Sustainability isn’t just about recycling or reducing emissions – it’s also about how we take care of ourselves and the systems that support us. One powerful, everyday way we can sustain ourselves is through active transportation – walking, biking, or using public transit. But for that to work, our communities need to be built for it.
That’s one reason I started Sustain With Age. The goal was to help people – especially in Rochester – focus on what matters to them, whether it’s running a business or caring for their families, without being burdened by unsustainable costs (like utilities) or limited mobility options. Everyone should be able to access opportunity, healthcare, and connection, no matter their income or physical ability.
And as we age, that becomes even more important.
We often think of aging in terms of healthcare or retirement, but transportation is just as critical. How do we get to the grocery store? To a doctor’s appointment? To see grandchildren? Transportation access is a social determinant of health, and yet too many communities still prioritize cars over people.
To be a truly age-friendly place, Monroe County needs to design for the future – for younger generations, but also those living longer, with changing physical needs. That means:
Safer streets with slower traffic and more pedestrian crossings.
Accessible sidewalks and bus stops with benches, shelters, and curb cuts.
Frequent, reliable transit of all modes.
A community design that reduces the need for long car trips altogether.
And numerous other measures like coordinated construction planning to allow those in wheelchairs, blind people, and others to continue to safely navigate detours.
The recent Vision Zero commitment in Rochester is a step in the right direction – it shows a recognition that lives are at stake and that we must design for safety, not just speed.
And there are more opportunities ahead. The filling-in of the Inner Loop, the possibility of higher-speed rail, and investments in more frequent bus service could all reshape how people of all ages get around. But we need to make sure accessibility and equity are at the center of that change.
Rochester has a unique role to play: we are a college town, a climate haven, a community for working families, and recently named a top city for aging in place. That mix gives us both an obligation and an opportunity to lead on sustainable, age-friendly design.
Importantly, this conversation extends beyond Rochester and Monroe County. We are a 9-county region with massive towns like Greece that need to be in this conversation and planning too.
I don’t expect a perfect system tomorrow. But as someone who works in the built environment, I see how deeply connected our homes, workplaces, and transit systems are. With smart planning and a shared commitment to sustainability – financially, personally, and environmentally – we can build a community that truly supports people across their lifespan.
Kyle is a climate risk and sustainability professional in Rochester. He is a Board Member of the Climate Solutions Accelerator of the Genesee-Finger Lakes Region and runs his firm, Sustain With Age which has a newsletter you can sign up for here. All views are his own and do not reflect those of any institution or organization.
At Reconnect, we’re always working to improve mobility access in our community. Sign up for Mobility Action Alerts for tangible advocacy and volunteer opportunities involving transportation, safe streets, and bike infrastructure.
Car Lite Rochester is a blog series that highlights the stories of Rochesterians living a car-lite lifestyle. The term “car lite” encompasses a variety of multimodal transportation lifestyles, featuring little dependence (but not NO dependence) on a car. It typically looks like sharing one car within a household or only using a car when absolutely necessary.
So, we hope you’ll continue to follow along. Maybe you will be inspired to join our bloggers in living a car-lite lifestyle!
A College Student’s Journey On Two Wheels & Transit
By Una Gogstetter:
As a college student who, like many others my age, doesn’t own my own car, living car lite has been necessary for me. My experience getting around Rochester with limited car access has been both enjoyable and eye-opening. I am a current sophomore at Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts, with a Statistical and Data Sciences major, Urban Studies minor, and Community Engagement and Social Change concentration. Living without a car while away at college has also broadened my perspective on car lite living in Rochester
Car Lite in Rochester
For the past two summers, I biked or took the bus to my jobs (first at Corn Hill Navigation then at Rochester Area Community Foundation). While this was more by necessity than by conscious choice, I did particularly enjoy my experience biking. I would often listen to music through my earbuds on my way, the bike ride integrated exercise into my daily routine, and I was able to observe various people, houses, and businesses along my route.
Some of my favorite areas to bike have been the Railroad Loop Trail or passing by the lovely old houses on Park Avenue. Furthermore, RTS provided a convenient way for me to get to work in rainy weather—my house, near Cobbs Hill, is located in close proximity to a bus stop. I will likely spend much of this summer in Rochester and I intend to continue frequently commuting by bike or by bus.
The turn onto the Railroad Loop Trail.
The bike commute to my internship last summer involved this lovely section of Harvard Street.
While I’m lucky to have worked at locations I can travel to without a car, I am still cognizant of the ways in which access to transportation in Rochester could be expanded and improved. I have had to be mindful of transportation-related concerns when applying and planning my schedule for jobs and internships in Rochester, as I am unable to access many Rochester area locations without a car. Transportation-related logistics have also been a concern for me outside of work-related contexts.
Excursions ranging from dining out with a friend to purchasing a particular item I need to going on a family hike would be much more challenging without my parents and friends having cars. While it is of course possible to live car-free in many parts of Rochester, having zero access to a car would likely come with unavoidable drawbacks.
Although living car-free in any city comes with challenges, such challenges are greater in the absence of extensive public transportation systems as well as in the absence of comprehensive infrastructure supporting pedestrians and bicyclists.
Similarly to many cities, Rochester’s bike lanes are neither physically separated from car lanes nor consistently present even on busy streets. Therefore, the current arrangements force bicyclists to choose between riding beside automobiles or riding on the sidewalk. Furthermore, if someone is seeking to live a car lite lifestyle, and thus potentially biking rather than driving, their commute will likely coincide with rush hour—an especially dangerous time to bike in the road.
Comparisons with Northampton
Northampton is certainly imperfect regarding friendliness toward non-automobile forms of transportation. Its bike lanes are inconsistent, not physically separated from automobile traffic, and its bus system does not reach all areas of the city. Still the city has greater mindfulness of pedestrians in comparison to Rochester.
Crosswalks at locations other than traffic lights are much more common in Northampton. Pedestrians frequently utilize these crosswalks—the downtown area is often busy with people visiting the shops and farmers’ market. Additionally, drivers tend to be more considerate toward pedestrians. They consistently stop at the many crosswalks and, even outside of designated crossing locations, and display an awareness of pedestrians I wasn’t previously used to.
Overall, my experience living car lite in Rochester highlights the importance of Reconnect Rochester’s mission to “champion transportation choice”. Tangible improvements, such as expanding the public transportation system, implementing safer biking infrastructure, and creating more crosswalks, would be undeniably impactful. Such improvements, though, must perhaps be accompanied by a shift in residents’ attitudes. A high level of mindfulness toward pedestrians could become more normalized, as it is in Northampton. Biking, walking, and riding the bus would start to be seen as feasible alternatives to driving—a mindset shift that would be helped along by infrastructural improvements.
Improvements in the physical infrastructure and the public attitudes around car lite living in Rochester would allow residents with limited or no car access to get around more safely and easily. And any resident, car owner or not, could experience enhanced well-being and a deepened sense of connection to the city and its communities as a result of walking or biking more often.
At Reconnect, we’re inspired by the stories of people in our community, like Karen Nozik, Steve Roll, and Calvin Eaton, who are passionate about living a car-lite or car-free lifestyle. If you want to support our work and make it easier for others to go Car-Lite please donate and sign up for Mobility Action Alerts to stay in the loop with opportunities of how to advocate for safer streets and transportation options.
Let us know if you want to share your mobility story! What’s in it for you? The intrinsic reward of knowing you’ve inspired others, and a free t-shirt from our online shop! Contact Chaz to submit your story.
In June 2024, Rochester Mayor Malik Evans announced the ROC Vision Zero Initiative to eliminate traffic fatalities and serious injuries on the city’s streets. Among the 10 priority actions announced was an effort to tackle Lake Avenue, one of Rochester’s most dangerous streets. The plan calls for making Lake Avenue a multimodal safety corridor equipped with a “Bus Rapid Transit” line or BRT for short. What is a BRT and why would a fast-moving bus lane make Lake Avenue a street safer? 🤔
BRT is a high-quality-bus-based transit system that delivers fast, efficient and frequent service along a corridor by implementing dedicated bus-only lanes, signal priority, bus stations with off board fare collection and elevated platforms. The City’s proposal is in early days, so we don’t have anything specific to react to, but we do hope they’ll go for the BRT Gold Standard. Gold standard BRT also includes designing for universal access for people of all abilities and pedestrian access and safety on the street. We should strive for the best and avoid what advocates have termed “BRT Creep”, when elements of good BRT are removed to save on costs and the line becomes unrecognizable from a standard frequent service line. This will take a healthy mix of up-front capital investments (to build out the infrastructure) matched with operational dollars that keep the service running frequently (for more on operating funds, see our February letter to Governor Hochul).
Only a few systems across the US have achieved bronze or better including Albuquerque’s ABQ RIDE (Gold), Clevland’s Healthline (Silver), and Pittsburgh’s Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. East Busway (Bronze). More locally, Albany’s Capital District Transportation Association has upped their BRT game with 3 BRT lines connecting Albany, Schenectady and Troy. Our friend the Urban Phoenix had a lot of good things to say about his experience using the system. Recently, a big step forward for Buffalo’s east side is the proposed Bailey Avenue BRT treatment, a 7.5 mile corridor connecting the City’s south side to north side destinations and the metro rail.
We could see our BRT line going from the Transit Center all the way to Lake Ontario, about 8 miles. Rochester’s initiative on Lake Avenue wouldn’t just add a BRT line to the existing street. It would redesign the street to enhance and advance multi-modal safety. BRT would be a component in a design that would enhance pedestrian and bicycle facilities while improving access to the transit system. While we don’t have formal designs yet, the National Association of City Transportation Officials (NACTO) thinks it could look something like this:
Planners often frame BRT as a potential catalyst transit project and on this one, we agree. BRT can offer Rochester a unique opportunity to connect Edgerton, Maplewood and Downtown with faster and more efficient bus service, and provide opportunities to invest in more transit-oriented development along the corridor. Basically, that means dense, walkable, mixed-use development near the bus stops that adds amenities closer to where people live and use the bus.
Currently, the City of Rochester is building a transit-oriented development in the Bull’s Head area where West Main St. meets Genesee St., Brown St. and Chili Ave. Local credit union ESL committed to being the first tenant in the redevelopment, bringing back banking services to the 19th Ward for the first time in a decade.
The City of Rochester identified Lake Avenue as a top transit-oriented development (TOD) corridor opportunity in the 2018 Transit Supportive Corridors Study. While improving transportation is a core goal, BRT on Lake Avenue goes beyond simply moving people. It’s a strategic investment with a ripple effect of positive outcomes:
Economic Development & Housing: BRT is a proven catalyst for transit-oriented development (TOD). By providing faster, more reliable service, it attracts businesses, housing, and services to the corridor. This is especially promising near underutilized parking areas around Kodak/Eastman Business Park, where BRT could spur valuable development and create a mixed-use hub.
Activating a Key Corridor: BRT will amplify Lake Ave’s potential, transforming the corridor into a thriving destination with increased foot traffic and economic activity.
Addressing Safety Concerns: The current state of Lake Avenue presents a barrier and many safety risks for residents accessing the Genesee River and other destinations. BRT will prioritize safety improvements for pedestrians, cyclists, and drivers, making the corridor safer and more inviting for everyone.
A Stepping Stone to the Future: BRT is not an endpoint but a stepping stone. The infrastructure built for BRT can serve as the foundation for future transit options like streetcars or light rail. This approach allows Rochester to incrementally build towards a more robust and interconnected transit network.
Safety, better transit options, economic stimulus. What’s not to like about BRT? Detractors in some places have promulgated fears that adding dedicated bus lines would create car congestion. As with most multimodal improvements, the opposite is shown to happen: Studies have consistently shown that BRT does not worsen traffic; in fact, it often improves traffic flow by prioritizing efficient transit and encouraging more people to leave their cars at home. The current levels of congestion on Lake Avenue is primarily limited to peak commute hours, and BRT will help alleviate this by providing a reliable alternative for commuters.
What’s it going to take to launch the BRT planning process? Well, RTS has gotten things off to a good start by announcing last September that the 22 Lake Ave line is getting restored to 15 minute service as was envisioned in Reimagine RTS. The next step is to get a study underway to scope the project. Lake Avenue BRT represents a transformative opportunity for Rochester. It’s a chance to create a more connected, equitable, and sustainable city – one where everyone has access to opportunity and a vibrant public realm.
At Reconnect, we’re always working to improve mobility access in our community. Sign up for Mobility Action Alerts for tangible advocacy and volunteer opportunities involving transportation, safe streets, and bike infrastructure.
We’ve been busy at Reconnect Rochester since the start of the year pursuing our 2025 Plans and Priorities. Below are a few key updates on what’s been going on in advocacy, especially those projects or events we asked you to mobilize around, and what to look forward to in the next few months:
Growing Our Movement:
Our biggest goal as an advocacy team this year is to grow our base of active, informed and engaged advocates throughout Monroe County. We’re always looking for more people to join the movement – get in touch if you are interested! We have opportunities to support multimodal transportation from taking surveys to speaking to elected officials or writing letters. The easiest way to learn about opportunities is to sign up for Mobility Action Alerts and we will send actions and events you can join.
