Lynx is making route and schedule changes

Lynx announced that it’s changing some routes, schedules, and even bus stop locations.

These changes go into effect on April 28.

Here is what will happen:

ROUTE ADJUSTMENTS

·         Link 155 – The Loop/Buena Ventura Lakes/Osceola Parkway (Osceola County) – The route will now travel between Greenwald Way and Centerview Boulevard via Osceola Parkway.

·         FastLink 407 – Kissimmee/OIA/Medical City (Orange County/Osceola County) – During the morning peak, trips to Lake Nona will first serve the VA Medical Center. Morning peak inbound trips to Kissimmee will serve Nemours Children’s Hospital and the USTA National Campus. Midday and afternoon peak service will remain unchanged, except for minor schedule adjustments.

·         NeighborLink 613 – Pine Hills (Orange County) – NeighborLink zone will be extended north to include the Park Promenade Plaza.

 BUS STOP ADJUSTMENTS

·         Link 61 - LYMMO Lime Line (City of Orlando) – Adding new bus stop on Amelia Street at Terry Avenue.

·         FastLink 441 – Kissimmee/Orlando (Orange County/Osceola County) – Inbound and outbound trips will now each serve a bus stop at South Orange Blossom Trail and Centerview Boulevard.

SCHEDULE ADJUSTMENTS

·         Link 15 – Curry Ford Road/Valencia College East (Orange County) – Minor schedule adjustments.

·         Link 26 – Pleasant Hill Road (Osceola County) – Minor schedule adjustments.

·         Link 60 – LYMMO Orange Line (City of Orlando) – Weekday, 10:30 a.m.-2:30 p.m., frequency will change to every six minutes.

·         Link 61 – LYMMO Lime Line (City of Orlando) – Weekdays, after 7 p.m., bus frequency will change to every 20 minutes. All day Saturday and Sunday bus frequency will change to every 20 minutes. Friday and Saturday the last trip will leave Livingston Street and Hughey Avenue at 10:40 p.m.

·         Link 62 – LYMMO Grapefruit Line (City of Orlando) – Minor schedule adjustments.

·         Link 63 – LYMMO North Quarter Line (City of Orlando) – On Friday and Saturdays the last trip will leave LCS at 10:40 p.m.

·         Link 103 – North 17-92/Sanford (Orange County/ Seminole County) – Minor schedule adjustments.

·         Link 301 – Pine Hills/Animal Kingdom (Orange County) – Minor schedule adjustments.

·         Link 304 – Rio Grande

Osceola County has a plan to improve Lynx bus service

Great news! Osceola County is taking steps to create a dedicated source for funding that can help both the Lynx bus and SunRail. The rest of Central Florida should follow Osceola’s lead.

On May 21st Osceola County voters will have the opportunity to approve a one-cent sales tax for transportation. If voters support the referendum, money raised by that tax can be used for a variety of transportation improvements from road widening to helping Lynx and SunRail.

Kissimmee Intermodal Station

That’s outstanding. Please vote "for" this referendum.

Lynx is catastrophically underfunded. Right now, the Florida Department of Transportation is helping to fund SunRail. In 2 years that becomes the responsibility of local governments.

Public transit – Lynx and SunRail – don’t raise enough from the fare box to fully pay operating costs. If government didn’t subsidize public transit, people would have to pay up to $14 for a one-way ride on some Lynx routes.

No public transit system in the world can pay for operations solely from the fare box. Typically, a transit system can pay about 30 percent of the costs from fares. Beyond that, they need government support.

Remember, public transit is a service. The police and fire are also very expensive services paid for by the government. Unlike police and fire, transit raises some of the money needed to pay for its operating costs. Keep in mind that all transportation – from the street outside your house to the airlines – receive government subsidies.

Up to now, every year Lynx officials must go hat-in-hand to local governments to beg for money to keep the buses rolling. This creates a precarious situation, which makes it difficult to improve the bus service.

