by location and across populations, and certain characteristics influence how likely a person is to ride transit or depend on it. CapMetro said that identifying and mapping transit demand helped show where transit may be the most productive, which can help ensure that any changes will be driven by serving high-demand areas while balancing equity considerations
Key takeaways:
- The existing system provides good coverage of transit demand, covering 90% of high-propensity (high-demand) areas.
- The demand analysis identified pockets of underserved areas along US 183, in the Wells Branch area and the William Cannon corridor.
- There are also several areas outside of CapMetro’s Service Area, just north and south of the boundary, that may have higher demand for transit. These areas can be considered for future service through strategic expansion of the service area.
Reliability
CapMetro said that if density and demographic characteristics help determine who is most likely to ride transit, reliability is the most important factor for retaining riders.
Key takeaways:
- Increasing construction and congestion on roadways has created significant challenges for maintaining reliable service. CapMetro’s bus service is collectively not meeting the set 83% on-time performance (OTP) standard.
- There is opportunity to improve OTP at little to no cost by reducing early vehicle arrivals, however, significant improvements will require more resources and lead to additional costs.
- When faced with vehicle shortages, CapMetro temporarily reallocates some resources from frequent routes to less frequent routes, where gaps in service would be more acute for riders. This approach helps CapMetro minimize overall customer impact throughout the system, but may create a negative customer experience for impacted users.
System Performance
The system performance report used data from the previous report pages, as well as performance data from CapMetro to present which aspects of the system are perfomring well and which may needs improvements.
Key takeaways:
- CapMetro uses a majority of its resources to operate Frequent routes. More resources are required to operate service on weekdays than weekends.
- Aside from the Red Line commuter rail, CapMetro’s Frequent routes generate more riders per-revenue hour than other services.
- Other tailored services, such as Pickup, may be less productive but are important as they can offer service to lower density areas and use smaller buses to navigate where it may be difficult for standard buses to operate.
- There is some mismatch in route frequencies versus ridership especially between Frequent, 15-minute routes and other Local routes.
Route Performance
CapMetro has conducted evaluations of each service in the system, focusing on specific performance and reliability metrics along with a review of existing ridership, travel patterns and identified transit markets. This will help guide decision-making as modifications to existing services and future new services are considered, CapMetro noted.
Key takeaways:
- Routes that tend to have lower performance share similar characteristics such as lower demand, impacts from changing travel patterns, reliability issues, complicated or limited service and service redundancy.
- A performance analysis of each route was conducted to assist with future recommendations. Specific performance of each route of interest can be explored in the dashboard at the bottom of this page.
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