Annual Executive Meetings:
Back in January, we held our annual meetings with Rochester Mayor Evans (City Hopes & Asks) and Monroe County Executive Adam Bello (County Hopes & Asks), setting the stage for our advocacy throughout the year, including budget advocacy that will be ramping up in the City soon. See our 2025 Budget Input submitted to the City.
ROC Vision Zero:
The Beacon’s ROC Vision Zero forum was well attended with a keynote by Mayor Evans, and an expert panel we helped assemble. Reconnect Rochester is serving on the ROC Vision Zero task force and will be participating in committees on education and community traffic safety champions in March and April.
We don’t know when the next version of the Rochester Zoning Alignment Project code will drop, but we have continued our focus on promoting transit-supportive land use that we had last year in our ZAP comments and Sprawl Effect Rochester Street Films Event. We’re continuing our focus on land use in the Transportation Impact Collective and partnering with Our Local History, Empire Justice Center, RMAPI, and the Climate Solutions Accelerator to deliver informational presentations to pro-housing advocates countywide.
Media Engagement:
Through our daily media monitoring, we are identifying problematic news articles covering crashes and sharing timely feedback using our Crash Reporting Toolkit as a guide.
Federal Uncertainty:
Last but certainly not least on our minds (and likely yours too) is the chaos and uncertainty set off by President Trump’s Executive Orders. Throughout the last two months, we have stayed in close contact with national advocacy groups such as the League of American Bicyclists, America Walks, and the National Campaign for Transit Justice. Focusing on just Monroe County, we analyzed USDOT memos and Trump Executive Orders and identified about $150 million of discretionary funding aimed at bike, pedestrian, transit and safer streets projects, already appropriated by Congress, announced, and some already under contract, potentially at risk through these orders. We have shared this information with Senators Schumer and Gillibrand and Congressman Joe Morelle, who will be meeting with Rochester cyclists in Washington during the National Bike Summit next week. Currently, we believe White House-mandated review outcomes will be announced in April 2025. We will continue to fight for resources that were appropriated by Congress and awarded to our community to fund multimodal transportation projects.
Save the Dates!
We’re excited about several things coming up:
May 1: Mayor Evan and County Executive Bello will deliver the official Bike Month proclamation at Austin Seward Plaza at 1:30 pm
Reconnect Rochester presents Voices of Transit, an ethnography profile blog series that shows how our current bus system helps (and sometimes hurts) transit-dependent riders in their daily lives. In the winter of 2024-2025 we interviewed RTS riders to hear about their experiences firsthand. Read more about how the initiative began in 2023 here.
1. Are you a Rochester native? If not, what brought you to Rochester?
I came to Rochester in 2008. My friend lived here and she invited me to visit and I am still here.
2. Are there any big differences you’ve noticed between RTS and other public transportation infrastructure?
I grew up in New York City and Rochester was quite an adjustment. But both transportation systems have improved a lot.
In NYC the buses are a lot more frequent. There are more routes. There are more points of connection so there are lots of ways to get where you want to go regardless of where you cut through. And I think that’s the biggest difference I saw.
3. Do you use the RTS OnDemand service?
I have recently started using the RTS OnDemand service. For the most part it’s worked. But I have had some times where they did not have enough buses and so a couple of times they had to call and cancel at the last minute.
I think it’s a great service and it really saved me a lot of money. Before OnDemand I had to find alternate means like Lyft to get places like Pittsford which gets very expensive.
The app can be tricky booking a round trip if I’m not going to the same destination that I left but there’s a support number that you can call in and have the people at RTS book the trip for me. It’s good knowing that service does exist for people who need it.
4. Do you own a car?
I don’t own a vehicle. Even thinking about the cost and everything else, RTS is just better for my life.
5. What do you like about RTS? What works for you?
The operators are great. They are very kind and helpful.
I also love the Transit app where you can track the buses in real time. That works really great. Then I only have to wait a couple minutes before the bus gets there so I’m not waiting in the cold during the winter. I like paying with the app so you’re not scrambling looking for change.
I’ve traveled to quite a few places and this is the most affordable transportation I’ve ever seen. In NYC it’s more than 3 times the cost.
6. What don’t you like about RTS? What doesn’t work for you? What would you change?
Culver is one of the major streets that runs through Rochester. Why isn’t there a direct route up and down Culver? My one hour commute would be cut to 20 minutes if that was the case.
I would love more frequent services. I think it’s kinda tricky because unless you get more people, you can’t really pay for it. But unless you do it you’re not gonna get more people.
Or instead of adding an additional bus per hour, they should try to work out the schedules so that the connections are better. So when I’m transferring from one bus to another I’m not waiting half an hour for the next bus.
7. How has riding RTS impacted your life?
How we go grocery shopping and when we do it is based on the scheduling is determined by the transportation that’s available. It also determines where we go out or exercise because if there’s not an accessible route to the gym you have to find somewhere else.
For jobs I’ve had to think, am I going to work there? Is it worth it? Is it going to be worth it at the end of the day paying for a personal vehicle?
I definitely change how I commute in the winter. I don’t necessarily have to go to the RTS Transit Center but in the middle of the winter I’m definitely going to there because I’m not waiting outside in 10 degrees for the next bus.
8. What are your thoughts on bus amenities?
They have varieties of bus shelters. Downtown they have stops with multiple seats and they are enclosed with heating. I would love to see more of that. At least more of the overhead shelters like they have in Brighton. If I’m waiting 20-30 minutes in between buses I would like something to account for the elements. Some type of shelter even if it’s not heated would be helpful.
9. What is your hope for the future for public transportation in Rochester?
Public transit has been a good service to me. My hope would be that we develop it to a place where people who want to do so can take public transportation. Especially if it’s economically convenient. I thought it was an opportunity when we had those super high gas prices. I was really hoping we would jump on that. There are people who it was a pain point for them and there are people who would have definitely given public transportation a try if they saw it as a benefit. But even then I don’t think numbers went up because I don’t believe that people saw it as convenient. It’s not just about cost, it’s about what works for their lives. So my hope is that we develop a system where the people who want to, are able to use the public transportation system that we have.
Trudy
1. Are you a Rochester native? If not, what brought you to Rochester?
I was born in Geneva, but raised in Canandaigua. I moved to Rochester in 2023 because of the people and the community. I’ve met some wonderful people here.
2. Are there any big differences you’ve noticed between Rochester’s and other public transportation infrastructure?
Canandaigua needs help. Their buses stop really early so if you’re out at night you could not get any transportation and living in the country you need transportation.
3. Do you use the RTS OnDemand service?
Yes. It’s a good system. One good thing about that is they check up on you. You call, you make the appointment and they call to verify it and then when you’re actually waiting for the bus, they let you know how close it is so you don’t miss it.
I’m grateful that they have it because that’s how I get to Canandaigua. I go to St John Fisher, and from St J Fisher I take an RTS OnDemand bus to Eastview mall. From there I take a bus to the race track. And from the race track I take another bus to Canandaigua.
I just wish we had more of them where we could accommodate more people. I know a lot of people who take them for work. So sometimes you may have to go to work an hour earlier because they can’t schedule you in. They also need more OnDemand buses to help with the people out in the suburbs. I have a lot of trouble getting to my church in West Henrietta.
4. How do you pay for RTS? Cash? Transit App? RTS Go Card?
I like the RTS Go Card. You don’t have to worry about fumbling around with money; I download money on my card and that way I can monitor how many rides I have and what I’m doing so I can budget it out for the month. I’m also glad that they have discounts for senior citizens.
I don’t use the Transit app. I’m not very good with doing stuff on the internet and stuff like that. That’s why I always call the RTS Customer Service when I have questions.
5. Do you own a car?
I did but I gave it to my daughter who lives in Farmington, NY when she had to walk home 13 miles from work one day. I don’t miss it because Rochester has reliable transportation. I can depend on RTS.
6. Did you grow up riding public transportation? Or did you start riding transit as an adult?
Growing up in Canandaigua I always just rode in cars or a taxi. After that I lived in NYC for years so I am used to public transportation. It has been a major part of my adult life. Even though I’ve owned vehicles, I am definitely used to relying on transit.
7. What do you like about RTS? What works for you?
Those people on University, bus number 9, are very good on that route. Most RTS routes they are. I can depend on the #9, so once I start working again I know I can get to work on time. I love that you can call and they will tell you when the bus is coming.
Overall, we have some really good bus operators. Most of them are very nice, courteous.
I’m glad that RTS does run really late. I used to work at Rochester Regional, at Unity, and I could get to work at 6-7 am and I could get home at 11-12 at night. RTS has a really good system.
8. What don’t you like about RTS? What doesn’t work for you? What would you change?
It’s really tough taking the bus on the weekend. If you miss that one bus, or if the bus is running late, you lose your connection. You’re sitting down for an hour or an hour and a half. Same with holidays.
We need more Customer Service people because sometimes while you’re waiting to find out where your bus is, you miss the bus! I also think they should have somebody working Customer Service at night. They leave about 5-6pm so if you’re there about 8-9pm and you don’t know where you’re going, you have to talk with a supervisor or security guard. Sometimes the security guards don’t know what they’re doing. One time they gave me the wrong gate and I had to sprint to the right spot.
They need more buses out to the suburbs like that one bus going to St John Fisher. I believe that more people in the suburbs would take the bus if it were convenient. Most commute with their cars. Who wants to drive in traffic all the time when you could take the bus?
9. What are your thoughts on bus amenities? Does your bus stop have seating? A Shelter? What would make you more comfortable?
We need more shelters. Or at least a bench. I like the shelter in front of the Walmart on Hudson. That’s really nice.
On East Ave they’ve got a couple benches where you can sit down. But I think every stop should have a bench especially for the elderly. And in the winter time. If they have an option where people could donate a bench in honor of a loved one or something that would be great.
10.What is your hope for the future for public transportation in Rochester?
As you get more people in the City, you’re going to need more routes or more frequent times. I love the 15 or every 30 minutes, it’s nice, but if we could cut it down that would be good. I think shorter waiting times for the buses, especially in the winter time would be wonderful.
Octavio
1. Are you a Rochester native? If not, what brought you to Rochester?
I was born in Mexico City. I came to the US for my job. First I was in Miami then they promoted me to Director and I had to move to the headquarters here in Rochester.
2. Are there any big differences you’ve noticed between RTS and other public transportation infrastructure?
Rochester is the smallest city I’ve lived in. Mexico City has buses and a subway. They also have these peseros which are basically like a car or a taxi where they charge you a small fee. In Rochester they only have the bus but they do seem to work here.
3. Do you own a car?
Yes I do have a car but right now it’s in the shop.
4. What do you like about RTS? What works for you?
RTS is very punctual. If you look at the schedules you can rely on the time table. Sometimes they are earlier which is unusual but I usually try to be there 5-10 minutes before the scheduled time. I don’t remember waiting more than 15 minutes for a bus.
The bus operators are very helpful.
5. What don’t you like about RTS? What doesn’t work for you?
There are some places that are not covered by the RTS so I have to take a bus to the closest bus stop and then walk for a mile or more or I’ll just use a different transportation method. There is a new U of R building-I can’t remember the name of it – but there are no buses there so I have to walk all the way through the hospital or just take Uber or Lyft. I would like to be able to take a bus there directly.
In general the buses are clean but in the winter it’s more difficult to maintain. Sometimes you cannot see through the window through the combination of salt and snow.
6. What are your thoughts on bus amenities?
One of the things that I admire is that they have facilities in the bus for people who use a wheelchair. They have the ramps to the buses, they have an assistant to lift up the seats and give space to the people to secure for safety reasons. I like that. They don’t have that in a lot of other cities.
7.What is your hope for the future for RTS?
More routes. As we’re becoming a bigger city we will have more traffic issues with all the cars. It should be easier to ride the bus.
Jillo
1. Are you a Rochester native? If not, what brought you to Rochester?
I am from South Sudan in Africa. But I’ve been here long enough to where I pretty much am a Rochester native.
2. Are there any big differences you’ve noticed between RTS and other public transportation infrastructure?
RTS is much easier because of the schedules. There is a time frame so I know when the bus is coming. Buffalo only has a bus running every hour and it’s difficult to rely on.
3. Do you use the RTS OnDemand service?
Yes. I used the RTS OnDemand service when I used to work out of Brockport. Before I knew about the RTS OnDemand app it took me a lot longer to get there so it helped a lot.
One challenge is that it runs until 10 pm but there isn’t anyone working at the RTS customer service past 7 pm. It would be nice to have someone working in that time frame in case they’re running late or if you have a question or something.
I would also love to see them use customer data from the app so they can figure out who is using RTS OnDemand the most and where they are going. Then they can prioritize regular users who depend on it and keep the service running.
4. Do you own a car?
Yes I do own a car. Unfortunately I can’t drive it right now that’s why I’m relying heavily on RTS.
5. Did you grow up riding public transportation? Or did you start riding transit as an adult?
I grew up riding RTS to get to school in the city. It’s very beneficial because it teaches these young adults how to learn different routes vs a yellow school bus with designated routes.
6. What do you like about RTS? What works for you?
They do a great job keeping up with the Transit app and giving you the information in the palm of your hands. Plus if you ever have any questions you can call the operating number or you can keep track of where your bus is at the exact time and the exact moment. I like that.
When you take the same route each day you see the same faces every now and then and just starting conversations with them makes the ride that much better. You’re getting some in person interaction which we all need from time to time. And we’re missing out on it these days. I’ve built some genuine friendships on RTS.
