EMBARK Releases FY16 Survey Results

November 22, 2016

EMBARK recently released its Fiscal Year 2016 research results revealing that investment in public transportation is important to Oklahoma City’s long-term future, while existing customers would like to see service enhancements continue. Highlights from the research were presented today to the City Council by ETC Institute, a research group that collected more than 2,000 responses from Oklahoma City residents and EMBARK customers.

The non-rider report details that 78 percent of the respondents stated that investment in public transit in Oklahoma City’s long-term future is important. This finding supports results from the City of Oklahoma City’s citizen survey, reported earlier this year, that residents believe public transit should receive emphasis over the next two years.

“We know that convenient and efficient connections throughout our city are important if we want to OKC to be the most desired place to live and work,” said Jason Ferbrache, administrator of EMBARK. “We are committed to developing a multi-modal transit system to get our residents and commuters to work, boost our economy, and provide vital mobility options for seniors, students, persons with a disability, and anyone without their own car.”

Other results noted that non-riders indicated they would use public transportation under the right conditions:

• 53% stated increasing bus service should be considered to improve transit service
• 69% shared that they live within five minutes of an EMBARK bus stop
• 70% stated that adding bus service for elderly/disabled is a priority
• 82% said that frequency of service is an important service characteristic when deciding whether to try riding the bus

Results from the customer survey include:

• 28% said that more routes to more places was their first request for service improvement, followed by more shelters at stops (19%) and later Saturday service (12%)
• 39% stated the purpose of their trip was to get to work
• 48% walk 10 minutes or more to reach a bus stop
• 63% indicated they had annual household incomes of less than $20,0000
• 72% of respondents rated the overall service as excellent or good
• 74% rated "Ease of getting service information" as excellent or good
• 79% reported the bus was operated safely

Ferbrache says the survey results are a critical part of EMBARK’s planning process.

“Since the 2011 customer survey, EMBARK has systematically implemented service enhancements based on the results from a Transit System Analysis and on what our riders have told us. We see in our recent survey a response to those improvements – in both satisfaction ratings as well as areas riders want to see more improvements.”

In the past three years, EMBARK has realigned routes to improve bus frequency, expanded service hours until midnight on four of its most popular routes, improved bus stops, doubled the number of bus shelters, and added real-time arrival information, a journey planner and Wi-Fi on every bus.

Those were improvements riders requested in the last survey and they have been well received; EMBARK ridership increased 18 percent since the last survey in FY 2011.

“Funding has a direct impact on our ability to operate a system that works for everyone. City Council has increased funding for transit and we’ve seen our ridership increase dramatically. We are serving more people and expect to continue this trajectory.”

The presentation to council may also be found on EMBARK’s YouTube channel.