Impact of Miami,Florida,Urban Partnership Agreement Phase 1A on Transit User Perceptions of I-95 Express Bus Service

Abstract

With the use of pre- and postdeployment onboard surveys conducted in May 2008 and May 2009, the effect of the Miami, Florida, Urban Partnership Agreement (UPA) project (I-95 Express Lanes) on user perceptions of the corridor's I-95 Express bus service was assessed. Because the majority of 95 Express bus users are commuters who use the service in both directions and only the northbound direction had been improved by the Express Lanes at the time of the study presented in this paper, the project's effect on user perceptions was significant. Although the service was already highly rated, the service's ratings have increased further, with travel time and service reliability ratings improving by margins that were statistically significant at the 99% and 95% confidence level, respectively. These margins relate directly to the improvements in travel conditions brought about by the UPA project. Despite these enhanced performance perceptions, responses to other survey questions showed that mode shifts to transit because of the Express Lanes project have been negligible to date. This finding is consistent with the findings of the Florida Department of Transportation study, which showed that transit mode share remained relatively unchanged between 2008 and 2009.

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