I’ve also been able to network on the bus. I met another male model and I don’t remember how the conversation started but he was able to give me a few pointers. He was excited to run into someone who was in the same field that he was.
7. How has riding RTS impacted your life?
It affects my schedule big time. I’m someone who likes to get to work on time. If I were to miss one bus then that would throw my whole schedule off now because now everything is pushed up 15 or 20 minutes longer than when I expected.
8. What are your thoughts on bus amenities?
The majority of my bus stops do have seating. I wouldn’t want them to go out of their way to build a shelter unless it’s a more popular spot where a lot of people would need it. I do like those cubes they have so if they can’t build a shelter the cubes are good.
Faye
1. Are you a Rochester native? If not, what brought you to Rochester?
Born and raised in Rochester, NY.
2. Do you own a car?
I don’t own a car but my significant other does and I have insurance so I do have the ability to use the car as needed. I only usually do that when I’m going places that RTS does not go.
When I stay in the city it’s a lot easier without a car. When you’re going out towards the suburbs that’s where things get more difficult. If my significant other needs to work but I need to go to a doctor’s appointment (because I have a lot of appointments due to my heart condition), I’ll bus over to his job which up til now has been in the city. I’ll take the car, do what I need to do then I’ll pick him up later. That will be much harder now because his new job is going to be in Henrietta.
3. Did you grow up riding public transportation? Or did you start riding transit as an adult?
I grew up using RTS buses in high school at Rochester City Schools. I started using actual RTS transit when I was 16. I had a car in college but have relied on RTS for the last 5 years.
4. What do you like about RTS? What works for you?
I like that you meet a lot of people that you see all the time. When you’re waiting for the bus or at the transit center or you’re riding the bus with them. Some of them know me by name. They’ll say “Hey! You’re crocheting! What are you making this time?!” so there is some sense of community there.
5. What don’t you like about RTS? What doesn’t work for you? What would you change?
The 13 just utilizes a standard bus when there’s way too many people for a standard bus it really should be a double bus.
I think a lot of buses need to be turned into double buses. Because there’s a lot of crowding on certain lines like the South Ave bus. I know that the Marketplace bus tends to be a double bus. That’s a good one. People think if you’re going to a really popular space, like the mall, tons of people are gonna go and you’ll need a bigger bus. But those smaller places, even the 3 that I take on Clinton Avenue, get crowded too. Everyone in that area is using public transportation. It’s not just like peak times, it’s all day.
The Transit app is great but when they make changes to the route they should put a notification on the app. They’ll post in the RTS Transit Center or at bus stops but those are things that people can take down and not everybody goes to the transit center. I was having issues with the Park Ave bus because there was a huge delay and rerouting from construction. It would come through then turn from Goodman at East Ave and then onto Park Ave. But it wouldn’t do that on the return ride and there wasn’t any signage indicating that it wasn’t picking people up on Park. People were missing the bus and it’s a 5-10 minute walk to get to the other stop depending on one’s physical ability to get there.
They only have one primary line that goes to Henrietta. They used to have more stops but they got rid of them. Henrietta’s not as bus accessible as I think it should be given how many businesses are out there.
Or if I have a doctor’s appointment in Greece or need to go to Unity Hospital it’s hard. There’s a line out there but if it’s one of those random buildings to the side it would take you like 45 minutes to walk there.
6. How does relying on RTS impact your life?
I don’t mind walking but I have a heart condition which makes it difficult. I seem perfectly able bodied but there are days when I can’t do as much as I could other days. Having bus access to get places in 2 minutes that would otherwise be a 20 minute walk is important for me. Because I don’t like being dependent on other people. RTS is an important tool for people who don’t have access to personal private vehicles.
7. What are your thoughts on bus amenities?
I would like to see more shelters every few bus stops along each route. Also lights. I would prefer to have a light source when I’m waiting for a bus at my job that starts at 6AM.
More places to sit at the bus stops would be good and also in the RTS Transit Center. Because they have benches but they don’t have benches for every single terminal. So you find people standing everywhere. Especially when it’s busy. You know the seats that fold up on the bus? They should put some of those in the transit center so people can access them if they need.
8. What is your hope for the future for public transportation in Rochester?
If corrections and improvements were made it would be such a great resource for everybody. The stigma would die down. Reaching out to the people who don’t utilize it and finding out why would be a good place to start. Everyone has preconceived ideas of public transportation; that it’s for poor people or it’s not safe. My hope is that it becomes accessible for the rich, for the poor, for the young, the old, the disabled; for everybody.
Denise
1. Are you a Rochester native? If not, what brought you to Rochester?
I am not from Rocheser. I moved here eight years ago from the suburbs for the very reason of transportation. Down in the Southern Tier, our bus would run from 6 am to 5 pm which is not adequate when you do not drive and you have to get to grocery stores or other errands. So one of the biggest factors for me to have independence was to move to a bigger city where I had better transportation services.
2. Do you use the RTS OnDemand service?
I have never used the RTS OnDemand services – I find it confusing. And most of the time when I need to get anywhere, it’s been on the main bus routes.
3. How do you pay for RTS? Cash? Transit App? Go Card?
The Transit app. I love it. It makes life so much easier. It actually shows you right where the bus is so you can plan and know when to leave your house. And you can see how many people are riding now. I love that they are asking for surveys on the app.
The only downside I see is that you cannot pay for more than one person through the app at one time. It would be great to have it prompt you to choose if you’re riding with two adults or if you’re riding as an adult with a child. It does have the ability to select if you’re a senior or have a disability. That’s great.
4. Do you own a car?
I’ve always used public transportation. At 46 years old I’ve never had a driver’s license and never wanted one. Plus I’ve not been privileged to have enough funds to get a driver’s license or a vehicle. I’ve always depended on bus transportation to get around – for appointments, for fun, shopping, and getting laundry done. It’s very important to have those services.
5. What do you like about RTS? What works for you?
The buses are unlimited for $3 a day. That’s huge. You cannot fill your gas tank for $3 a day. For $60 a month you can’t even pay for your insurance on your vehicle for that price or the maintenance but you can get a monthly pass for less than that. I would encourage people to look into riding the buses. Especially during events like the Lilac Festival. Bus 41 goes right to the lilac festival. Why take a car? Now you’re worrying about where you’re going to put it. They go right downtown for the Jazz Festival for Fringe. I would encourage people to look into the option.
I love that they are willing to adapt and make improvements with their schedules. Believe it or not the 41 wasn’t designed to go to Brighton. We used to have to take three buses just to get out to MCC’s Brighton campus but now there is a direct line. Which is huge.
The same thing with Walmart because of the 41 we can go directly to Walmart or Aldi. It really opened a lot of doors.
I don’t have kids but I do have nieces and nephews and when they visit I can take them to the Strong Museum of Play or the Science museum. They love to ride the accordion bus and we get to go out to the movies. It’s great.
6. What you like to see changed?
Trying to get to the Public Market on a Saturday is a problem for me. It’s a jewel of the City and more routes should allow us to get there. I have to go from 41 to Bay St, and Bay St all the way up. If you’re two minutes past, the bus is already gone and you’re waiting another hour.
7. What are your thoughts on bus amenities?
My biggest thing is when you’re transferring, not all the bus stops have adequate spaces for seating. I have neuropathy in my feet, so standing for long periods of time is really hard. ADA compliance is needed in our city as far as bus stops go. We also don’t have enough lighting.
8. What is your hope for the future for RTS?
During the weekdays you can catch a bus in 20 minutes, a half an hour at most, but on Saturdays and Sundays you’re waiting an hour which is hard. I think we need to do a little better on weekends and holidays. I get that no one wants to work those days but it’s so important.
Reconnect Rochester would like to thank all of the RTS riders for the time and effort they’ve dedicated to our community, and for taking the time to answer our questions. We are proud to elevate these voices and ask for the funding RTS needs to expand service.
The protected bike lanes surrounding DC’s iconic landmarks highlight the importance of multimodal infrastructure for attracting residents and enhancing livability. Between the three bike share programs, metro trains, and a bus system, DC provides a multitude of options for those looking to get around without a personal vehicle. Pedestrian islands provide refuge for those crossing the street on foot while also providing space for turning bikers. Bus stop islands and shared bus stops allow riders to step out of the flow of traffic while maintaining awareness of cyclists.
We were struck by the decisive action of DDOT and their leadership prioritizing proven safety measures over means-testing and hesitation. Washington DC’s mayor has pushed to add 20 miles of protected bike lanes over three years to meet the demand for bicycle infrastructure for all ages and abilities without worrying about miniscule delays for drivers. Rochester could take inspiration from this approach by installing infrastructure such as two-way protected bike lanes. While this would require coordination with the county and some new traffic signal configurations, the benefits far outweigh the challenges.
We also had the chance to see DC’s Curb Extension Murals (the inspiration for Downtown SmART Streets) up close. As we prepare to break ground on this new program and review artist submissions (due March 22nd) we were eager to take notes on what has worked (and what hasn’t) for these traffic calming elements.
The Asks
The most critical part of the summit was taking our advocacy to Capitol Hill. Thank you to the League of American Bicyclists for the herculean task of organizing these meetings on a national scale. Our first ask? Fighting for Safe Streets for All grant funding—money that has already been approved by Congress but is now threatened in an unprecedented move from the Executive Branch.
The local projects funded by this grant are designed to meet the needs of each community, understanding that local governments know their streets best. In our meetings with Congressional Representative Joe Morelle, staff from Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer’s office, and Senator Kirsten Gillibrand’s legislative aide, we pressed them to recognize the importance of projects such as completing Rochester’s Bike Spine Network or expanding our Downtown SmART Streets program. These projects will make the streets safer for everyone—cyclists, pedestrians, and drivers alike. Canceling their funding will also harm our communities through the loss of local construction jobs from the projects and the long-term economic benefits these amenities bring.
As traffic dangers increase for everyone on our roads, improving safety isn’t a political issue; it’s a necessity.
Our next ask to the US House of Representatives was to support HR 1668, The Sarah Debbink Langenkamp Active Transportation Safety Act. In 2022, Sarah Lagenkamp was killed while riding her bike after dropping off her son at daycare. Her husband Daniel made it his mission to make our streets safer.
As the League of American Bicyclists say, this bill highlights the need to fill gaps in biking and walking networks and makes it easier for states and local governments to use Highway Safety Improvement Program (HSIP) dollars as a “local match” to build safe bicycling and pedestrian infrastructure.
We were proud to have a strong Rochester contingent to mingle with our fellow advocates across the country. If you want to get more involved in our incredible local bicycle community here at home, please make sure you are signed up for our Mobility Action Alerts for weekly emails with local advocacy opportunities for safer, multimodal streets.
Two immediate actions you can take to support our cause:
With federal funding for bike lanes and many important transportation projects in danger of being cut off by USDOTwe urgently need your support to show the importance of these projects for the entire community. The League of American Bicyclists have put together a petition to show how many people oppose cutting this funding. Please take a moment to sign and send it to 5 of your friends Getting as many signatures as possible is critical to the success of our upcoming projects.
Reconnect Rochester has taken the lead on Complete Streets Maintenance, a bill that would require NYSDOT to consider complete streets design features on all types of road projects or when they receive both state and federal funding. Complete streets design features on all road projects would allow the necessary design interventions needed to enable safe access for all road users including pedestrians, people using mobility aids, cyclists, and public transit users.
Thank you to the bill sponsors Senator Sean Ryan and Assembly member Jonathan Rivera for meeting with us!
Simply put, state roads are the main streets of many of our towns and villages in Monroe County, and NYSDOT isn’t currently required to consider complete streets on their most common and most frequent types of projects. Even when towns want to improve safety, the state often doesn’t remove barriers to doing so. With NYS not currently meeting its climate law mandates for transportation, this is a cost-effective way to expand safe walking and biking infrastructure through existing maintenance routines.
NYSDOT is in the midst of updating a wildly out-of-date walk/bike strategic plan (2005 was the last update!). That plan will set the goals, but our bill is the way they can implement it. We understand it may require some process changes within NYSDOT to plan for AT infrastructure on each project and we would urge NYSDOT to show leadership on making it a best practice in the country rather than shying away from these urgently needed changes.
On Transit Equity Day, we called on lawmakers to let us Get Around New York!
Thanks so much to Senator Brouk and Assembly Member Bronson’s teams for meeting with us on February 4th to discuss transit equity issues.
The new federal administration has already attacked funding for transit riders, seniors, immigrants, refugees, low-income and disabled New Yorkers. New York State must dramatically alter how federal funding is spent so as not to waste taxpayer dollars. Highway expansions are ineffective. Highways do not solve long-term traffic problems, they entrench archaic land-use, and they create worse traffic and transportation outcomes long-term.
We urge the State tofix roads and bridges first, reduce Vehicle Miles Traveled (VMT) 20% by 2050, and invest taxpayer dollars in mass public transit, walkability, and density.
Thank you to Senator Jeremy Cooney, Chair of the NYS Senate Transportation Committee who said, “Following the legacy of civil rights heroes like Rosa Parks, Transit Equity Day is a time to reflect on the ways public transportation fueled the progress of yesterday, while also working towards a better tomorrow. In this year’s budget I’ll be advocating for more sustainable and reliable initiatives to get New Yorkers from Point A to Point B, pushing for more funding for public transit systems, and continuing to use transportation as a means to combat poverty.”