Osceola County Commissioners demonstrated enormous wisdom and courage in putting this issue up for voters to decide.

No elected official likes to raise the subject of increasing taxes, but "for"  this issue is an important investment in Osceola's future. One of the great things about this referendum is it includes a little something for everyone.

If approved, this tax would raise $67 million per year.

That money will go to:

·        Improve roads and bridges

·        Install sidewalks and bike lanes

·        Help Lynx and SunRail.

For more details on the tax and how the money will be used, click here.

Osceola County residents make great use of public transit. You can see that every day in the crowds at the Intermodal station in downtown Kissimmee that serves Lynx and SunRail. You can also see it on the SunRail trains. They’re packed leaving and returning to Osceola.

Granted adding a penny to the sales tax will put a squeeze on some residents. But the sacrifice is worth it because communities with a strong transportation system – both roads and public transit – are attractive to investors and that means more employers; more and better employment opportunities, and a better standard of living for everyone.

We encourage Osceola residents to vote “for” this sales-tax referendum on May 21st.

We would be remiss if we didn’t mention that on May 21st, Volusia County is also holding a vote to increase the sales tax by a half-cent. Sadly, that money is for infrastructure improvements, which includes roads. None of that money can be used for Votran or SunRail.

That’s a shame, and very shortsighted.

Meanwhile, we’ll rejoice that Osceola County is showing real leadership on public transit funding. We urge Orlando, Orange, and Seminole counties to get on board with dedicated funding sources for public transit.

We need it now, more than ever!

Lynx riders were the biggest losers when the bus CEO resigned

Lynx bus CEO Edward Johnson is gone, but not forgotten.

Though Johnson had some shortcomings, we believe that he tried his best to improve public transit for thousands of Central Floridians.

Ultimately, Johnson’s departure will hurt riders the most. It could take six months or more before a permanent replacement is selected, and then that person faces a learning curve to understand the system and all the political players.

Much has been said about the $21 million deficit at Lynx, we think it’s important to note the technology innovations the bus system added under Johnson’s leadership to improve the rider experience.

Those include:

·        Mobile-fare collection (paying with your smartphone)

·        Real-time bus tracking app

·        Free wi-fi on all the buses

As for the $21 million deficit – that’s what happens when you try to provide transit service to a sprawling metro area when your agency is catastrophically underfunded and doesn’t have enough people, equipment or other critical resources.

In an interview last year, Johnson described some of the things Lynx needs to improve service. To see that interview, click here.

Despite these shortcomings, Lynx provides roughly 83,000 rides daily, compared to SunRail, which provides 5,300 rides daily on weekdays. Lynx has 300 buses to serve three counties. By comparison, the Orange County public school district has 900 buses to serve one county.

Point your fingers as much as you want at Johnson, he was not the problem. The problem is that Central Florida’s elected officials have neglected Lynx for decades.

Lynx riders have been neglected because most of them don’t have a choice because they can’t afford a car. Many ride the bus for almost two hours on the way to work and two hours on the way back home.

Neither Lynx nor SunRail, have a dedicated source of funding to subsidize the cost of service. Almost every public transit system in the world (THE WORLD!) needs to subsidize the cost of service. Taxpayers subsidize all transportation systems and services from the street outside your house, to the airlines.

Every year Lynx officials go hat in hand to local governments to beg for money to keep things rolling. They get the bare minimum, which is why Lynx is always limping along.

Lynx needs a reliable source of funding that could come from a penny sales tax or surcharge on car rentals – two possible sources.

It’s up to our elected officials to demonstrate political courage to embrace a dedicated source of funding to provide Lynx with the resources it needs.

Without a dedicated funding source, the next Lynx chief will be on a fool’s errand doomed to suffer the same fate as Edward Johnson.

Either that or the next Lynx chief will be forced to eliminate many routes and reduce the frequency of buses to cut costs.

