AUTOMATED TRANSIT RIDERSHIP DATA COLLECTION PILOT TEST AND USER'S GUIDE. INTERIM REPORT

Transit systems need to collect bus ridership data to evaluate operational efficiency and to comply with the reporting requirements for federal government subsidies. Manual data collection, coding and summarization is a tedious, inefficient and expensive process. An automated data collection system such as the one produced by Multisystems, was found to be the most cost effective and versatile system for Texas small transit agencies. The automated system consists of two software packages. The Check*mate software is used on a portable computer to collect ridership data and the TIM software is used on a PC to correct, store and summarize the data. The supplied documentation for the system was inadequate for implementation and so a supplemental user's guide was developed. The automated system (including the new user's guide) was furnished to Citibus, the local transit agency in Lubbock. The implementation and their use of the automated system was then documented. Several comments and recommendations were generated for the automated system. Overall, the pilot test demonstrated that the automated system could be used effectively by transit systems to improve efficiency. The system does require considerable time to set up, and was one of the major concerns resulting from the pilot testing. State assistance in training and set-up may be one possible alternative for small transit agencies. TTI and Citibus personnel agree that the concept of an equipment "pool" for transit agencies to borrow the hardware necessary for an automated data collection system is not feasible due to the frequency at which data must be collected.