There are proven strategies that New York can implement this year. Our state can fulfill the goals of New York’s Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act and include the Get Around NY Act (S4044/A4230) in the One-House Budget this year.
Public Transportation Investments
As in past years, Reconnect Rochester met with RTS and the New York Public Transit Association’s lobby team and we support their state budget recommendations, highlighting the particular need for upstate state operating assistance to increase 15% per year. Why is this important? State funding is the largest proportion of the RTS operating budget and increases are needed to make routes run more frequently.
In addition to Reconnect Rochester’s state priorities, we’re actively participating in supporting other state coalitions:
Standing with the Climate Solutions Accelerator, we’re calling on NYS to pass the NY HEAT Act to protect New Yorkers from skyrocketing natural gas prices, as part of the overall shift away from fossil fuels that emit greenhouse gases.
At Reconnect, we’re always working to improve mobility access in our community. Sign up for Mobility Action Alerts for tangible advocacy and volunteer opportunities involving transportation, safe streets, and bike infrastructure.
Car Lite Rochester is a blog series that highlights the stories of Rochesterians living a car-lite lifestyle. The term “car lite” encompasses a variety of multimodal transportation lifestyles, featuring little dependence (but not NO dependence) on a car. It typically looks like sharing one car within a household or only using a car when absolutely necessary.
So, we hope you’ll continue to follow along. Maybe you will be inspired to join our bloggers in living a car-lite lifestyle!
I leave for work around 7:30 each morning. In winter, that’s when the sun clears the horizon, slicing through the trees and spotlighting treasures like my neighbor’s PEACE sign—a gem I would surely have missed if not for its timely glow as I walked by. Stunningly beautiful!
Today’s scene was no less inspiring. The sky displayed every shade of pink and orange against freshly fallen snow. These are the moments that make life worth living! Had I not been outside walking I most certainly would have missed it.
When I think of my walkable life, the gratitude I feel cannot be contained. While reflecting on why I often choose walking over driving, I realized it’s because walking outdoors is the only time I truly feel free. When I am out walking it is my time—precious stretches between hither and yon where no one can find me. I go at my own pace, look at things that catch my eye, see things about my city that can never be seen from inside a car. It’s a time when I truly live—focusing not on what I have to do, but on what I want to (traffic being the only exception, of course!).
Art Everywhere
Once you break free from the shackles of traffic—with its constant demands and occasional mean-spiritedness—you’ll be amazed to discover art all around you. It’s in the gargoyles perched on buildings, staring down from above, and in the vibrant murals bursting with color on their walls. It’s in the historical markers scattered through parks, offering fresh context and appreciation for the struggles of those who came before us, the vision of past civic leaders, and the progress we’ve made in transforming neighborhoods into more livable spaces. You’ll find it in splendid gardens, cascading fountains, and the intricate beauty of stained-glass windows.
Add Time to Your Day
A lot of people wonder how I can be so prompt if I always arrive on foot. They mistakenly believe that driving is always faster than walking. But I am almost never late. I pride myself on arriving on-time, mindful not to “steal other people’s time.”
The truth is— “trip-chaining” errands– the practice of linking multiple walking trips together in a single outing and combining several tasks into one journey is the most efficient way to travel! It minimizes travel time and distance and reduces repeated car starts and stops. Consider that I never have to waste time looking for parking. Or wait for traffic lights to change. I just keep moving by crossing the street in the other direction to get across and continue on my way. If you feel like you don’t have enough time in your day, try walking where you need to go. I promise it will feel like you are gaining time back from everything that has been conspiring to rob it!
Who Needs a Gym? (Or Pharmaceuticals?)
And forget excuses about not having time to work out. Or seasonal affective disorder (SAD). Walking is an antidote to the winter blues. As a bonus, while enjoying surroundings and avoiding road rage, I can also hit my 10,000 steps, listen to music (and even dance along), stay up-to-date on podcasts, reduce stress, breathe fresh air, and reflect on the day’s events. Nothing like a walk through the park to blow off steam, get your Vitamin D on, and forget about work.
Speaking of work, some of the best work meetings happen on a walk. The open air makes it easier to deliver bad news or tackle tough problems head-on. There’s something about walking and talking that sparks creativity, eases tension and builds camaraderie.
It’s All about the Gear (and Planning Ahead!)
Arriving at work after a cold Monday morning walk. Wearing black from head to toe without reflectors isn’t the best idea, but against a snowstorm?! (Take that logic with a grain of salt!)
Of course, walking everywhere sometimes requires a little planning ahead—what shoes will you need once you get there? (What shoes will you need to walk there?) It’s all about the right gear to weather the weather and get you where you’re going. The common phrase “use the right tool for the job” fits. I call my closet the convertible wardrobe, because every piece of clothing should do double-time in my walkable life. Those walking tights pair nicely with my work dress and boots!
Still, how will you get groceries home? Is it raining? These are trivial obstacles to a walking life, and nothing that a lightweight trusty backpack, sturdy boots, an umbrella, and a warm hat cannot solve. (My Jan sport is still going strong after 40 years. I wouldn’t call it fashion, but it’s black and fits in anywhere—business meetings, theatrical performances, the public market). For a middle-aged woman fighting osteoporosis, carrying weight on my back helps keep bones strong and is just what the doctor ordered.
Get to know your Trees, and your Neighbors
In short, there are dozens of reasons why walking is preferable over driving. Walking offers so much more than just a way to get from point A to point B —it’s a lifestyle choice that enriches every part of my day. It helps to assuage highway anxiety, allows chance meetings with neighbors and friends, and connects me with my community. It supports local businesses, keeps me active and healthy, and allows for notice and appreciation of the art and nature around me. Trees look different 365 days a year, and just by watching them while walking we can learn things. Walking gives back time for simple pleasures while saving money and sparing my car wear and tear. Most importantly, it brings a sense of peace and serenity that driving simply can’t match. That’s why, whenever I can, I choose to walk. And you can, too.
Get Involved
Reconnect Rochester has been integral to improving transportation options in Rochester and Monroe County. This work is important so that transportation is less of an obstacle for daily living.
Join Reconnect Rochester in making our city and county more livable by expanding transportation options:
Sign up for Mobility Action Alerts to stay in the loop with opportunities of how to advocate for safer streets and transportation options
Be part of the change happening in Rochester by getting “multi-modal” yourself and riding a bike, taking the bus, walking, or rolling for your next trip!
At Reconnect, we’re inspired by the stories of people in our community, like Steve Roll, Calvin Eaton and Yamini Karandikar, who are passionate about living a car-lite or car-free lifestyle.
Let us know if you want to share your mobility story! What’s in it for you? The intrinsic reward of knowing you’ve inspired others, and a free t-shirt from our online shop! Contact Chaz to submit your story.
Car Lite Rochester is a blog series that highlights the stories of Rochesterians living a car-lite lifestyle. The term “car lite” encompasses a variety of multimodal transportation lifestyles, featuring little dependence (but not NO dependence) on a car. It typically looks like sharing one car within a household or only using a car when absolutely necessary.
So, we hope you’ll continue to follow along. Maybe you will be inspired to join our bloggers in living a car-lite lifestyle!
For most of my adult life, I got around using the default transportation mode in America: a car. I didn’t own a bike as an adult and never thought about using the bus. I was perfectly content to drive my Honda Fit to wherever I needed to go.
Then, in the spring of 2019, I had a seizure while walking out into a parking lot after a workout. I grew up with epilepsy, but it was well-controlled and I hadn’t had a seizure in about a decade. As I regained consciousness and the EMTs began loading me up into the ambulance, my mind quickly focused on one thing: not the ambulance bill I was going to get or the fact that I just had a seizure again, but that I wouldn’t be allowed to drive for at least 6 months.
You see, when someone has a seizure in New York State, they lose their driving privileges for 6-12 months until their neurologist and the DMV Medical Review Board clear them. I had to go through this once before when I was in high school and I remember how frustrating it was to lose my independence suddenly and be reliant on others for rides.
That’s what I was scared of: losing my independence to get around because I relied solely on my car for transportation. That’s why this is called “car dependency.”
I lived alone, so my mind was suddenly flooded with questions like:
How will I get to work?
How will I get groceries or run errands?
How will I see friends and family?
The options seemed to be:
Get a bike and a use the bus
Depend on friends, family and Uber/Lyft to chauffeur me around
Be stuck at home for 6-12 month
I chose to get a bike and a bus pass.
Adapting to Life Without a Car
The Importance of Walkable Neighborhoods One thing that helped a lot is that I live in a walkable neighborhood in Rochester, the North Winton Village. I didn’t fully appreciate the importance of a walkable neighborhood until I wasn’t allowed to drive.
I live about a mile from Wegmans, walking distance to where I worked at the time (Carlson Cowork), and near plenty of shops, restaurants, and parks. This made a huge difference. Life would’ve been much more challenging if I had lived in the car-dependent suburbs.
Getting around by bike Soon after the seizure, I went to my local bike shop and bought my first bike as an adult, a Trek FX3, which I still ride today. I also made sure to get a bike rack and a set of panniers so that I could carry cargo like groceries (more on that later).
At first, riding my bike on the road around cars was nerve-racking. However, I was lucky enough to find out about Reconnect Rochester’s On-Bike Smart Cycling Class taught by Jesse Peers where I learned how to ride safely on city streets. After taking the class, I was surprised at how much more confident and comfortable I felt biking through Rochester. I highly recommend it!
Getting around with the bus Besides my bike, I began using the bus more regularly to get to doctor appointments and other trips that were too far away or inconvenient to bike. Although the bus was not as convenient as a car, it was nice not to have to do the actual driving in traffic and I could sit and read.
It’s also really easy to combine a bike and the bus with the nifty bike rack on the front of the bus. Or you can bring your scooter. This adds a lot more flexibility to using the bus and it extends the range of a bike, especially on corridors where it’s unsafe to ride. For example, I recently had to go BayTowne Plaza from the city. Instead of biking on Empire Boulevard and putting my life at risk next to four lanes of 60 mph traffic, I rode my bike from my house to Empire Boulevard and took the bus the rest of the way.
Managing Challenges
Busy Roads Early on, I used Google Maps to map out a route to bike on. This would often give me a route that was shortest, but that also included busy roads that were very stressful to ride on, especially with all the giant SUVs and pickups these days.
At the Smart Cycling class, I learned about Reconnect Rochester’s Low-Stress Bike map and the Bike Boulevard Network. These tools helped me plan out a safe, comfortable bike route to get where I needed to go.
For example, riding downtown for me includes a lovely ride down Harvard St.
Groceries I thought getting groceries would be a big challenge without a car, but I quickly realized that a bike is fully capable of carrying a load of groceries. With a set of panniers, I can carry two fully loaded grocery bags with room on top of the rack for more. It’s also easy to hook up a small trailer to carry more and e cargo bikes are becoming more popular options as well.
When I didn’t ride my bike for groceries, it was easy enough to take the bus. I found the bus more convenient than I expected to get to Wegmans, as long as I didn’t stay too long and miss the bus on the way back!
That’s all to say: Good News Everyone! You don’t need an F-250 to get groceries!
Weather The weather also wasn’t as much of a challenge as I had expected. I try to avoid riding during a downpour, personally, but if the roads are wet or it’s only raining lightly, bike fenders and some rain gear go a long way.
Even in the winter, the roads are usually snow-free most of the time. Also, cold weather isn’t as bad as you’d think on a bike, as long as you have the right gear, like pogies to keep your hands warm. Even if it’s chilly out, riding a bike naturally warms you up with the exercise.
In the summer, the challenge sometimes is hot, humid weather. Riding at a leisurely pace helps, but it can be a challenge if I need to arrive somewhere and I don’t want to be all sweaty. This is where e-bikes have an advantage over regular bikes.
Bus Routes A main challenge with taking the bus was that I often needed to make a connection through the Transit Center. This was compounded with the fact that bus headways were often 30 minutes apart or more. Together, this meant that the travel time could be an hour or more by bus instead of a simple 15 minute drive by car. A short errand could take half a day on a bus.
However, if the bus route is convenient, it’s a great way to get to where you need to go. Just use the Transit app to easily see what bus you need to take and buy a bus pass on your phone!
Transitioning to Car-Lite Living and Lessons Learned
Overall, I was able to maintain my independence during those six months thanks to my bike and the bus. After about 6-months, I was cleared to drive again.
These days, I’d say I’m “car-lite.” I get around by bike if I can, but I drive when I need to go somewhere farther away or when the weather is bad and I just don’t feel like biking (that’s OK, too!). In case I have a seizure in the future (a very real possibility), I want to live a lifestyle that’s not dependent on driving everywhere.
[8/29/24 edit: Welp, unfortunately, I did have another seizure last week. Looks like I jinxed myself writing this. In the future, I’ll have to write an update about Car-Free Living Round 2!]
I learned a number of good lessons during this period
1 – The Benefits of Traveling by Bike
First, I realized so many unexpected benefits from riding a bike for transportation, which is why I still ride my bike to get around today. Some key benefits:
Being more active and enjoying the health benefits
Feeling more connected to the community as I bike through it
Improved mental well-being – I always feel better if I get somewhere by bike than by sitting in a car
A major lesson I learned is how important transportation resilience is. If you’re solely reliant on driving for everything, having a car breakdown, a medical issue leaving you unable to drive, or aging out of driving can be a major life challenge. For this reason alone, I think it’s important, both on a personal level and societal level, to make sure different transportation options are available. Just in case.
