Ordinance 1925-93 - Laserfiche WebLink

cities. ET and Community Transit have established interlocal agreements where PTBA residents traveling within the City of Everett may use ET's paratransit service, and Everett residents may use CT's demand-response transit service. By its nature, demand-response service will not be a major factor in commute trip reduction. Vanpool Programs - CT currently provides vans to any group of commuters wishing to form a vanpool. A minimum group of seven persons qualifies for an eight-passenger van, 10 persons for a 12-person van, and 13 persons for a 15-passenger van. The cost per person is based on the monthly mileage and includes operating costs and capital recoupment. Administrative costs are not captured by the fares. Metro also provides vans for a number of King County residents commuting to Snohomish County employers. Vanpools can compete very well with SOVs, especially for long commutes and in corridors with HOV facilities. The travel time for vanpools may be slightly greater than for SOVs because of the additional time to pick up passengers at their homes or for individuals to drive to a central meeting place. However, this loss of time can be compensated for by the ability of vanpool passengers to use their commute time to read, sleep, etc.. In addition, vanpool passengers are guaranteed a seat as opposed to commuters on some crowded express transit buses. The travel costs for vanpools are usually comparable to fares on transit express routes. For the smaller vans the fares are higher than for the larger vans. Vanpools work well in the Puget Sound Region because of the dispersed land use. Only the Seattle CBD, and to a lesser extent the University District and Bellevue, have employment concentrations large enough to support significant transit express service. Smaller employment centers like the Everett CBD, Lynnwood CBD, the Paine Field area, the Canyon Park area, and certain large employers, may be too small for transit routes but definitely large enough to support vanpools. The demand for vanpools currently outstrips the supply. Waiting lists exist, consisting of groups of people who want to vanpool, but for whom vans are not yet available. The limiting factor is the capital outlays necessary to purchase more vans. Community Transit relies on Federal programs for the initial capital outlays and to a lesser extent on capital recouped from the existing vanpools. Unlike transit bus services, Community Transit's vanpool services are not heavily subsidized by public revenues. Vanpools operate on a "break even" basis in which the revenues from the vanpool fares must pay for the operating costs and capital recovery. Only the administrative costs are subsidized. It has been argued that being the most fuel-efficient mode, vanpools deserve to be subsidized to a greater extent. Such subsidy would create even more demand for this service. 23