Advisory board pushes for more accountability from staff

Panel suggests holding specific managers publicly responsible for safety, cleanliness

Should I take transit? More than half of the people taking the bus or LRT today would say no, according to a new report released by the city Thursday.

According to surveys conducted quarterly at transit centres, only 44 per cent of respondents would recommend transit to a friend. Half of the 20,500 complaints received in 2015 were about the drivers either not picking up people who are waiting at a bus stop or not driving safely.

Edmonton’s transit advisory board released a detailed set of recommendations aimed at transforming that customer experience Thursday, including best practices from other North American cities.

They’re pushing Edmonton to make specific managers publicly responsible for the safety and cleanliness of transit centres; publicly post the on-time records for buses each day, month and quarter; and make a better system to upgrade training for any bus driver who receives customer complaints.

The recommendations are set to be debated Monday in a community services committee meeting.

“We want to see that people are accountable,” said Izak Roux, chairperson of the city’s transit advisory committee. “It brings Edmonton Transit closer to the user. It’s a partnership in a way — there’s a relationship.”

Last year, an audit found at times only 58 per cent of buses were arriving at their timing points on time.

Roux wants regular public updates on unreliable buses. But also for safety incidents — reporting locations and details of the incident — so users can get a realistic impression of the system.

As for the drivers, most people said they were impressed with their safe driving and courteous service. But when there was an issue, six per cent of the complaints related to one per cent of the drivers.

Roux’s advisory board is recommending transit officials also ask riders with a disability to help with driver training.

Transit head Eddie Robar said his team is already working on some of these recommendations. Edmonton Transit has gone through a major restructuring in the last half year, hiring for six of the seven director roles.

“It’s an entirely different focus than it was before. What I’m building the organization around is the service,” said Robar, who started with Edmonton Transit one year ago. “Transit operations is our core business. All the other groups are there to support the on-street service.”

He called the advisory board’s work “super helpful.”

Transit officials have a busy year already with the transit strategy — a possible complete restructuring of basic routes — and the new regional integrated fare system. They shortlisted two companies for that, are doing site visits now and hope to award the contract within the next few months.

His new head of workforce development, once hired, will be tasked with increasing the ongoing driver training program.

For late buses, he plans to change the schedules before September to reserve five standby buses, so for the first time they’ll have a driver ready to move when a bus breaks down. That should help, he said.

“We don’t have that capacity on our system right now.”

On accountability, Robar is planning to publish on-time records and other reliability statistics in his annual work plan, expected to be released this spring.

“It’s about how do I have people hold me accountable,” he said.