3 – The Inadequacy of Rochester’s Transportation System for Non-drivers 24% of Rochester households don’t have access to a car, but Rochester’s transportation system is built around the assumption that everyone has a personal automobile and can drive. This largely ignores the transportation needs of non-drivers; people who also need to get around to live life.
When driving was taken away from me as an option, I realized how difficult our city makes it for non- drivers in our community to get around. The main issues I personally noticed were:
Inadequate public transit: too infrequent, lack of connectivity, and lack of amenities like benches and shelters
Lack of a safe, connected network of comfortable bike lanes
Not enough safe crosswalks and crosswalks spaced too far apart
Roads built for moving cars fast at the expense of safety for pedestrians, bicyclists, kids, and other drivers
Signs of Improvement
Despite the challenges for non-drivers, I am excited about the steady progress and improvement I’ve seen in Rochester since 2019.
A (literally) concrete example of this progress is the reconstruction of E. Main between Culver and Goodman, which includes comfortable cycle paths, traffic calming measures, pedestrian islands, and crosswalks. Now, I bike it almost weekly to shop at the Public Market. Yes, bike lanes are good for business!
Reconnect Rochester has been integral to improving transportation options in Rochester and Monroe County. This work is important so that transportation is less of an obstacle for daily living.
Join Reconnect Rochester in making our city and county more livable by expanding transportation options:
Sign up for Mobility Action Alerts to stay in the loop with opportunities of how to advocate for safer streets, bicycle infrastructure, and transportation options
Be part of the change happening in Rochester by getting “multi-modal” yourself and riding a bike, taking the bus, walking, or rolling for your next trip!
At Reconnect, we’re inspired by the stories of people in our community, like Robert Picciotti, Calvin Eaton and Yamini Karandikar, who are passionate about living a car-lite or car-free lifestyle.
Let us know if you want to share your mobility story! What’s in it for you? The intrinsic reward of knowing you’ve inspired others, and a free t-shirt from our online shop! Contact Chaz to submit your story.
Reconnect Rochester presents Voices of Transit, an ethnography profile blog series that along with the qualitative survey data from over 200 RTS customers, shows how our current bus system helps (and sometimes hurts) transit-dependent riders in their daily lives. Read more about the initiative here and to review the survey results from the Transit Ambassador Pilot Program, click here.
Tell us a little bit about yourself and give us an introduction to your transit story.
I’m from Northern Pennsylvania, near Allegheny County. Before moving to Rochester, I lived in Denver for a couple years and was looking to move, and a friend recommended that I move out here, so it’s been about 10 years now.
Tell me more about your experience with riding RTS. Which routes do you ride the most?
I’m car free so getting around Rochester now is better than it was, especially after Reimagine RTS because now buses run at least every hour and there’s more coverage. Before Reimagine, I worked out in Webster and on the weekends I would get on the bus at 6:30 in the morning, work from 10 AM – 6 PM, and when I got off of work I had to walk from my job in Webster to Winton Road which was the closest bus stop.
So it’s a lot easier, but it still has some complications. Now, I work at Eastview and I take the 41, 11L and Victor OnDemand service to get to work. Coming home, I’ll take OnDemand from Eastview to Blossom Loop and then walk 2.5 miles home to Rosewood Terrace. At Blossom Loop, there’s the 9 and 10 which alternate every half hour so I can take that to the 41, but then when I get to Goodman, the 41 at that time starts to come every hour. So at that point, do I wait for a half an hour or do I just walk home?
Tell me more about your experience with OnDemand.
It’s not bad, but it’s tricky to schedule. I have to schedule the night before, but it’s not guaranteed that I’ll get a ride, and it can be frustrating because if you can’t find a ride at the time that you need you have to try and schedule in 15 minute increments until you get a ride.
I think OnDemand to Eastview makes more sense than maybe a fixed route, but they do need more drivers to service that area because the few times when I couldn’t get a ride, I’ve had to walk home from Eastview which was 4.5 hours. The second time, I walked to Pittsford just in time to catch the 11L home.
What’s your experience with bus stop amenities? What would make you more comfortable while you wait?
I get on the 41 at Greeley and Parsells, and there’s a shelter and bus stop cubes, but there’s a lot of stops where there’s nothing there and you just have to stand on the side of the road hoping the weather holds out. I also like that the bus stop cubes make the stop more visible to drivers which is nice.
Is there anything that you would change about the current service? What’s your hope for the future of public transportation in Rochester?
I would like to see the 22L go back running every 15 mins. I also work at the Maplewood YMCA and it was easier to get to and from work when it was every 15 minutes compared to every half hour.
Also, Route 50 is terrible. It runs every two hours. I went for an interview in East Rochester on a cold day and I was stuck standing outside in the cold waiting for the bus. Luckily, my interview ended 15 minutes before the next bus came, otherwise I would’ve been waiting another 2 hours for the next bus. It should run at least every hour, but I understand that there may not be enough riders to support that.
But, things are in a good space and service could be expanded to make it easier for people to access more parts of the city and suburbs.
Anything else you would like to add? There’s the southern part of Webster all the way down to Henrietta where there’s no service coverage for OnDemand or regular bus service and I think that gap could be filled.
Reconnect Rochester presents Voices of Transit, an ethnography profile blog series that along with the qualitative survey data from over 200 RTS customers, shows how our current bus system helps (and sometimes hurts) transit-dependent riders in their daily lives. Read more about the initiative here and to review the survey results from the Transit Ambassador Pilot Program, click here.
Tell us a little bit about yourself and give us an introduction to your transit story.
I’m from Sao Paulo, Brazil and I moved to Rochester in October 2021 to live with my stepdad. Moving here was a little scary since this was the first time I’ve ever traveled outside of my home country.
I grew up taking the local buses with my mom. In my hometown, you don’t need a car to get around, and it’s a lot easier to get around with the bus because you don’t have to deal with traffic.
I was 7 years old when I first took the bus alone. My mom told me I had to take the bus to school by myself because she had to be at work early that day. I was so afraid that I almost started crying because I didn’t know how to ride the bus without her. But she stayed on the phone with me the entire time and once I got on the bus she had me hand over my phone to the bus driver so that she could tell him which stop I needed to get off for school. After that experience I became more comfortable with taking the city bus by myself to get to school and even to explore the city as I got older. Even if I got lost, I always knew how to get back home by bus.
Tell me about your experience riding the bus in Rochester. What do you like and dislike about it?
I don’t have a license so I ride RTS almost daily to get to work and school. It’s been difficult learning how this system works compared to what I’m used to in Brazil. Here in Rochester, I have to travel to the center of the city to transfer to my next bus. In Sao Paulo, if I’m traveling on the west side of the city I can transfer buses there easily. I don’t need to go to the middle of the city to transfer buses.
I live in North Gates and work in Chili, but there’s no bus that connects both places. So I have to take the #19 toward city center and then take the #18 back out to Chili. It’s a 15 minute drive, but can take over an hour by bus.
Something that I do love about this bus system is the Transit App. I don’t have to worry about remembering to carry a card or stopping somewhere to refill it with money. It’s on my phone and I always have my phone on me. I also like being able to plan out my trips on the App and see how long it will take me to get somewhere.
I also love that there’s air conditioning on the bus which is basically nonexistent on the buses in Brazil!
As someone who’s a new RTS rider, if you could change anything about the bus system and the amenities, what would that be?
I generally like the amenities that I see around, especially the ‘mini houses’ that protect you from the rain and snow. These aren’t too common in Brazil, but I want to see more lighting at the bus stops.
I would also like to see more lines that directly connect each neighborhood instead of people having to go all the way to the Transit Center.
Anything else that you would like to add?
I love that people here care about the customer’s experience. In Brazil, that’s not a thing. But it’s nice to see people like Reconnect Rochester and RTS interviewing people to make changes to the bus system.
Reconnect Rochester presents Voices of Transit, an ethnography profile blog series that along with the qualitative survey data from over 200 RTS customers, shows how our current bus system helps (and sometimes hurts) transit-dependent riders in their daily lives. Read more about the initiative here and to review the survey results from the Transit Ambassador Pilot Program, click here.
Tell us a little bit about yourself and give us an introduction to your transit story.
Before I moved to Rochester, I lived in NYC and walked and biked everywhere. I have a brain injury and have been disabled for the last 14 years which prevents me from driving. Now, I ride RTS to get everywhere that I need to go. In the winter, I have a fat bike that I use to bike around the city too.
Can you talk about why you ride RTS? What do you like about it?
I live in a building that has a lot of elderly and disabled people with mobility challenges, so I take different routes like the 23, 14, or the 3 to get to Walmart to buy groceries for my neighbors, or to get to Home Depot to buy parts to fix the mechanical problems on their wheelchairs.
I live on a tight income and I don’t have a car so riding the bus is very convenient. I also love the Transit App, it makes it easy to find the bus schedules and figure out where I need to go.
The other day there was a woman with crutches carrying bags getting on the bus and I love that the bus driver waited for her to sit down and find her stability before taking off, that’s important.
Is there anything that you don’t enjoy about RTS? Or anything that you might change?
I use my [Transit] app and I only pay .50 cents for a ride and one time the driver asked for my ID and I was surprised because this hasn’t happened to me before, I didn’t know what he meant. He got angry with me and things escalated quite quickly. The second time it happened, the driver snatched my card out of my hand. Not all bus drivers are like that. But, we are all human, we have our days.
What are your thoughts on bus stop amenities? Is there anything that would make you more comfortable while you wait?
There are a lot of people drinking and smoking and using the bus shelters as housing. I know that this can’t be avoided but I would prefer to not have to hear [sic] that while waiting for the bus.
What’s your hope for the future of public transit in Rochester?
I work with the National Council on the Arts and I bring culture and art to rural communities around Rochester like Victor, Brockport, Medina, and Geneseo. I don’t drive and biking is 21 miles to Brockport, even longer to Geneseo, so my only option is the bus. But it’s not frequent or in some areas there’s no service. I have heard of OnDemand but I have no idea how it works so I would hope that there’s more service in these areas.
Is there anything else you’d like to add?
One of my greatest joys of riding the bus in Rochester is that I get to hear people from all over the world, speaking different languages. Like if I take route 1 down St. Paul near the school for English learners, I hear different languages, people dressing in traditional garments, I love it!
Reconnect Rochester presents Voices of Transit, an ethnography profile blog series that dives into the deeper stories of five transit-dependent RTS riders who vulnerably and authentically detail how our bus system helps (and sometimes hurts) them in their daily lives.
These profiles were gathered during our Transit Ambassador pilot program which launched in July 2023 and wrapped up at the end of September. Over 10 weeks, two Reconnect Rochester Transit Ambassadors conducted 2-3 minute surveys, capturing the experiences of over 200 RTS riders at 40 different locations. We learned alot about what’s on the minds of RTS riders and their ideas for system improvements. View the survey results and recommendations that we shared directly with RTS leadership.
During these interactions, our Ambassadors asked if riders would be interested in sharing their transit story more in depth for our Voices of Transit series.*
Jenelle, Antonio, Anthony Thomas, Leticia and William were the inspiring bunch who, with their stories, proved why we are committed to this work. We hope that after reading their stories, you will join in our efforts to both celebrate what’s good about public transit, and advocate for an improved system that will better serve the people of Monroe County.
*As a thank you for their time and lived experiences, survey respondents were offered an All Day Pass, and ethnographies interviewees were offered a Weekly pass.
Disclaimer: All stories in this blog series are reflective of the rider’s experience and may not convey the most up to date and accurate information on the current RTS system. We will add relevant links directly to the RTS website where readers can find more information and inquire with the RTS team for further clarification on routes, bus passes, amenities, schedules and other details that might be pertinent to rider experiences.
Jenelle Harriff (she/her/hers)
Tell us a little bit about who Jenelle is and an introduction to your transit story.
I grew up in Webster, right off of Bay Road, and I started riding the bus when I was 16. My first job was as an intern at the Board of Elections in the Sibley Building, so I always took the bus downtown.
I went to college in NYC and after a year I came back home and ended up working 3 jobs and going to night school at MCC all while taking the bus, so I was a ‘super rider’. All of my drivers that I grew up with back then are still on the road today. So it’s always fun to keep up with each other after all these years…25 years actually!
You’ve been riding with RTS since before the system change (Reimagine RTS). What difference has it made to your trips?
I live in North Winton Village, by Winton and Browncroft. So I’m on routes 8, 9 and 10. I was very disappointed that they eliminated the Winton road service because the abbreviated 9 route from Blossom Route to downtown flies!
I don’t think they [RTS] realized how many people they isolated in our neighborhood when they eliminated the 48 bus route. There used to be 12 people a day on a morning bus, now it’s 2 or 3. Now people get rides from spouses or neighbors. I think that RTS is doing great on improving the system, but I think they need to think about people’s first and last mile trips and how far they have to hike, especially when carrying groceries or children. My walk went from 3/10ths of a mile to over 7/10ths of a mile up to Winton and Blossom, it’s not bad in nice weather. But when there’s ice and unshoveled snow, it’s treacherous. It’s more than double the walk and there’s no easier way to do that trip.
