Public Transit News / Current Events (MN only)

[grant1simons2]

Now if only SWT weren't a-holes

[Tom H.]

Now if only SWT weren't a-holes

Care to elaborate?

[grant1simons2]

Well they don't want to work with the MET council to bring more people from around EP to the SWLRT station. They think if they agree with the council to work together that they won't have any leverage. If you work in the city of Minneapolis or go to the Uofm or Normandale then great this is the bus for you. But numerous times I've suggested a route to the Mall of America or to Uptown or places more people are wanting to go to shop and they just seem to not listen. I get that they're more of a commuter bus service, but if they made more routes I feel like ridership would rise and EP could start being less car dependent

[Tcmetro]

I'm not a huge fan of SWT because they don't try to work well with Met Council/Metro Transit and complicate matters that should be complicated.

My other grievance is that they don't even attempt to serve transit dependent populations. The entire service model is around serving highway park and rides. Whenever they try a local service, it's usually withdrawn after a few months or drastically altered. People cannot depend on local service because SWT doesn't let the service mature.

Additionally, they run too many specials (senior buses, Vikings, Twins, Como Zoo) and are likely subsidized, when subsidized services should focus on more traditional routes, like a local connector service to Metro Transit hubs.

[grant1simons2]

I actually like those services like the Twins service, that's awesome. But the Como and Walker sucks because they claim it's "family fun" day. So they don't have to run the service more than once

[Tom H.]

To be fair, SWT does have SOME local service (e.g. the Dell/Valley View route, and the mall loop), but I'll grant it's not much. I think it's more of a result of the poor incentives and weird funding structure that we've put in place for the opt-outs, rather than the administrators being "a-holes", though.

[David Greene]

rather than the administrators being "a-holes", though.

No, if you look at the conversations around SWLRT, it's pretty much that they're a-holes.

[grant1simons2]

The buses that run locally run at until about 7am.. then they come back at 6. I live right next to one of the dell stops and I want to leave at like 11.

[mattaudio]

So they are really just feeders for express routes. About half of MVTA's locals are the same thing. I imagine that's the only way they can get ridership.

You know, Grant, if you want to live in Eden Prairie you should really just get a 8 to 5 white collar job downtown. Har har.

[Tcmetro]

MVTA's local routes are feeders to the Red Line or the Blue Line, and primarily serve a local transit-dependent ridership and connect those riders to inner city transit services. MVTA local services have a decent span of service (5am-11pm) and offer 30-60 minute frequencies.

SWT's local services are tails on peak hour express buses. They operate a few peak hour trips, and are primarily designed to serve walk up trips for downtown commuters. The midday SWT service only connects the highway park and rides to Downtown and the U, and it even skips ridership generators like Prairie Center Dr and the Eden Prairie Mall. Span of service is decent (5am-9pm), but there is no weekend service and there are few connections to Metro Transit. Unlike MVTA, SWT makes no attempt to serve the transit-dependent population, which believe it or not, definitely exists in Eden Prairie and Chaska.

[HuskyGrad]

I spotted this thing today (yes, while driving. yes, I'm a bad person)


Southwest Transit's new double decker on NB 35W by twincitizen, on Flickr

They've been running them for fair service.

[grant1simons2]

Riding on a SW transit bus to downtown. Currently 17 people on the bus including myself. Pretty good for a 12:15 departure, now imagine if they had local stops

[mister.shoes]

There'd be 10 people?

[grant1simons2]

Yes at non peak hours.

[grant1simons2]

Why isn't the seating at the stops on Marquette? I'm at stop D and its sort of weird that there's a shelter without a bench

[talindsay]

If there were a bench, then people who don't have anywhere to sit out of the elements would sit there. And that's apparently a bad thing.

[grant1simons2]

This is why we need to build a shelter downtown. Even though I see less panhandling, I see a lot of people just loitering downtown sleeping and what not. The thing that bugs me the most that I try to keep in is the amount of low income people who come down and just start trouble and yell at each other. Anyways benches. Why can't we just build them and ask people to move who are laying on them

[talindsay]

Or let them lay on the benches - it's public infrastructure and some people don't want to go to a shelter.

[grant1simons2]

Okay ill see you tomorrow night camping in front of ids center. Why would we let the homeless sleep outside. If you want to sleep outside and not go to a shelter then what are you doing in the city?

[talindsay]

Okay ill see you tomorrow night camping in front of ids center. Why would we let the homeless sleep outside. If you want to sleep outside and not go to a shelter then what are you doing in the city?

Who are we to say why or how somebody lives? Why is it the business of a couple middle class men to decide what to "let" somebody do? The homeless are homeless for a variety of reasons and many of them need help - often mental help. But they have individual agency just like everybody else; the government is no more their parents than anybody else's. Choosing not to make specific accommodations for the homeless is bad enough, but choosing to take away accommodations just because the homeless may use them - or worse yet, sticking metal spikes under places like bridges to make them impossible as places of shelter - is mean spirited and inhumane.