It’s a blazing hot day in early July. It’s one of those midsummer days when almost everyone would have the air conditioning in their houses or cars blasting ice-cold air into their faces.
But for the people who ride public transportation, staying cool can be a challenge.
At the Santa Maria Transit Center on Miller Street, people waiting for buses are packed under the center’s shade-providing patio and covered benches.
On one particular bench, an older man and woman are engaged in a particularly colorful conversation. Clearly, they’re frustrated about something. The scorching weather, perhaps?
Think again.
“I had to walk four blocks from my house to get to the bus stop the other day. And I can’t walk very far,” the woman, Ginger Bachus, says as she leans against her pale pink walker.
To this, the man, Mike Whitby, responds sympathetically: “I can’t walk, really.”
He says pain in his legs, back, and feet pretty much prevent him from getting around. Sitting beside him is a small portable cooler. His brown wooden cane is hooked on the cooler’s extended handle.
“The distance between the [bus] stops is rather far,” Whitby explains to an eavesdropping reporter. “For people with mobility problems, it’s very difficult. The reason I need the bus is because I can’t walk.”
According to Whitby—and several other bus riders the Sun talked to—it seems like Santa Maria Area Transit has cut the number of city bus stops as part of its new “streamlined” route schedules and services. The changes, Whitby says, make it more difficult to get on the bus and to appointments.
“I haven’t talked to anyone who’s happy about the changes,” Whitby says. “I’m never in a hurry so I don’t mind if it takes longer to get places, but it must be difficult for the people who need to get from point A to point B, who are going to work or are on a schedule.”
At this point, Bachus chimes in: “I don’t like [the new routes]. And those ca-ca maps; I don’t know when the buses are leaving or stopping. It’s aggravating because it doesn’t explain nothing.”
Stop and go
SMAT held a handful of public workshops to discuss transportation services leading up to the grand opening of the new transit center in June. According to the SMAT website, some of the changes include new easy-to-read schedules, new convenient stops and locations, new schedule times, and new website features.
The Sun was unable to determine how many old stops were cut, but did confirm that stops were eliminated at the Betteravia Government Center and all of Blosser Road. Additionally, a Sun reporter was unable to obtain a route map on the bus she was riding. She also noticed that many of the bus stops on Skyway Drive near the Sun office didn’t have maps posted on them—just blue signs with a bus decal and a phone number.
Transit service manager Austin O’Dell said the locations of certain bus stops have changed, but there aren’t fewer stops. If anything, the city added stops, he said.
Still, Whitby said he’s considering using ADA paratransit, a curb-to-curb transportation system for disabled individuals, instead because of the changes.
“I picked up an application,” he said. (People who ride ADA buses have to submit an application with a doctor’s note or some other proof of disability.)
But the ADA service might not be the solution he’s looking for—at least according to some local seniors.
Cities are required by law to offer curb-to-curb transportation to disabled people who live within three quarters of a mile from a regular bus route. In Santa Maria, certified ADA riders call the city to make an appointment. The transit service has to provide rides within an hour of the requested time.
However, Santa Maria resident Betty Townley said there have been times when she called in to confirm her appointment and the dispatcher said her request wasn’t in the system. Other times, the bus has been late picking her up.
“They said I wasn’t on the schedule and that my information must have been bumped off, whatever that means,” Townley said, adding that she took it upon herself to call the city because most of the seniors she’s talked to are afraid they’ll be denied service if they complain.
“All the bus drivers say is, ‘You have to call the city,’” she continued, “but I can’t get through to anyone. I’ve gone down the list and followed protocol, but nothing’s changed. The service has gotten worse.”
Transit service manager O’Dell said he thinks the city is “doing a really good job of trying to accommodate everyone.”
“We don’t cancel [ADA] trips without telling people because we can’t,” O’Dell said.
The only reason information would be bumped, he said, is if a person didn’t show up for his or her ride three times or more.
“If you get that many no-shows, you’re told you can’t use the bus because it ties up the services for other people,” he explained.
Another challenge: ADA services can only provide “subscription trips” 50 percent of the time. Subscription trips are ongoing rides at regularly planned times.
O’Dell said the city is planning to hold more public workshops in the future to discuss changes to the transit system and he encouraged people to attend.
“For the most part I think people were surprised by the changes,” he said. “When there are changes, people need time to adjust.”
Contact Managing Editor Amy Asman at aasman@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Jul 14-21, 2011.