So unfortunately the system change made my life a lot tougher and I wasn’t a huge fan [of Reimagine RTS], but most of the time I get the service when I need it.
What do you like about RTS?
I try to advocate for our public transit system whenever I can. I always tell people they can take the bus to the public market and not have to worry about the headache of finding parking, or to get to one of our many festivals and concerts (like the PGA!).
I also love the Customer Open House. There are a lot of people who are deterred because they don’t want to ask questions. But the open house makes using the bus system more approachable for people.
In our harsh winters, even on the snowiest days, I’ve always gotten home safe. I’m always thankful for my drivers because it’s been ugly out there sometimes. But I’ve always made it home and you can always depend on the good heat on the bus. It’s been my lifeline.
What do you dislike about the current system? What makes it difficult as a transit-dependent rider?
I’ve been job hunting for months now and I’ve had to eliminate several employers who are out on Bailey Road or W. Henrietta Road.
OnDemand doesn’t extend past East Avenue and there’s no service to Linden Avenue. So all of those healthcare agencies and offices really cut out my prospective employers. Paychex, Remade Institute, all of the big companies out there don’t have bus service to get to work, unless you’re willing to pay for a $20 uber. So it really compressed my job hunt and it was discouraging. I have several college degrees and a great job history, and it really puts a linchpin in everything.
Thankfully I was able to find a position in Canandaigua on Main Street, so I trialed it and I was able to get there by bus! It took a while but all the connections worked to RTS Ontario: I went from Blossom Loop and got to Eastview and connected my next bus to Finger Lakes Gaming and took the third shuttle down to the West Avenue Hub, and my new job is one block away.
The lack of transit to a lot of the best paying jobs in our region really made it so I was pushed to relocate and it’s discouraging. I love my neighborhood here in the city and I’m very involved in my community as the Block Captain. I’ve been a vendor at the public market since I was 17 and I’m involved in my local Community Gardens. But I need to independently get around and I don’t like to depend on family or friends to do so.
To add onto that, when I lived in Philadelphia and NYC, I was independent and that really empowered me as a disabled person. I have one good eye but I have bad depth-perception, so the world’s a safer place without me driving. I came back home in 2010 and trying to get around after all of those years of independence and frequent service was an adjustment.
What are your thoughts on bus stop amenities? What would make you more comfortable while you wait?
My local stop doesn’t have any seating or shelter. But, I love the bus stop cubes because even just to put your bags down after shopping because the ground gets muddy in bad weather, just those little touches makes people’s lives easier, or just a place to lean or I’ve seen people who are disabled with walkers using the cubes which is really helpful. It’s nice to see those enhancements.
I would love to just see a simple plexiglass panel that can protect you from the elements, even if it’s not a full shelter. And if there is a shelter, having regular maintenance and cleaning would be nice. Sometimes the shelters are just gross, the seats are gross, there’s litter and cigarettes and the trash gets piled up. I would rather not have a shelter where it gets dirty and you don’t want to sit and be comfortable.
What’s your hope for the future of public transportation in Rochester?
The existing system with set service is great. I would love to see enhanced service to suburban areas through OnDemand more. We’re on the right path for more frequent service in the city. But better and additional service for surrounding towns because there’s real travel gaps for people that used to ride old service frequently.
I would also like to see more park and rides. We’re a very car centric city but get people to realize how convenient and easy it is to take the bus.
Anything else you’d like to add?
I love talking to people on the bus, you meet wonderful people and it builds camaraderie in your community.
It’s also not as expensive as owning a car. Driving could be an option but the expense of a vehicle is insane. So I always ask myself, “Do I really need a car to go 2 miles to work?”
Generally, I have been so happy to see improvements and I know it’s only going to get better.
At Reconnect Rochester, 2022 brought renewed hope and activity as the world fully opened up and we could get back to what we love doing best — getting together and working alongside people and organizations in the community who share our passion for improved mobility.
This has also been a year of dramatic organizational growth that’s allowed us to do even more to pursue our hopes and dreams for mobility in Monroe County. Check out below the Top 10 things we’re most proud of accomplishing in 2022. The list gets more action-packed each year!
TOP 10 THINGS WE’RE MOST PROUD OF IN 2022 (In no particular order of importance.)
#10
Inspired People to Get Multi-Modal
At Reconnect Rochester, we want to inspire and empower people to use various modes of transportation and discover the joy and freedom of getting around by bus, by rail, on bike or on foot. Our Car-Lite ROC blog series featured the voices and stories of folks around the community who are living a car-lite lifestyle in Rochester and loving it! Catch up on the blog series here and listen to the podcast of some of our guest bloggers on Connections with Evan Dawson.
#9
Expanded Bus Amenities
In August, we held a ribbon cutting to celebrate the installation of 23 more bus stop cubes on Portland, Hudson, Lake, Dewey & St. Paul. Seating at bus stops not only supports the basic needs of people who rely on RTS bus service, it also encourages more people to use public transit by improving the experience. Special thanks to the City of Rochester for being a valued partner on this project, and State Senator Samra Brouk for securing funding to support this round of bus stop cubes.
#8
Transformed an Intersection
We continued our effort to make Rochester streets safer for all with a Complete Street Makeover of the intersection of Orange Street and Orchard Street in the JOSANA neighborhood. In collaboration with many neighborhood and community partners, we implemented temporary street design changes to make the intersection safer for those who use it every day. As a result of our installation, the average speed decreased 20%, the 85th percentile speed declined 28%, and the maximum speed declined 26%.
In January, we welcomed James Dietz in the newly created Advocacy Manager position to bolster our volunteer-based advocacy work with staff-based efforts. Our advocacy efforts this year included a virtual trip to Albany to fight for safe streets legislation & public transit funding, supporting the expansion and accessibility of mobility options like HOPR bike & e-scooter share and the launch of Floshare electric car share, and more on-the-ground action like mobilizing a team of staff and volunteers to shovel out bus stop cubes.
#5
Stepped up Communications and Outreach Efforts
In August, Jahasia Esgdaille joined our team in another newly created position of Community Engagement Manager. This investment in staff capacity has allowed us to step up our engagement in the community with things like increasing our in-person presence via event tabling, conducting an RTS rider survey, introducing quarterly Engagement Breakfasts, and expanding our social media presence (you can now find us on Instagram!).
#4
Strengthened Partnerships
This year, we made a concerted effort to strengthen our relationships with key entities in the transportation sector and organizations that share our passion for better public transit and safe streets. We’ve established regular meetings with RTS, GTC, the City of Rochester and Monroe County, and work with countless other elected officials and organizations in the course of our day-to-day work. It was collaborative conversations that led to Monroe County’s decision to fund the relaunch of the public awareness campaign Drive 2B Better, developed by a coalition group led by HealthiKids that aims to increase safety for all road users. You can request a D2BB lawn sign for your yard here!
#3
Gave & Encouraged Public Input
Thanks to the work of our Advocacy Committee, Reconnect submitted input on every major street project and community plan in Monroe County, beating the drum to incorporate complete streets policies and a more multimodal community. We gave special attention to providing robust input into the City and County Active Transportation Plans, attended countless public meetings, and served on project advisory committees for Aqueduct Reimagined and the Zoning Alignment Project.
Check out the CYCLING TOP 10 LIST for even more about bike-related efforts led by our rock star Cycling Manager, Jesse Peers.
#1
Leveled Up Our Staff & Welcomed New Board Leadership
If you’ve made it this far, you’ll know there were a few areas where we mentioned increased staff capacity. In 2022, we were able to hire two full-time employees and increase the hours of our part-time employees. More human power means more impact, and we are loving all the new and expanded ways we’ve been able to tackle our mission. This growth was made possible in great part by the continued support of Dr. Scott MacRae and a generous grant from the ESL Charitable Foundation’s Building Strong Neighborhoods initiative.
We also brought on three new board members – Bree-Ana Dukes, Bo Shoemaker & Erick Stephens – who have each used their experience and talent to energize our efforts.
Car Lite Rochester is a blog series that highlights the stories of Rochesterians living a car-lite lifestyle. The term “car lite” encompasses a variety of multimodal transportation lifestyles, featuring little dependence (but not NO dependence) on a car. It typically looks like sharing one car within a household or only using a car when absolutely necessary.
So, we hope you’ll continue to follow along. Maybe you will be inspired to join our bloggers in living a car-lite lifestyle!
Car Lite Rochester: From Car-Free to Car-Lite, Three Years Later
By: Calvin Eaton
Calvin Eaton is a disabled scholar, author, cultural curator, content creator, and social entrepreneur. He founded the theglutenfreechef brand and website in 2013 and founded 540WMain, Inc. in 2016.
Whew! It’s been a long time since I last checked in! Can you believe it’s been three years since my last blog with Reconnect Rochester? And what a time we’ve had in three years. We’ve survived an incessant global pandemic and I’ve survived two bouts of COVID-19, vaccinations, boosters, masks, and so much more. With so much change you would think we would be closer to realizing neighborhoods and streets that are more universally designed, pedestrian friendly, and less reliant on the all-powerful automobile. This is hardly the case. So much has changed yet when it comes to a culture that is less reliant on cars so much has remained the same. Still it’s not all doom and gloom. There’ve been lots of positive changes in the realm of more bicycle and pedestrian friendly infrastructure in recent years. Before I dive into that let me update you on what’s been happening with me.
New Bike, New Me
I got a new bike in 2021. Actually, a very kind friend gifted me a brand new bike. It was a complete surprise and I am forever grateful. After what seems like decades of lamenting about how I needed to get a bike, I just wasn’t making it a priority. One day in early summer 2021 I reached out to my Facebook community to ask if anyone had recommendations for a decent used bike and next thing I knew I received a brand new bike on my doorstep. What a thoughtful and amazing gift. I was able to test out my new bike just in time for the 2021 edition of the Juneteenth Roc Freedom Ride through Rochester. Tapping into the robust bike community and the dedicated bike trails has been key for me since I still don’t always feel comfortable riding my bike solo on the city streets. Even though fibromyalgia prevents me from cycling as much as I would like, having my new wheels has been amazing.
Rochester’s affinity based cycling communities have grown throughout the pandemic. These communities are important to me because they break down the stereotypes and bias that Black people don’t bike or can’t bike. Amazing transformative leaders like Rashad Smith and the Roc Freedom Ride initiative are a beautiful homage to the bus desegregation movement of the 1960s and parallel the modern day desegregation of “cycling culture” in Rochester and other cities around the country. Cycling culture in Rochester like most cities looks very homogenous (i.e white) and groups like Roc Freedom Riders, Black Girls Do Bike, Conkey Cruisers, and the Flower City Feeling Good bike rides are some of the initiatives that have grown over the past few years that diversify and bring equity and inclusion to cycling culture in Rochester. This work is priceless. Despite this progress, bike legislation and biased enforcement has led to over policing, racial profiling and pretext stops for Black and brown cyclists. Group bike rides provide a measure of support and safety for those of us that are new to cycling as a regular form of transportation.
Car-Free to Car-Lite
In my last blog I shared my journey to a car-free lifestyle and three years later I’ve migrated from car-free to car-lite. The short story version is that during the pandemic my brother purchased a used car from Geva’s fleet of cars for performers and then gifted the car to me. It all happened very quickly but I do remember needing a week or two to think about the implications of bringing a car back into my life. This was at the top of 2021 and at the time I was teaching as an adjunct at St. John Fisher University and we were migrating back to in-person learning. After three years of being car-free, having access to my own vehicle again didn’t seem like a bad idea.
My final decision came down to convenience. Even with the many improvements to bicycle infrastructure, and the reimagine RTS initiative I would be being disingenuous if I didn’t admit that having a car is simply more convenient in our city. Owning and maintaining a car is a privilege, this I must admit. Getting reacclimated to car life and taking care of the administrative details like registration, insurance, and transferring the title was relatively easy for me to do and I recognize this immense privilege. As someone living with a disability my lifestyle lends itself to far less driving than the average car owner. Due to the disability that I live with, each month my car sits idle in the driveway for multiple consecutive days. More often than not, I don’t have the stamina or energy to drive. The majority of my work happens online and I hold many meetings remotely via zoom. Even on my good days having a car for me isn’t essential. Understanding this privilege I recently was able to loan my car to a car-free friend who was taking a road trip for a couple of days.
For me having a car during the cold winter months is most helpful. And I notice and advocate for improvements in how our streets and sidewalks are plowed during the winter months. Anyone that uses a wheelchair or power chair is figuratively and literally stuck when the snow starts to accumulate, and this is simply unacceptable. There remains much work to be done in this regard.
Transportation Justice is an Ongoing Movement
Despite my return to life with a car, I remain an active and vocal advocate for safe streets, increased and improved bicycle infrastructure, and better accessibility for our roads, public transportation and the built environment for disabled people. My journey has taught me to have more compassion and empathy for everyone’s choice to own a car or not and to spend less time making moral judgements about people’s decisions and more time advocating for a city that includes all perspectives and voices. There have been lots of additions that allow more transportation choice in our City like the HOPR bike and scooter share, bike clubs, electric vehicle sharing, renovations to the RTS station, road diets, improvement along East and West Main streets, and the advocacy and education presented by Reconnect Rochester. Still we have so much work to do to reimagine and redesign our city to be more pedestrian safe and friendly.
