Posted on: Sunday, April 6, 2003

New neighbors given chance to ride bus for free

By Mike Leidemann
Advertiser Transportation Writer

The city is sending more than 1,000 free bus passes a month to families that have recently moved, hoping to get them to change their commuting habits, transportation officials said.

"It's a way to get them to think about the bus at a time when other things are changing in their lives," said Cheryl Soon, the city's transportation services director.

Using low-cost direct mailing techniques, the 4-month-old city program tries to identify every Honolulu household that has changed addresses in the past 30 days, then sends a packet of bus information to their new home.

The packet includes a new four-color O'ahu bus route map, time schedules for buses in their neighborhood, and a bus pass that can be used only in the current month.

"When you move, you change your daily trip patterns," Soon said. "That's one of the best times to consider whether the bus might be a better fit than a car."

O'ahu Transit Services, which runs the city bus service, uses a contractor to identify families on the move, including those who file a change of address form at the post office or with credit card companies.

Since the program began in January, the contractor has identified more than 1,000 households each month that have recorded new addresses, said O'ahu Transit Services spokeswoman Marilyn Dicus.

"We know they've undergone some changes, so we send them a packet of information that may help ease the transition," she said.

The packets go out about the first of each month and arrive a few days later, making the bus passes good for three or four weeks, she said.

The new bus maps, the first in many years, are printed in English, Japanese, Tagalog, Ilocano and Korean, Dicus said.

City officials say they have no way of knowing how many of the free bus passes are being used. They plan to send a survey later this year to those who received the information packets and ask them how they were used.

Costs for the program, including the direct mailing list contractor and postage, are less than $10,000 each year. Because the bus passes would otherwise be unused, they represent no cost to the city, Dicus said.

"It's one of the best ways we have to tell people how the bus operates in their neighborhood," Soon said. "We're hoping that they'll give us a try."