Tuesday, March 12, 2024

EMTA County buses used to have fare zones

This photo is from the 2004 EMTA County route schedule. Note that some county routes had fare zones during this time. 

The only county route I can recall using when they had fare zones  then was North East, which had only two zones. The second zone started in Harborcreek borough, and the driver would pull over there and collect the second fare. Usually riders knew that was part of the ride, but I did once see a rider become belligerent with the driver because she thought the driver was pulling some sort of scam. The zone fare set-up was printed on the schedule, but she may not have actually seen a schedule.  I wondered at the time why the company didn't have kind of have a sign or info sheet available on the county buses to head off these confrontations, because it must have sometimes been unpleasant or scary for the driver if a rider went off on them like this.

The fare zones were eliminated I think about ten years ago.



Thursday, February 15, 2024

Apartment hunting for transit users

Apartment hunters, here are a few words and tips about the Facebook marketplace features for walkers, bikers, and Transit users.

These are helpful but sometimes not exactly accurate IMHO

For example, I've chosen an address right by 8th and Cherry, (which I've highlighted in yellow.) I'm very familiar with the area so I'm also familiar with the transit situation. See screen capture below.

Transit Score™ (highlighted in green) offers a score that sometimes doesn't seem to be that accurate. I would actually rate this address pretty high in terms of transit availability, yet the score they give it is only 41 out of 100. For instance from 8th and Cherry address there are four bus routes: Routes 4 and 30 on West 10th and Route 31 and 32 on West 6th. These are each very close by at least for my purposes. It seems to be a very transit-friendly location (.2 mile/4 min on foot) and I would think deserves a higher rating than they gave it

Below the scores is a "Nearby Transit" feature (in red highlight).

This is very helpful and usually quite accurate in telling you what which routes are near an address. 

For this particular address, however, I was surprised because it tells readers that for that -- although both 31 and 32 stop at West 6th and Cherry, the feature tells them to go to the Gridley Park shelter corner (.4 mi/9 min)

The scores and the transit info come from a national organization so I guess they could miss things that a local concern wouldn't. For me it wasn't a biggie just be aware.. it's still pretty helpful. (click/tap to enlarge)
 
Map
Also if you want housing on a particular route, open up the map (next photo) and click on the addresses being offered on that route. Click on a listing for further info and photos