Job Access and Reverse Commute (jarc) Program fy 2009 Service Profiles Region X alaska, Idaho, Oregon, and Washington October 2010 fta-08-0162 Job Access and Reverse Commute (jarc) fy 2009 Service Profiles: Region X

City of Canby (774)

Canby Area Transit (1637)

Location: Clackamas County (OR)
Type: Trip-Based Services/Fixed route
Goal: Expanded geographic coverage
Service description: CAT’s Orange Line provides commuter service between Oregon City and Canby and between Canby and Woodburn. The portion of this route between Canby and Woodburn is funded with JARC dollars. Additionally, the express service between Canby and Oregon City Transit Center is partially funded with JARC dollars. The Orange Line provides nine trips per day (Monday-Friday) between Canby and Woodburn. The first trip from Canby to Woodburn leaves Canby at 5:35 AM and the last trip between Woodburn and Canby leaves Woodburn at 6:45 PM. The route travels through the small communities of Aurora and Hubbard on its way between Canby and Woodburn, providing much needed transportation services to these communities.
The Orange Line also provides service between Canby and the Oregon City Transit Center. Monday to Friday we provide express trips between Canby and Oregon City with JARC funding. There are three express trips in the morning and two express trips in the evening. Express buses leave Canby on weekday mornings at 5:13 AM, 5:46 AM, and 6:19 AM. Express buses leave Oregon City weekday evenings at 4:50 PM and 5:08 PM.
The Orange Line service is a classic jobs access reverse commute service. It is designed to meet the needs of workers traveling to work sites in Woodburn, Canby, Wilsonville, Oregon City, Portland, and points in between. CAT service connects directly to TriMet, SMART, SCTD, CARTs, and Woodburn Transit. In addition to serving the communities of Canby, Woodburn, and Oregon City, the Orange Line service between Canby and Woodburn provides service to small communities where there is no other transit service. The populations of these communities are the exact demographic JARC was intended to serve: low-income rural area residents who desperately need to have access to jobs, educational opportunities, and other community services.
Evaluation: We monitor all service data and regularly survey riders and drivers. The number of rides provided between Canby and Woodburn continues to increase and is the fastest growing service provided by CAT. During this reporting period (10/08 to 9/09) the service averaged 139 trips per day. This is especially significant given the fact that the hours of service were reduced from 14 hours per day to seven hours per day in November of 2008.
Accomplishments: In August of 2008 we made significant changes to CAT services. The change that impacted our commuter service the most was interlining our buses and renaming the routes between Oregon City and Canby and Canby and Woodburn. Prior to the change these services were marketed separately and called by name the “Oregon City Route” and the “Woodburn Route”. We changed the name of both services to the Orange Line and put both services into one schedule. Although it was possible to travel from Oregon City to Woodburn before the schedule and service changes it seems that customers were not aware of that fact. Since the change, many customers now take advantage of the service all the way from Woodburn to Oregon City and back.
Lessons learned: Assuming the communities in question are similar in demographic breakdown to the communities of Canby, Hubbard, Aurora, and Woodburn our advice would be to do it as soon as you possibly can. This service has grown much faster than anyone expected it to and it provides a vital public transportation link to the region.
It would have been helpful to know sooner that many customers did not realize they could transfer from the Woodburn Route to the Oregon City Route and travel between Woodburn and Oregon City several times each day. Marketing both the Oregon City Route and the Woodburn Route as connecting to each other might have caused even more rapid initial growth of the Woodburn service.