Photo courtesy DASH
Do residents want more frequent bus service or faster trips?
That’s one of the questions that City of Alexandria officials are asking residents to help them answer as they develop a Transit Vision Plan for the Bus Network.
The bus network includes DASH, which serves Alexandria, as well as other bus operators in the area including Metro.
“The Alexandria Transit Vision Plan will identify existing and future bus transit needs and community priorities in the City of Alexandria as a basis for designing a future bus network that improves mobility, accessibility, and overall cost efficiency. The City of Alexandria and DASH are leading this study,” according to the City’s transit website.
City officials are working to ensure that concerns and ideas from residents and businesses are “heard, recognized and incorporated into the development of a future transit network,” according to the City.
An online online transit choices survey is available at https://form.jotform.com/ATLkimleyhorn/AlexandriaTransitVision. Those who participate may be entered into a drawing for a free DASH pass or $50 VISA Gift Card.
The survey asks residents a series of questions, including what the priorities of transit should be, how to allocated additional funding (if it existed) and whether residents would prefer more frequent services, shorter walks to bus stops, or faster trips with fewer transfers.
Existing Ridership and Past Surveys Summary
Ahead of this fall’s request for input, City officials contracted Jarrett Walker + Associates to do a Choices Report on existing ridership and service, previous surveys on bus service, origin-destination analysis.
The 80-plus page report shows, among other things, that tolerance for waiting is proportional to trip distance. It also found that a high proportion of commutes by Alexandria residents are to jobs in the District, followed by jobs elsewhere in Alexandria.
“Compared to commuter outflows from Alexandria, there are relatively few commuter inflows from Washington or Arlington to jobs within Alexandria,” according to the report.
The report also looked at where households with no cars are located, where young residents and senior citizens live and other demographic details such as poverty and median income. Walkability of different neighborhoods and residential density also played a role in the report.
You can download the entire report here.
Past surveys and studies have shown that getting people out of their cars and onto the bus requires an increase in bus frequency. According to the report:
"People who are accustomed to traveling by car often underestimate the importance of frequency, because there is not an equivalent experience in driving. A car is ready to go when you are, but public transit is not available until it comes. The closest approximation to frequency for drivers is parking availability. The longer you have to walk to your car the less available it is when you need it. Few people are willing to walk 15 minutes to their parking spot, yet the design of the bus network in Alexandria means that often people must wait 15 minutes or more for a bus."
In some cases, DASH is actually competing with MetroBus because they run along the same routes. Some DASH bus routes are unproductive and lack riders during certain times of the day, and in some cases shuttle routes provided by residential communities compete with DASH.
Next Steps
Following this first phase of input, City officials will work on concepts with additional community and stakeholder input this winter. In the spring of 2019, a plan and short-term recommendations will be drafted, followed by a Final Transit Vision Plan and Near-Term Implementation Plan by the summer of 2019.
Earlier this month, Alexandria Living Magazine sent a survey regarding traffic and transit to all City Council candidates. Eight of the nine candidates (plus the one candidate for mayor) answered questions on DASH, transit priorities, communicating with residents and more. Read their answers (or download a PDF of their answers for easier reading) here.
