Survey says, “Extending Service Hours is #1 Issue”

A Transit Master Plan or TMP is a comprehensive, 20-year plan that will guide the future development of The Rapid transit system. The following is a section pulled from the approved TMP. Download the full Transit Master Plan from The Rapid's TMP website.

Community Workshops – Issues and Needs

After working with The Rapid and GVMC to develop some basic information on how the region was expected to grow over the next twenty years and where those future residents might travel to and from, the project team set out to engage residents in the six cities through six community workshops. Each workshop began with an open house, followed by a short presentation and ended with a question and answer session, providing opportunities for public input into the process. The dates and times of the initial six meetings are listed below.


1) Wyoming: Nov. 4, 6‐8 pm

2) Kentwood: Nov. 5, 6‐8 pm

3) East Grand Rapids: Nov. 11, 6‐8 pm

4) Grand Rapids: Nov. 12, 7‐9 pm

5) Grandville: Nov. 17, 6‐8 pm

6) Walker: Nov. 18, 6‐8 pm

At each workshop, the project team listened to residents voice their opinions regarding existing service and ideas for new service. While some comments were very specific (for example, Route 24 ‐ Burton needs weekday evening service or a concrete pad at a particular stop), most comments were more broadly based (for example, a general need for improved night and weekend service). The specific comments were recorded for The Rapid to possibly address in the short‐term or through the COA update and the broad comments were condensed into fifteen issues that the public was then asked to prioritize in an online survey.

Online Survey

Upon completion of the first round of Community Workshops, the TMP project team developed an online and printed survey to gauge the community’s interest in specific transit improvements. The survey asked two questions that were critical in helping identify priorities for the TMP. The first group of questions asked respondents to identify their top five priority issues out of the fifteen issues identified in the workshops. The second group of questions asked respondents whether each improvement was very important, somewhat important, important or not important.

On the “Top 5” question, the two most critical issues were extending service hours, specifically for weekday evenings, weekends and holidays (21.9% reported as the #1 issue) and increased service frequencies (18.0% reported as the #1 issue). Other Top 5 issues included more modal choices, such as BRT and Streetcar, expanded service into the county and new routes serving underserved, or unserved, corridors inside the service area. Table 3‐1, below, shows the tabulation of the priorities for the 15 issues.



On the “Important” question, the issues’ importance was similar to that of the Top 5. Extended service hours was the most important, with 85.3% of all respondents ranking the issue as either Very Important or Important. Other issues that rated highly as Very Important or Important included increased service frequency (84.0%), improvements to travel time (79.6%), better connections or more direct service to downtown Grand Rapids, medical services and entertainment destinations (79.6%) and new routes serving underserved, or unserved, corridors inside the service area (78.2%). Table 3‐2, below, shows how Important or Very Important the issues were to the survey respondents.


See the Full Master Transit Plan