Public Surveys Become Key Tool for Transit Agencies Navigating Post-Pandemic Uncertainty

Oklahoma's third-largest city, Norman, is home to the University of Oklahoma, which long controlled local transportation operations until transferring those responsibilities to the city in 2019. That shift required the city to learn new skills, as it now oversees the movement of 300,000 passengers annually. To improve transit, Norman developed a long-term plan to review existing bus routes, but it lacked current data. So the city turned to a simple civic engagement tool: a public survey.

"This survey is informing most, if not all transit decisions in Norman," said Taylor Johnson, the city's public transit coordinator. Norman is one of many cities and agencies nationwide using surveys to gather public input on transit.

Surveys are valuable for guiding policy change, said Ashley Amaya, senior survey research methodologist at the Pew Research Center. Responses can be collected relatively quickly, and repeated surveys can track changes and trends over time.

"When governments survey the public, they also can find out how frequently things are being used or what would happen, potentially, if they did make changes," Amaya said. "That can help them allocate money towards different parts of the programs that maybe need a little bit more help."

To succeed, agencies must craft effective questions and choose the best distribution methods. In Norman, the city developed questions for its Go Norman Transit Study with help from Nelson\Nygaard Consulting Associates. The transportation firm compiled a survey covering topics from bus shelters to transit routes, which the city then reviewed.

The survey ran for about three weeks last month, ending Nov. 30, and drew 638 responses. Norman promoted it on social media, posted flyers inside buses, and emailed stakeholders urging participation. The city will combine survey results with census data and community meeting input to guide transit decisions over the next two decades as its population grows. "Since the routes haven't changed very much over the last 20 years, I would say it's all on the table of what the plan could recommend," Johnson said.

Immediate changes will likely come from low-cost recommendations, such as moving a route or eliminating underused bus stops while adding needed ones, Johnson said. These will be paired with medium- and long-term plans. In February, the city will hold community meetings to gather feedback on proposed recommendations.

'Getting future riders where they want to be'

Norman isn't alone in seeking public input. In Idaho Falls, home to about 60,000 residents, the city's only public bus service closed in May 2019 due to financial issues. Since then, transit companies and partners have filled the gap with paratransit and senior-focused services.

Now, Idaho Falls is relaunching its bus service as Greater Idaho Falls Transit (GIFT) and needs a fresh perspective on community transit needs, said Michelle Ziel-Dingman, president of the Idaho Falls City Council and GIFT board chair. The agency is creating a survey to guide deployment of planned fixed-route and paratransit services. The survey is slated to launch at the end of December and run until mid-January.

"At this point, we want to fully understand if you were to travel on a GIFT bus, where would you go? Is that to work? Is that shopping? Is that for medical?" Ziel-Dingman said. "Our city has grown and changed. New businesses have come in. New large retailers have come in. And we want to assure that we're getting future riders where they want to be."

The survey will ask where people would travel on the bus, plus demographics such as gender, age, and employment status. The agency also needs to know if students and staff at the College of Eastern Idaho and University Place require a bus route, and if seniors need additional transit.

Survey data can also help target advertisers. For example, if many users want to go to a specific business, GIFT can approach that business for advertising opportunities, Ziel-Dingman said.

GIFT used former transit surveys from the local Bonneville Metropolitan Planning Organization as a starting point. A student at Brigham Young University-Idaho with survey experience is assisting with design. The survey will be distributed online with help from Idaho Falls' communications department, businesses, hospitals, and local colleges. Ziel-Dingman acknowledges that online communications can exclude those without internet access, but she is confident that free internet at libraries will help bridge that divide.

Assessing COVID-19's effect on transit

Even agencies that have long analyzed rider habits are in uncharted territory due to the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. Before the pandemic, the Regional Transportation Authority (RTA) in Chicago was working on a survey of non-riders—those who stopped riding or never used transit. Suddenly, COVID-19 made nearly everyone a lapsed rider, completely altering the survey, said Hersh Singh, principal analyst at RTA.

"Everything we knew pre-COVID about people's desires for transit, I don't think really hold at all right now because everything has completely changed," Singh said. "I don't think any of us in the transit profession think that those same preferences will hold."

So RTA, which oversees planning for northeastern Illinois' three transit operators and their 2 million riders, changed its survey's core goal: understanding the pandemic's effects on ridership. RTA reworked a nationwide study on COVID-19 and transportation with consulting from Resource Systems Group. It kept questions about transit movements and added ones to identify a new baseline for habits: Are they commuting to work? Are they going to the grocery or using delivery services more?

Two questions even addressed granular transit funding through an exercise asking respondents to allocate an imaginary $10 across nine transit priority areas. While this portion took extra work, it lets agencies see which priorities riders find most important, Singh said.

"It's weird because we just got thrown into an unknown," Singh said of COVID-19. "Planners pride themselves on understanding the markets and market preferences, but right now we just have no clue."

The 18-day survey ended Nov. 30, attracting more than 2,600 responses. RTA reached people by emailing customer lists of transit agencies and the Ventra ticket buying app. They targeted riders of the three agencies as well as current transit users, such as essential workers and those without cars. A second wave will be conducted in mid-January. Analysis of both surveys will allow RTA to see if opinions change during the intervening 1.5 months and to better identify what people want from transit.

Best practices

Surveying the public is not a sustainable approach to engagement unless done effectively. Transparency is key to ensuring people know a survey is worthwhile, said Amaya of the Pew Research Center. One indicator is having information online about how the survey is conducted, including sampling methods, question wording, weighting, and analysis methods.

Amaya said the preferable sampling method is probability-based, where the organization randomly surveys from a variety of samples. This includes calling random phone numbers or mailing random addresses from the U.S. Postal Service's list, a common way to sample for online surveys as well. Organizations can mail invitations with unique links so respondents can take the survey only once.

Another common approach is a panel. Organizations recruit random people via phone or mail to sit on a panel that can be surveyed multiple times. These processes are typically online, quicker, and cheaper because the audience doesn't need constant refreshing, Amaya said. Surveys should avoid non-probability-based samples, she added, because volunteers often differ from the general population.

Before writing a survey, spend time talking with riders through focus groups or community events, said Steven Higashide, director of research at TransitCenter. These discussions can highlight important issues to incorporate. He also emphasized thinking about how to reach audiences. An online survey is likely skewed toward higher-income riders, so agencies can pay community-based organizations to distribute surveys to diverse groups, Higashide said.

He pointed to Metro Transit in Minneapolis-Saint Paul, which collaborated with 13 community-based organizations to publicize a recent project to build new bus shelters. These groups knocked on doors, staffed tables at community events, and surveyed riders at bus stops. This led to responses representative of riders in terms of race, ethnicity, income, and disabilities, said Higashide.

"These are all groups that tend to be harder to reach when you're just doing an online survey," Higashide said. "In a lot of projects, public engagement is something that is not well-resourced, which means that input into a project might come from a few townhall meetings done at times and places that are inconvenient for a lot of transit riders to attend. That makes projects more politically difficult and it skews the feedback that agencies get."

In addition to getting continual rider feedback, agencies shouldn't overlook other stakeholders. For example, Higashide said the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority in Boston regularly surveys employers to understand how transit demand changes as the pandemic progresses.

While surveys should be one of many tools agencies use to collect feedback, they remain an important method to hear from a wide array of riders who might not otherwise offer planning input. "Whether it's changing service or changing the fare structure or planning new projects, transit decisions should be informed by transit riders," Higashide said. "The folks who plan transit aren't always in the same room as riders. Transit gets influenced by elected officials and by business groups and developers and all sorts of interests who don't always have the same interests as riders."