UTA Campaign to increase bus rapid transit ridership

Target Audience: Primary Audience: Residents ages 18-54 who live in Provo and Orem, Utah, and who will benefit directly from the new service. Secondary Audience: College students at Utah Valley University and Brigham Young University who can ride UVX free with their student ID cards.

Strategy Objective:The primary objective was to announce the soft opening of the new Utah Valley Express (UVX) bus rapid transit line, to build awareness of the new service, and to generate immediate trials and ridership. The secondary objective was to rebuild goodwill in the community, which had been strained by construction issues and delays.

Situation Challenge: According to the U.S. Census Bureau, in 2018, the cities of Provo and Orem are the No. 8 fastest-growing metropolitan area in the country, out of 382 metropolitan areas studied. This explosive growth is causing significant traffic congestion, air pollution, and quality of life deterioration. To alleviate these problems, the Provo Orem TRIP (TRansportation Improvement Project) plan was created. TRIP is a partnership between the Utah Transit Authority (UTA), Utah Department of Transportation (UDOT), Mountainland Association of Governments (MAG), and Utah County. While the plan is comprehensive, including road, transit, bicycle and pedestrian improvement projects, a key element of the plan is a high-capacity Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) system that runs throughout Provo and Orem.

Results Impact: Construction on UVX is expected to continue through the end of the year. Currently, the line isn't operating as a true BRT system. When complete, UVX will feature signal priority at intersections, dedicated stations, and service every six minutes during peak hours and every ten minutes during off-peak. Currently, UVX is operating as more of a traditional bus route. All of that said, the soft opening has exceeded all projections. In just over a month, marketing has helped grow daily ridership to 9,513 trips'five times higher than the 1,863 average daily trips taken on the same transit routes last year.

Why Submit: As you know, soft openings tend to be failures, especially when transit lines are still under construction and not operating at peak efficiency. In the case of UVX, it also opened to poor public perception caused by construction delays. To solve these issues, UTA incorporated lots of local dance teams, students, flag teams, and musical groups into its UVX marketing. The local outreach and involvement helped to build positive perceptions, social media engagement, community goodwill, and trial ridership. Ridership is currently five times higher than it was last year on the same routes, and once actual BRT service is implemented, it is expected to exceed all projections.