Before they offer wi-fi on the buses. They need to clean up the curent buses. Stop allowing bags of cans on the buses, and add new stops. Thistown has grown, the routes and stops need to be updated with growth of the city.

WORD!

-s

i ride the bus about twice a week. it only takes about 15 minutes to get downtown. i read the paper in the morning. it's only a quarter. i always have something to read or a crosswork puzzle for the ride home. i can't imagine sitting down, setting up my laptop, and doing any meaningful work at all. so while this is a good idea, and one whose time will soon come, i think there are more pressing problems on fax that need solutions.
what fax should do, right away, is put the schedules on the major stops so that you know when the next bus is expected. this would be cheap, easy, and really helpful.
my experience riding fax is that the buses are, at least early in the morning and at night, within a minute or two of their schedules almost all the time.
i am lucky i don't have to make a connection. but ask anyone who does, and they will tell you how many times their connecting bus drove off while they were running from their first bus. i know the drivers want to make their stops on time. but when there's a bus waiting at a red light, and another bus is at its stop, can't the driver just wait for 30 seconds for that bus to get to its stop and let passengers off, and look to see if any are coming. i mean this is just common sense.
i can see it may be hard to justify adding more buses when there are so few riders most of the day already. i sure would like to see weekend service be a little better than every hour though.
there have been times at night when i was the only rider. then i think, am i really saving gas and the air? my car doesn't get the best mileage in the world, but it's better than a bus!
last, buses should be free. they just should.
k-

I rode the bus for a long-ass time in Fresno (almost ten years). Never say never, but I will never do it again here the way things are (that, and you can’t beat the sound system in my Element!). WiFi is NOT a useful draw at all for me.

Okay, if they wanna draw more people who already have cars to the bus, maybe they might wanna:

1) Clean them. (no one likes sitting in or near spit, vomit, unidentified slime, etc.)

2) Design routes that actually take you where you need to be. (this has come up many times before)

3) Have MORE FREQUESNT stops. (DUH! 30 minute to 1 hour waits: who the F wants to do that?) I can already envision people getting robbed of their laptops while sitting sitting all day wondering, “Did it break down again?”

In 1994 I was in school at University of Hawaii at Manoa. Now, keep in mind Maui is actually my second home, and on Maui there pretty much were NO busses (in 1994), but on Oahu it was a whole different story…

The busses there would pick up EVERY TEN MINUTES (and guess what? They were actually ON TIME: people actually MAINTAINED them!). There is a route that will literally take you ALL OVER that island, even out to the rural areas. The collage campus actually was the center point for the two main bus lines, Ala Moana & Waikiki stations. A bus ticket would cost 75 cents, and came with UNLIMITED TRANSFERS (this has changed now, but you can still buy an unlimited pass for half the cost of Fresno’s), and the busses were CLEAN. For 75 cents, you could get to work, school, the beach, the rainforest, or even just take the route that goes in a circle all around the island. A whole tour for 75 cents, without sitting in out in shit-hot weather with a bunch of gang-bangers wondering if the bus is ever going to come.

GUESS WHAT? EVERYONE RIDES THE BUS ON OAHU. And when I say everyone, I mean EVERYONE. Mopeds are for fun: the bus is for regular use. Oahu's Bus network has more than 90 routes and 4,200 stops around Oahu!!!!!!!

Shit, even during the 1980’s Cold War the busses in Russia would pick up every 5 minutes. This whole, “let’s make them sit around all day on a Sunday and see if a bus ever comes by” attitude sucks. In fact, I find it racist (or classist anyway), and designed to keep poor people poor. How typically Fresno.

Maybe Duncan or Autry can pull their swollen heads out of their rumps for a second and check out some of these links:

http://www.thebus.org/Route/Routes.asp

http://www.tripadvisor.com/Attraction_Review-g29222-d500858-Reviews-The_...

http://www.pacificislandtravel.com/hawaii/about_destin/oahu_thebus.html

http://www.hawaiilogue.com/thebus-oahus-excellent-bus-service.html

WiFi: gimmi a friggin BREAK!!!

-s

I don't think downtown+the surrounding area is big enough for a lot of bussing around, we'll it seems like there aren't enough people. Not yet anyhow. A little more city involvement in forcing business downtown and we'll get the benefit from busses I think.

Right now it seems like driving a car works for the most part. A park n ride from the north side to downtown would be quite effective though I think. Those backed up ramps in the morning could be alleviated to some degree, and the evening too for that matter. I bet the people that are in that morning back up actually plan for that time spent waiting.

When it takes too long to drive through downtown due to congestion busses will rule. Tourism counts as well, tourists like to take public transportation to not have to worry about getting lost or parking.

Proper planning will entail giving busses right of way through downtown, their own signalizing and so on. Also giving them their own lanes around town. When that happens the wifi will totally make sense. Seems like maybe it's a little too soon for it, but progress starts somewhere, sometime...

The development of bussing around is more a function of time economics as it is personal finance economics. At this time at least. Perhaps ridership could increase over time due to fuel rates, maybe when it hits 5.00-6.00 bucks a gallon...

Props to the people that ride the bus to help the environment...

Diablo

spleece,
there are definitely a lot of people on the bus that can't currently afford a car. but, i think they are trying to draw more people to the buses. amenities like free wifi could be a draw.

but, i don't know if it's draw enough to defeat convenience.

...the majority people on the bus cannot afford a car, much less a laptop.

Maybe I'm way off on this?

-s

it really would not cost that much for a Wireless and Mobile Router and the service should cost the price of a high-speed Internet cell phone connection.

I saw this item on the agenda for yesterday's City Council Meeting. Council member Duncan brought forward a "Request that staff prepare a proposal to conduct a pilot project to determine the effectiveness of FAX bus-enabled Wi-Fi as an amenity to our FAX system" - www.fresno.gov/NR/rdonlyres/498EC1AA-72D6-4D2A-B89E-EC6885EC8D53/0/Janua...

For the full report to Council see: www.fresno.gov/CouncilDocs/agenda1.29.2008/915b.pdf

I don't know how the vote turned out. Was the vote turnout included in the ABC 30 piece? I think it is an interesting idea. I ride the 26 route from Tower up to my office at Palm an Herndon. I have to walk the last 1/2 mile + to Palm and Alluvial, but I need the exercise so I don't mind. I would use it in the evening on my way home. I wouldn't be able to use it in the morning because it is standing room only because of Fresno and Bullard High students. The route passes 2 elementary, 2 middle, and 2 high schools on that Palm stretch.

Good idea Jerry, I think it is well worth looking into.

Kiel Famellos-Schmidt

It's a pretty good idea for trying to increase ridership. But I'm skeptical it would work.
Now, maybe if they tried to improve the bus lines while at the same time doing this, it could work. Maybe followed with an ad campaign. But the bus system here is too useless for too many people for this alone to have a great impact. Even if we don't yet include a great mass transit system in Fresno, our existing bus system could stand to be improved (i.e. more stops, more frequent buses, extended times or even night buses, etc.). I would take the bus, but due to the more odd times I work, I simply can't.

Of course, if you just mean as a convenience idea for existing riders, it's absolutely great! :D