The community deserves more, not less public transportation.

Please fix the Kissimmee Connector bus

The Kissimmee Connector bus at the Kissimmee SunRail station needs some tweaks to succeed.

The Connector, launched in January, was designed to make it easier for people at the Kissimmee Intermodal Station – serving SunRail, Lynx, Greyhound, and Amtrak -- to reach the Osceola Courthouse and other destinations, such as the local hospitals.

The problem is that the Connector runs on a 30-minute schedule. It is not uncommon to see the Connector sitting empty at the intermodal station while the driver is waiting to leave on the schedule. People who want to use the Connector waste time sitting and waiting for the driver to start.

Instead of waiting, some people opt to walk, which defeats the purpose of launching this service. This is one of the reasons why the Connector sometimes runs empty, or with only one or two passengers.

The Connector would get more use if it ran on a non-stop loop, like the Lymmo buses in downtown Orlando.

In addition, merchants in Historic Downtown Kissimmee, have told us that they wish that at least part of the Connector’s route took it down the Broadway business strip, instead of skirting that downtown commercial corridor, which hosts dozens of restaurants and shops.

The Connector is operated by Lynx. Is anyone at Lynx and Kissimmee City Hall paying attention?

See you on The Kissimmee Connector.

Blame our politicians for the Lynx deficit

No one should be surprised by the recent TV news story reporting that Lynx has a $21 million deficit.

That’s the inevitable outcome when you have a fast-growing 3-county metropolitan region served by an underfunded, poorly equipped public bus system.

Our elected officials – local, state and federal – have ignored Lynx for decades. They’ve never given Lynx the resources it needs and that riders deserve. Now the suits are acting surprised.

The best suggestion some people have come up with to address the problem is laying off drivers and cutting routes.

Are you FRIGGING KIDDING US!

Anyone suggesting cutbacks is both an idiot, and an elitist!

Maybe those Lynx critics don’t ride the bus, but tens of thousands do every day.

For the record: Lynx provides 83,000 rides daily.

Lynx serves Orange, Seminole and Osceola counties with about 300 buses. By comparison, the Orange County school district has 900 buses to serve one county.

Lynx needs more drivers, more buses and more routes – not fewer.

The overwhelming majority of people who ride Lynx use it because they don’t have a choice. They don’t have a car and can’t afford one. Many spend two hours or more every day on trips to and from work, school, doctors office and such.

Most of the riders are working people – employed in the low-paying service industry that drives Central Florida’s tourism economy. They are voters and taxpayers and they deserve better.

Many walk a mile or more to reach a Lynx bus stop and must make multiple transfers to reach their destination. There are many important destinations – such as Orlando-Sanford International Airport -- that can’t be reached on a Lynx bus.

We won’t even discuss how long passengers wait – often without shelter from the sun and rain – for their bus to arrive.

The first thing some people want to do is blame the deficit problem on Lynx CEO Edward Johnson. Who knows maybe the Lynx board will throw Johnson over the side because of this deficit. But guess what? Lynx bus service will continue to suck and struggle financially!

Johnson didn’t cause the crisis. The factors leading up to this situation existed well before Johnson took over the agency. They are beyond his authority to fix.

Unlike most other transit agencies throughout the nation, Lynx does not have a dedicated funding source, to help pay for the service. (SunRail doesn’t have a dedicated funding source either and will soon be facing the same budget problem in 2 years when the Florida Department of Transportation turns over that rail system to local governments to run.)

A dedicated funding source could be a penny sales tax; a surcharge on rental cars (Orlando is the nation’s largest rental-car market), or a slice of the expressway authority tolls.

No public transit system can support its operations solely from the fare box. Typically, a public transit system can get about 30 percent of its operating money from the fare box.

It is the responsibility of our elected officials to provide that funding source to subsidize our public transit. Politicians don’t want to touch it so they won’t be blamed for a tax, but if they’re too timid to make the tough decisions, then they need to quit so we can elect people who will.

