All LANtaBus routes changed August 29, 2011

And so far, the transition has gone relatively smooth. Please click here for some background on the rationale for the changes, and for a conversion guide to see what the 'old' route translated to in the 'new' system.

We are not saying things went perfectly. A number of bus riders had problems the first day - missed their bus or didn't make connections. For that we apologize. But given the length and breadth of the change - the first such comprehensive system change in 25 years - we think we did pretty well.

The changes included renaming all routes, creating categories of routes indicating the range of service available, linking route segments in different ways to respond better to community demand and providing some temporal 'ease' to the system to make it easier for bus operators to drive and remain on schedule. A new system of information was developed also to make it easier to understand and read timetables and, an 'automated transportation management system' or, ATMS, was installed to make it easier to manage the system and to provide customers with real-time information about their bus service.

It has been an incredible period of change culminating in the service revisions rolled out on Monday, August 29. And while countless hours were spent testing and reviewing the data for glitches, with the magnitude of change involved here, we are sure to have missed something, so stay-tuned for updates and perhaps some minor tweaks in the coming days and weeks.

While the system has only been in effect for one day, already we are getting back some positive feedback and, we expect, some criticism on the changes implemented. No change worth it's salt comes without major effort and its positive and negative aspects. But we firmly believe that the enhancements made far outweigh the drawbacks.

As we've been saying for years now, people make a 'smart choice' when they chose to ride LANtaBus. Now we are convinced that that choice is even smarter and more people should make it.