Car Lite Rochester is a blog series that highlights the stories of Rochesterians living a car-lite lifestyle. The term “car lite” encompasses a variety of multimodal transportation lifestyles, featuring little dependence (but not NO dependence) on a car. It typically looks like sharing one car within a household or only using a car when absolutely necessary.
So, we hope you’ll continue to follow along. Maybe you will be inspired to join our bloggers in living a car-lite lifestyle!
Car Lite Rochester: Small Decisions Become Core Values
By: Tracey Austin
It’s interesting to think through why your life includes (or excludes) something that most other American families find normal. I would say my family’s car-lite life was born from necessity. We never really made a conscious decision on a particular day to be car-lite, yet it has become one of our values. And it has amazed me how such a seemingly small decision has shaped our life.
After college, my sister and I wanted nothing more than to get an apartment together in the City of Rochester. We shared our college car, and since my job was downtown and closer, I was the one who got to take the bus, ride my bike, and walk. I learned so much about Rochester during that time of my life because I used these multimodal ways of getting around. They weren’t an alternative for me; it was just what I had to do, like most people who don’t have access to a car.
After I got married, there was no question whether we would also live in the city near friends and our jobs. Proximity to work and “life things” has always been a natural priority for us. I love this city. I have spent the past 20+ years exploring some of its best short cuts. Back in the day, my favorite shortcuts were through the old midtown building and the enclosed path you could take from MCC to the other side of Main Street – glory days!
I love bike commuting, and the bus has helped in a pinch. But I prefer to walk most places. If I’m short on time, I bike. But walking is a form of therapy for me, especially before and after work in the winter. It’s always a peaceful way to start and end the day. And when I worked downtown it was always a good excuse to pick up coffee on the way into work without having to wait in a drive thru or park my car. I guess all of my life’s decisions usually come down to coffee access.
For these combined reasons, we have been able to get by with one car (even now with a teenage driver also sharing it!). My husband prefers the bus to biking or will walk sometimes when I need the car. And all of us are now very used to asking friends and co-workers for rides. I wish that was more normalized. I even have close neighbor friends who always anticipate my request for a ride if we are both invited to the same event. Most people don’t mind at all, especially if you help pay for gas or bring them something freshly baked. ☺
We manage, and we manage well. Although I sometimes agree with my youngest son’s wish that “we at least had a newer car,” I don’t frame it as a necessity and I never will. What started as an economic decision continues to be one: I could never stomach paying a car payment on a new car, let alone two. And paying for parking when the job or event is fairly close to my house seems silly. I am happy that my kids prioritize material things less, since the necessity of cars wasn’t modeled for them. And sometimes I make a point to say things like, if we had two cars to pay for we wouldn’t be able to go on this trip or pay this bill. As they get older, I hope they will prioritize adventure and healthy budgeting over something that ties them down.
I suppose my story isn’t going to be a huge revelation to most readers. But my car-lite life has revealed a lot to me—about myself and about my city. I choose to interact with it daily in a more tangible way by how I travel through it, and that in turn helps my bank account and our environment. That makes me happy. So as long I have physical mobility to travel the way I prefer, I will do just that. And I hope I can help some friends to try it along the way.
Car Lite Rochester is a blog series that highlights the stories of Rochesterians living a car-lite lifestyle. The term “car lite” encompasses a variety of multimodal transportation lifestyles, featuring little dependence (but not NO dependence) on a car. It typically looks like sharing one car within a household or only using a car when absolutely necessary.
So, we hope you’ll continue to follow along. Maybe you will be inspired to join our bloggers in living a car-lite lifestyle!
It was early 2015 when my transportation lifestyle hit rock-bottom. Rochester’s winter had been especially cold and snowy that year. I was still bitter over the cancellation of the RTS route that had shuttled me, all through the prior winter, directly from my own block to my job at the University of Rochester (anybody else have fond memories of the 52 line?). With my children in elementary school and my wife and I both working new jobs, busy-ness and frustration led me to break my routine by buying a parking pass and commuting in a car all winter. It seemed logical enough, especially since my wife and I happened to own two cars for the first time since our daughters had been babies.
But by March, it was clear that car commuting had been a terrible blunder. I found myself much more grumpy, fussing over traffic and parking and gas prices. I was out of shape and feeling lethargic. Canceling the built-in exercise of walking to the bus or biking to the office, and eliminating the routine that gave me quiet outdoor moments for reflection twice a day, had made me miserable — both physically and emotionally. The writing was on the wall: I crave exercise and the joys of active transportation more than I hate the cold. I swore I’d never buy another winter parking pass, and I never have. We soon got rid of that second car.
Once we did, the benefits piled up. For starters, living a car-lite lifestyle can be a big financial help for a young family. Driving less meant we spent less on gas, of course — and today’s high gas prices would increase the impact. Dropping my parking pass saved us a few hundred bucks a year. (Shout out to the University’s free Occasional Parking Program!) But the real financial payoff came with getting rid of that car altogether: no car payments, no insurance, no oil changes, no brake jobs or belt jobs or worries about what would break next. Our car-lite lifestyle continues to save us thousands of dollars each year.
Other benefits are less tangible, but for a family, maybe more important. Exercise is one of the best things anybody can do for physical and mental health, so building exercise into daily transportation routines is great for parents and kids alike. Biking and walking make my family and me happier, more focused at school and work, and ready to enjoy time together more fully. Burning less fossil fuel and emitting less carbon make my wife and me feel better about our climate impacts, not only for our own sake but also for our two teenage daughters. After all, they will live through more repercussions of climate change than us, and going car-lite now will empower them to be more adaptable and less dependent on fossil fuels. Meanwhile, strolling and rolling around the neighborhood weaves all of us more tightly into our community. The kids bump into classmates; my wife and I see friends and neighbors.
Maybe the best perk for families who go car-lite is one we hadn’t anticipated back in 2015: it has made parenting easier for us. Teaching our kids to walk to elementary school saved us countless hours idling in carpool traffic jams. More importantly, living car-lite lets children gain freedom and learn responsibility in baby steps, as appropriate for their age. In second grade, our girls were big enough to walk by themselves to the playground across the street. In third grade, they could walk to a friend’s house down the block, or another around the corner. Soon, they could bike to see more friends or walk to music lessons. By the time our daughters reached middle school, we found ourselves living a year in Copenhagen. There, great public transportation, world-beating bike infrastructure, and negligible crime rates meant the girls could go nearly anywhere in the city without setting foot in a car. We didn’t own one there anyway. Back in Rochester, though the infrastructure doesn’t match Copenhagen’s, our daughters have the skills and confidence to go many of the places they need, walking to school and work, biking to the pet store and thrift stores. Restricting their childhood transportation to cars alone would have robbed them of the chance to gain agency and independence, steadily and surely, through all those years. Our older daughter will get her driver’s license this fall, and I shudder to think what would have happened if she’d been handed car keys and set loose to drive two tons of high-speed steel without first having learned how to find her way around the world, independently, on foot and on bikes and on buses and trains.
The Kelley Family in Copenhagen
Though living car-free in Copenhagen was a breeze, our family has never lived car-free in Rochester. Looking ahead to a time when all four of us will have driver’s licenses, we’re transitioning now from owning just one car to owning two — but certainly not four! The car-lite lifestyle is a pleasure we will continue.
Our chosen lifestyle is made more enjoyable by a few practicalities we’ve figured out along the way. First, we chose to live in a neighborhood with ubiquitous sidewalks and good bike routes to many places, especially our most common destinations, including my workplace, the kids’ schools, grocery stores, gyms, a bank, a pharmacy, a bakery, and a library. If you live near good routes to work and everyday destinations, by bike or bus or walk, transitioning to a car-lite lifestyle could be almost seamless. If you are among the millions working from home nowadays, going car-lite is even easier. If not, and if you’d like to commute by biking or walking, ask whether your employer has a shower. (Pro tip: U of R has many at the medical center, many at the gym, and at least two others on River Campus.) By providing a little extra power, an e-bike can be a key enabler of a pleasurable car-lite lifestyle, especially if you have health or mobility limitations, your commute is a little longer, or you frequently find yourself hauling young children and groceries. Cargo bikes and trailers are wonderful for families, not to mention backpacks and panniers. When children are old enough to pedal themselves but not yet old enough to navigate to school independently, a great solution is a bike train, in which just one or two parents bike along with a group of neighborhood classmates. Carpools are another great way to go car-lite, whether to school or to work. You can find great routes using RTS’s Transit app or browsing Rochester’s Bike Boulevards. When winter weather makes roads and sidewalks slick, you can pull on some microspikes on your way to the nearest bus.
Microspikes are a great way to make walking in the snow less treacherous!
Finally, you can help make a car-lite lifestyle more possible and more pleasurable for your own family and for everybody else by communicating its importance to public officials. A great way to start is by giving input for the City of Rochester’s new Active Transportation Plan and for Monroe County’s new Countywide Active Transportation Plan.
Car Lite Rochester is a blog series that highlights the stories of Rochesterians living a car-lite lifestyle. The term “car lite” encompasses a variety of multimodal transportation lifestyles, featuring little dependence (but not NO dependence) on a car. It typically looks like sharing one car within a household or only using a car when absolutely necessary.
So, we hope you’ll continue to follow along. Maybe you will be inspired to join our bloggers in living a car-lite lifestyle!
Car Lite Rochester: A Lifetime of Multimodal Memories
By: M. André Primus
I’ve always lived a car-lite lifestyle, but growing up in the hood we used to just call it “broke.” I suppose in Europe they don’t call it anything, it’s just normal. Whatever you call it, it works out to be the same thing: Do you make the majority of your trips with a car or without one? And what does that mean for how you experience your life?
Growing up, we could only afford one car, so I have very early memories of sitting in the child seat on the back of my mom’s bike, watching her standing up in the pedals to get us both up the hill over the train tracks on East Main, on our way to the Public Market. I remember a few years later, pedaling up the same hill behind her on a little bike of my own, my baby sister now taking my place on the back of the bike.
Rochester winters were colder and snowier then, the lead up and lag longer — practically a six-month progression of slush, then ice, then snow, then ice, then slush again. When our bikes were away for the winter, we trudged through the snow to the Sully Library, where I, homeschooled-kid that I was, would sit for hours and read.
I remember finding a stash of old RTS tokens in some corner of our old house, undoubtedly uncovered by my mom’s continuous renovations. Even though they had been phased out of use by the mid-1990s, we used them to get on the bus for the next couple of weeks, the driver accepting them out of some combination of bemusement, kindness, and apathy.
The funny thing is, we did have a car for all that time! When gas fit in the budget, or our destination was too difficult for a single mother to haul her two children with alternative transportation, we drove. But I don’t have any memories of my time in the car with my mother, save for a few family road trips. Any day-to-day car travel was struck from my mind, while even the most mundane bike trips stand out with a sort of magical glow. I was a very imaginative child, and as soon as I sat in a car I checked out of this universe. I read a book, or explored the wilds of Hyrule on my Gameboy Color, or simply imagined a world of my own. But traveling without a car, I was present; I could see the world around me.
As I got older, our life stabilized. My mom started getting higher-paying work, I started attending school, and we used our car more. But I retained a love for alternative transportation. By the time I got to high school I was walking to school every day and exploring the city with my friends, on foot or by bike.
Once I graduated high school and began attending MCC I biked out to Henrietta daily, year-round. I was occasionally endangered by drivers on my way to school, when I reached the point where Mt. Hope became West Henrietta Road and the shoulder became narrow. More than once the rush of air from a passing truck shook me, or even knocked me off my bike onto the curb. But that couldn’t stop me any more than the snow could. I’d practically been born doing this.
Nowadays I have a family of my own. A wife and two daughters, one four and one six. I’ve worked to create memories for them, the same way my mother did for me. I hope that when they get older, they’ll remember being pulled through the snow in a sled to the Sully Library, or to New City Cafe. Maybe they’ll remember riding to the Public Market as a family on Saturday morning. Maybe they’ll remember how excited they were every time they got to ride the RTS 41 crosstown, how they would cry out and point every time they saw it around the city, “The 41 bus! Look!”
And I’m still creating my own memories. I ride my Onewheel to work most days, with the exhilarating feelings of floating along powered by electricity and intention, of seeing the city, the people, of feeling the wind in my face. A feeling that, besides the visceral pleasure, provides the sort of feeling of freedom a teenager gets upon getting their license, but without the feeling of being tied down that same teenager will get once they begin dealing with gas, insurance, maintenance, and the inevitable lack of a parking spot.
When it gets too snowy for the onewheel, my mountain bike comes out. In the depths of winter, the effort of plowing through snow banks and navigating the maze of icy berms left by competing snowplows warms me up enough that I often have to remove my jacket, and certainly don’t miss a car’s heating. I’ve watched Rochester’s winters get milder and milder in my 30-odd years, so I take a sort of savage joy in wrestling with the winters we have left.
I realize I could have made a case here, telling you all the economic, financial, environmental, and sociological reasons why you should consider using your car less, but at the end of the day, I think the emotional experience of living less of your life in a car is reason enough. Maybe you don’t need the monotony, isolation, and immobility of car travel in your life. Maybe, you could have something better?