Without a subsidy, people would have to pay $15 per ride on some Lynx routes. That’s obviously too much for service workers who bring $300 or less weekly.

Let’s not forget that all transportation -- from the airlines to the street outside your house -- is supported by taxpayer subsidies.

Public transit is a service just like the police and fire departments, which are also expensive to run. Unlike police and fire, public transit does generate some income through the fare box. As noted earlier, public transit plays a major role in our local economy.

Instead of a steady source that can be counted on, every year Lynx managers must beg local governments for financial support. Lynx never gets the amount needed to create a robust, convenient bus system. Now we have a crisis. Thanks for nothing!

Time for our local, state and federal elected officials to pull up their big-boy and big-girl pants and give Lynx and its riders the financial support they have always needed.

Want a fast ride to a Disney job on Lynx?

Our bad!

A few months ago, we suggested that SunRail’s Southern Extension into Osceola County would make it easy for people to reach Disney by taking the train to Kissimmee where riders could transfer to Lynx bus route 56.

Later we learned the bus ride from the Kissimmee Intermodal Station (used by SunRail and Lynx) to Disney could take an hour or more. In a car, that same ride would take 30 minutes give or take -- depending on the time of day and the traffic.

The Link 56 bus uses U.S. Highway 192 and makes stops so you can see why the trip takes so long.

It would be much quicker if Lynx ran an express bus straight from the Tupperware SunRail station down Osceola Parkway to Disney. That trip takes 20 minutes or less.

Lynx has said it has considered such a route, but that has not been included in the bus service changes that go into effect this month.

People need the bus service now, not some time in the future.

That’s why we’re asking people to CLICK HERE to sign a petition to launch a Lynx express bus connecting SunRail to Disney.

This bus service would boost the ridership of Lynx and SunRail.

Orlando Mayor Dyer doesn't seem to care about Lynx riders

Not once during the Orlando State of Downtown address last week (Dec. 6) did Mayor Buddy Dyer mention the importance of improving and expanding Lynx bus service.

In a section of the speech Dyer labeled “connectivity” (which you can see by clicking here) he praised the SunRail commuter train. Dyer spoke of pedestrian trails, bike-share, optimizing vehicle flow, and even the introduction of a ride-share hub for downtown’s late-night club hoppers.

But Dyer – a member of Lynx board – did not specifically call out Lynx and the vital role it plays in moving people, especially those who live east and west of downtown Orlando.

Mind you Lynx Central Station sits in the heart of downtown – a stone’s throw from Creative Village – the mayor’s urban renewal pet project in the historically black Parramore community.

By overlooking Lynx -- either unintentionally or purposefully -- Dyer showed why Lynx continues to limp along. Too many politicians don’t give Lynx the priority and attention it deserves.

Pols are more interested in talking about SunRail – the new shiny toy -- than Lynx, which is the backbone of the local public transit system.

For the record, Lynx provides 83,000 rides daily, compared to SunRail which provides 5,300 rides daily.

Lynx is not sexy, and many of the people who rely on Lynx are needy, or people of color who have little political juice. The routes are convoluted, and many must wait up to an hour between buses or must walk miles to reach their closest bus stops.

Yet without Lynx, the local service-based economy would grind to a halt. Even SunRail depends on Lynx to bring many passengers to the train stations.

Lynx struggles because there is no dedicated source of funding for the system that serves Orange, Seminole and Osceola counties with a fleet of 300 buses though they really need 600 or more buses.

Every year Lynx executives must beg local counties for money to subsidize the system. Nearly every public transit system in the world requires government subsidies to keep running. Without the subsidy Lynx riders on some routes would have to pay up to $14 for a one-way ride.

It’s noteworthy that Dyer gave his State of Downtown address on the same day the Lynx board met. He didn’t make it to the Lynx meeting.