I read recently — in fact, it might have been just yesterday in the Hays Free Press — that the city of Buda is conspiring with Austin’s Cap Metro to develop a mass transportation plan for our neighbors to the north. As I recall (I actually just skimmed the story), some city official — it might have even been Buda Mayor Todd Ruge — was quoted in the story as saying, at the very least, the city needed mass transportation services between Buda and Southpark Meadows in South Austin.
Good for Buda. I really hope there’s a demand for mass transportation services between Buda and Southpark Meadows because there isn’t any such demand for those kind of services between Kyle and that particular Austin shopping venue. How do I know what? Because Kyle not only already offers that service, but it’s one that will pick you up right at your front door. And do you have a guess as to how many local residents have availed themselves of that mass transportation service between Kyle and Southpark Meadows? The answer is zero. Zilch. Nada. Not a soul. No one.
For the life of me, I can’t see any reason why Kyle officials should enter into any kind of strategy sessions involving developing more mass transportation options when there seems to be little demand for the one that already exists.
Kyle/Buda Taxi provides taxpayer-subsidized mass transportation services two days a week for Kyle residents who want those services and a handful of people actually do. But you can count the number of people that do on the fingers of one hand and still have most of your fingers left over and those passengers only want to go to other places in Kyle. When I first reported on the ridership of Kyle/Buda Taxi about six weeks ago, ridership averaged 1.75 persons a day. It would figure, as more and more people became aware of the service, that ridership level would increase. Sure. Fine. Whatever. Since its inception through yesterday, the service has averaged 1.73 riders a day. Talk about taking the "mass" out of mass transportation. And, to date, no one has sought the service to travel to either Austin or San Marcos.
Come to think about it, those numbers don’t suggest a pressing need for Lone Star Rail either. If no one is going to use a transportation service that will come to your home, can you imagine anyone using one that required them to drive to a station? Of course, they could always use Kyle/Buda Taxi to take them to the local Lone Star Rail station (the thought of anyone actually doing that cracks me up).
It will be fascinating to see how this service fares (pun intended) during the upcoming City Council budget sessions. If money is tight, I could easily see this item first up on the chopping block. After all, the City is just billing this service as "a pilot" program.
Thanks to Chief of Staff Jerry Hendrix for making the following taxpayer-subsidized Kyle/Buda Taxi ridership numbers available:
Tuesday, March 1: 1 rider
Thursday, March 17: 1 rider
Tuesday, March 22: 2 riders
Thursday, March 24: 1 rider
Tuesday, March 29: 0 riders
Thursday, March 31: 2 riders
Tuesday, April 5: 3 riders:
Thursday, April 7: 3 riders
Tuesday, April 12, 1 rider
Thursday, April 14:, 3 riders
Tuesday, April 19:, 0 riders
Thursday, April 21: 2 riders
Tuesday, April 26: 2 riders
Thursday, April 28: 1 rider
Tuesday, May 3: 3 riders
Thursday, May 5: 2 riders
Tuesday, May 10: 2 riders
Thursday, May 12: 1 rider
Tuesday, May 17, 2 riders
Thursday, May 19: 4 riders
Tuesday, May 24: 1 rider
Thursday, May 26: 1 rider
For mass transportation programs to be successful in a community, that community needs to have population numbers significantly larger than what Kyle currently has and a population density far greater than Kyle’s. It would also help if the city didn’t have an interstate highway cutting right through its heart. The above figures reflect a ridership of 3.5 passengers a week. By comparison, Austin’s Cap Metro claims 103,000 boardings a week. Of course, you can argue, Austin is much larger than Kyle and you would be right about that. Austin’s population is actually 26 times larger than Kyle’s. But Cap Metro’s ridership is 29,429 times greater than Kyle/Buda Taxi’s taxpayer-subsidized service. That’s the real story of why mass transportation issues need no further discussions in Kyle. At least not for the next decade or so.
It is true that The City of Buda is currently exploring transportation options. We are conducting a feasibility study to see if there would be enough ridership to merit developing a strategy plan for future implementation. While decisions have not been made yet, I believe two questions must be answered before moving forward with any mass transit plan. Overall cost to the taxpayers of our city and the anticipated level of ridership.
ReplyDeleteTo be fair the author did say he had only skimmed the Free Press article, but I'd like to be clear that another Councilmember had stated their desire to see service to Southpark. I'm taking a more cynical stance at this point. Here's what I said to the Free Press.
Buda Mayor Todd Ruge on the other hand wants to look at mass transit options “cautiously”.
“Ridership would be one of the major determining factors in a future mass transit option,” Ruge said.
Ruge suggested that the city purchase a van and hire a full time driver in order to meet demand service needs. But he said that a mass transit plan would not be effectual until the 2017-2018 budget cycle.
Regards
Todd Ruge, Mayor of The City of Buds
Sounds like angry pessimism here Mr. Oppell
ReplyDelete