Car Lite Rochester is a blog series that highlights the stories of Rochesterians living a car-lite lifestyle. The term “car lite” encompasses a variety of multimodal transportation lifestyles, featuring little dependence (but not NO dependence) on a car. It typically looks like sharing one car within a household or only using a car when absolutely necessary.
So, we hope you’ll continue to follow along. Maybe you will be inspired to join our bloggers in living a car-lite lifestyle!
I love biking. I do it for fun, and for about eight years it was the only way I got around. I love being a part of my surroundings instead of being isolated in a car. I love seeing a friend on a bike or on the sidewalk and calling a quick hello. I love hearing the birds sing and feeling the breeze. I love hearing a busker playing on the street or snippets of a conversation from outdoor diners on Park Avenue. I love that instead of finding time in my busy schedule to work out in a stale indoor space, I can get exercise during my commute. I love that when I’m not feeling active, I can take it easy, bike slower, and still get to work without much effort.
From Chicago to Rochester
I spent my twenties living car free in Chicago before my wife and I moved back to Rochester. Here our lives would be different. We now had a dog and we would be visiting multiple suburbs rather than mostly staying within the city. One of the first things we did was buy two cars, one for each of us.
I added my new car key to a key ring and put it in my back pocket. The key was large and hard to ignore when I sat back down. I shifted slightly and set off the alarm button on the remote. The symbolism of the moment was a little too on the nose for me. I started thinking about how I could get back to my car free lifestyle – or at least car lite.
Commuting by bike in Rochester wasn’t too much of an adjustment from Chicago. In warmer weather, I ride to work in gym clothes and keep my work clothes in a light drawstring bag to stay cool. When I get to work I splash a little water on my face and change in the bathroom. In the winter, I just throw on a jacket over my work outfit. I put my computer and lunch in my panniers. I take East Avenue which generally has a wide shoulder since cars can’t park there during work hours. It is quite spacious for a bicycle.
The shoulder on East Avenue
I am rarely carrying much so taking my bike to work is pretty easy. Even if I have to run multiple errands, I just make sure to bring my backpack. You’d be surprised how much stuff fits in those three bags (panniers and backpack). Due to commuter traffic, travel times are pretty similar on a bike vs a car (especially if I’m traveling within the city). I almost always bike when I go out for the evening and I never worry about where to park or how much it will cost.
Speaking of cost…that alone is a good reason to consider a car lite lifestyle. My bike initially cost me $200 and I’ve probably put about $500-$600 into it for repairs over the course of ten years. Imagine this minimal cost replacing how much you put toward car repairs/payments over even half that period of time.
Challenges & Allowances
I considered my other travel needs beyond commuting, night life, and errands. I’m a musician and I often play gigs where I have to set up my own sound. Here, I allowed that I would need a car to transport my full PA system and multiple instruments/microphones/stands/amplifiers.
My next challenge was visiting family in different suburbs. I started riding from my place in Brighton to my brother’s place in Irondequoit. It’s a long ride but I enjoy it. The only time I feel nervous on a bicycle is crossing under Route 104. There are a lot of drivers who are in a hurry to get on or off the highway and they just aren’t expecting a cyclist. Nonetheless, it’s definitely doable and 104 is only one small part of my ride. TIP: I stay safe by assuming a car doesn’t see me unless I have made eye contact with the driver.
My next allowance was to drive to my parents’ place in Webster because biking this route is unfortunately quite impractical. The Bay Bridge is obviously not built for bicycles and although Empire Boulevard has a wide shoulder, cars are often going upwards of 60 MPH. I’ve read a few sobering stories about collisions gone wrong there. Plus, biking in Webster itself makes me nervous.
If I took public transit I would need to take three buses for an hour, without any delays. There isn’t a bus that goes to my parent’s neighborhood so I would need to walk an additional five miles to their house which is not in the RTS demand area. Or I could drive and it would take 20 minutes. I can hardly blame someone who chooses to drive when we have made it so much easier than the alternative.
I decided that other than these allowances, I was going to bike even in challenging circumstances. I have a raincoat for rainy days, staying active on my bike keeps me warm in the winter, and I have multiple lights for night riding.
Then my son was born. Now the lack of protected bike infrastructure I had been blissfully unaware of as an able-bodied adult became glaringly obvious. I’m in the process of putting a toddler seat on my bike so my son can join me for errands in the city, but it’s still nerve-racking to consider. His daycare is located on a particularly busy four lane section of South Clinton Avenue so I plan to ride on the sidewalk with him for safety.
South Clinton Avenue’s four lanes
The Big Picture: Why Be Car Lite?
It’s hard not to feel a little frustrated at the decisions made for our communities. When I mention reducing car usage to people I often hear the counter argument: “don’t force your lifestyle onto the rest of us.” But we’ve already all but forced people to use cars with our street design and inefficient public transit.
Some people genuinely prefer driving and that’s fine. But there are plenty of people who would opt for transit or biking if they felt it was safe and convenient. Many people don’t realize how impractical cars are because they never considered a life without them. I was certainly one of those people before spending nearly a decade without a car.
Beyond their environmental impact, cars are just inefficient for most of our daily needs. Go to any public area and look at how much space is devoted to parking. Imagine if we could reduce that. Imagine how much more space we would have and how pleasant it would be. Imagine if drunk drivers weren’t a concern because most people weren’t driving when they went out. Imagine if children could travel with classmates via buses to their various after school activities rather than relying on overtaxed parents to transport them everywhere. Imagine if you didn’t have to drive to work every day and you could spend your commute on public transit; reading or daydreaming or writing or texting or sending emails. Imagine not needing to spend every day operating a dangerous machine that requires complete focus to stay safe. Imagine not needing to worry about car repair bills or auto insurance. Imagine a world where road construction is less common because there aren’t thousands of cars degrading the quality daily.
For those who say it’s impossible: consider the fact that our cities used to operate this way with a multitude of pedestrians, trains, buses, bicycles, and cars sharing public space. Even now our public school bus system shows us this is far from a pipe dream. Systemic change is difficult to imagine and even more difficult to enact but it’s certainly not impossible.
Eventually my son will be able to walk to school and take his own bike to get around town. Then I can reduce my car reliance even more. I hope to eventually go back to being car free when it’s possible. For now, I will continue to support institutions such as Reconnect Rochester that are working to correct the imbalance.
Reconnect Rochester meets with the team at RTS on a regular basis. We listen and ask questions. We share feedback from transit riders and offer ideas. We seek to understand and strive to be a good community partner.
Many of you might be wondering what’s going on with all the service changes over the last few years. We want to share our latest understanding with the general riding public, and anyone else who cares about having reliable public transportation in our community. Read on for our take on what happened, what’s happening, and what to expect.
As an advocacy organization, it’s important for us to collect input and channel it to the ears of RTS leadership so they can better understand the impact of their decisions on transit users. To that end, we’ve constructed a survey to find out from RTS riders how your experience has changed (for better or worse) since the implementation of the Reimagine RTS system redesign last spring. We also want to hear from former RTS riders about why you have stopped riding and what it would take to get you back.
We’ll be collecting this input through the month of August online and in-person, and then we’ll collate it and pass it on to RTS leadership. Please help us out by sharing this survey with your friends!
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What’s the current situation and what can we expect?
We’ll give it to you straight first with no sugar added, and then add a dash of hope and sweetness later.
RTS ridership is still hovering around 65-70% of pre-pandemic levels with no sign of an upturn.
On-demand service in the mobility zones is exceeding demand, resulting in a service denial rate of 30-35%. The service management platform has been problematic. This combination has made service in the towns and suburbs of Monroe County often frustrating and unreliable.
Five (5) of the seven (7) 15-minute frequency routes in the core service area – the big promise of the Reimagine RTS system redesign – reverted back to 30-minute frequency. The result is worse service for some riders than they had before.
RTS doesn’t expect any of this to change or improve until at least January 2023, when new buses and vans arrive, enough drivers are hired, and a new on-demand technology platform is put in place.
Who is impacted most?
The unfulfilled promise of Reimagine RTS of more frequent and robust service is a burden that falls squarely on transit dependent people in our community. It stands to reason that transit dependent folks make up most of the 70% of riders who are still on the bus. Unlike “choice riders” who were able to choose another way to get around, this group of folks don’t have another option than to rely on the bus.
With the system as it is, a commute time that was already long, is made longer. Those who live or need to get to work in the mobility zones are especially hard hit. Because demand is far outpacing service capacity, there is a new unreliability that is arguably worse than the service that existed before. At least then you knew a fixed route bus would be coming along at a set time, even if only every 60 minutes.
How did we get here?
The pandemic took a huge toll on RTS. In June 2020, the long-awaited Reimagine RTS system redesign launch was postponed as RTS focused on pandemic response, health safety on buses, and pitching in to meet emergency transportation needs. Reimagine RTS finally launched almost a year later in May 2021.
A few months later (Sept 2021), a shortage of private contract bus drivers created a crisis with RCSD school bus transportation. RTS stepped in and provided service so that kids could get to school. However, to free up buses and drivers, they rolled back the 15-minute frequent service that had been the hallmark of Reimagine RTS.
For the last year, RTS has been struggling to get the buses and drivers in place so they can add back the frequency in regular service and meet the unexpectedly high demand for on-demand service in the mobility zones. The good folks at RTS want to restore the frequent service as much as anyone and are working overtime to problem-solve the situation.
There are two things standing in the way: 1) Supply chain issues have prevented vans and buses, ordered more than a year ago, from arriving. 2) Steep competition in the labor market has made it more challenging to hire RTS drivers. In April 2022, due to ongoing equipment and staffing shortages, RTS announced service changes that included “pausing” the new Rt 42 crosstown, another rollback of the Reimagine RTS system redesign.
A host of Reimagine RTS service improvements were successfully implemented and have made a big difference for many riders. Things like increased weekend service hours and frequency, the Rt 40 & 41 crosstown routes, newly added 30-minute frequency routes, and two 15-minute frequency routes (E. Main & Dewey Ave) that were reinstated.
This spring, the RGRTA Board approved a new service management platform in the mobility zones to replace the problematic one, so that fix is on its way.
Ridership data collected from the 15-minute routes has proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that frequency = increased ridership. Unexpectedly high ridership in the mobility zones shows there’s a strong demand for public transit in the towns and suburbs. What’s the takeaway? When we can restore the promises of Reimagine RTS, we will see huge gains in ridership.
Thanks to advocacy efforts led statewide by NYPTA and locally by Reconnect Rochester, as well as our Albany delegation’s support for public transportation, State Transit Operating Assistance funding for RGRTA will be increased by 15.17%. This removes funding as a barrier to service expansion & restoration (the problem is that money can’t solve the immediate problem of staffing and equipment shortages).
Many would say the Transit App has been a bright spot. Anyone who uses it can attest to the awesome design and functionality to guide transit riders in moving around.
Finally, there’s also hope for expansion of bus amenities to improve the riding experience. Reconnect Rochester just got 23 more bus stop cubes on the ground, bringing the total to 54 bus stops around the city. Even more exciting, the City of Rochester with support from RTS, is applying for a $2M State funding grant to make a sweeping investment in bus stop amenities. This could mean shelters, benches, and bus stop cubes installed at hundreds of stops in the city that currently have no seating. Keep your fingers and toes crossed!
What can RTS do?
We wouldn’t be a very worthwhile advocacy organization if we didn’t point out some ways that RTS can do better even under the current constraints.
We challenge RTS to acknowledge what its customers are really experiencing minus any positive spin. Be transparent and communicate what’s happening. As transit riders, we’d like to know what’s going on. Share ridership statistics and denial rates with the community and explain why. Tell us what you’re doing to resolve the service issues. How many drivers are in the pipeline? How many buses are on order? What’s the timeline for the new user management system for the mobility zones? You get the idea.
Whether you’re a current rider or a former rider that has stopped riding the bus, we want to hear from you. We promise to deliver your thoughts to RTS leadership in the hope that your voice will impact future decision making.
They might not be able to make major changes happen, but they have been responsive to small improvements when they hear a sensible adjustment that can be made. Positive feedback is important, too. If RTS does something that improves your situation, let them know! Also, driving a bus can be a difficult and stressful job. A friendly greeting to the driver when you enter the bus, and thanking them for getting you to your destination safely can make a difference. You can play a part in driver retention!
Ditch the car and ride RTS whenever it works for your schedule.
Mary at Reconnect talking here. My own personal commute improved significantly thanks to the new Route 41 crosstown, which gets me to the office in 17 minutes door-to-door. In those 17 minutes, I get to enjoy some fresh air and a little exercise, check my inbox, give and take smiles (even if only with the eyes) with fellow passengers, and save gas money leaving the car at home.
Wondering what your bus commute would look like? Visit myrts.com or download the Transit App to find out!
We still believe
Reconnect Rochester has long advocated for a public transit system that delivers frequency. We still believe that the Reimagine RTS plan – when fully implemented – will set us on a path to a more frequent and robust system. There are tradeoffs, yes, but it will be a net positive overall.
At Reconnect Rochester, we look forward to when we will see the full promise of the new system fulfilled, and can truly welcome in a new day for public transportation in Rochester. We look forward to bringing back our Roc Transit Day event to showcase the changes and attract busloads of new choice riders – because choice ridership enriches the whole system, making it better for everyone. We look forward to the day when public transportation can serve as an integrating, rather than segregating, force in our community.
