Dial-A-Ride and other university transportation services will still be in service this coming semester despite COVID-19. Changes include a limit to the number of passengers in each vehicle depending on the vehicle, physical changes to the vehicles, further cleaning regimes, and all passengers and the drivers will be required to wear a mask.
“In general, our plan includes reduced capacity on all buses and vans, mask requirements for passengers, and altered service so that we can focus our resources on where we anticipate the most demand,” said the director of transportation services Paul Kunkel. “I feel like we have maybe over-planned for the Fall which is definitely better than under-planning.”
The changes to vehicle capacity will be posted on all vehicles and are to help with social distancing, said Kunkel. Only two passengers will be allowed in the minivans at a time which are used for both Dial-A-Ride and SafeRide. The minibuses will allow up to five passengers. Typical buses that usually carry 40 to 50 passengers will now only carry 12 to 17 passengers depending on the size of the bus. Standing is also no longer allowed on the buses. Seats will be marked for which ones are open for use, said Kunkel.
Due to these changes the wait times for rides will likely be longer.
“We are putting additional buses and drivers on routes during peak times to hopefully minimize the impact,” said Kunkel. “Students will definitely want to plan on additional time for commuting as opposed to previous years.”
The Campus Commuter, another university transit, will now run every 20 minutes as opposed to the usual ten minutes in order to move some resources to the Express Routes where university transport is used a lot, said Kunkel. LaramieLink may be changed to a Dial-A-Ride service or will remain as a route service as it has in the past.
“I hope to do some driving as we get back when school starts because I personally love interacting with students and people that use our services,” said Logan Smith, junior at UW and employee of Dial-A-Ride and SafeRide since September of 2019. “It is unclear yet how it will look at the start of the fall semester, but I do think there will be more cleaning time that will need to be taken and I think that we will have to adapt to the guidelines that the university provides for us as we near.”
Smith’s spring semester of work for Dial-A-Ride, after COVID-19 put all the classes online for UW, consisted of training for proper cleaning. Smith said half his shift would be cleaning the office and the other half would be cleaning the university buses and the vans used for ParaTransit, Dial-A-Ride and SafeRide. He would be “cleaning anything and everything” related to the campus transit system at UW.
“Our transit staff goes through extensive training, and our staff has had additional opportunities for training over the summer with our extremely reduced service,” said Kunkel. “All drivers have been trained in the additional cleaning and sanitizing standards we have employed since the pandemic began in March. Transportation Services has recently acquired several electrostatic sprayers which will be used to quickly sanitize vehicles throughout the day and at night during deep-cleaning. Our drivers and cleaning attendants are currently being trained how to properly use this new equipment and sanitize our vehicles properly.”
There have also been additional precautions made for the drivers’ safety including plexiglass barriers installed in all of the transit vehicles. They have been given masks and hand sanitizer. Mask and hand sanitizer dispensers are also being installed in buses for public use and in case a passenger had forgotten their mask, said Kunkel.
Smith said he personally carries multiple cloth masks for his own use and switches them out during the day. He said he also washes his hands constantly.
“I know people say that the cloth ones last longer throughout the day, but you can never be too careful,” said Smith. “I wash my hands all the time. My hands are drier than ever and I have never used so much hand lotion before in my life. But on a more serious note, yes I try to take all of the necessary precautions and try to think ahead for if some unexpected event takes place.”
Training also involves transportation for individuals with disabilities following the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) regulations. They are also trained in drug and alcohol, defensive driving and customer service as well as many other topics and scenarios that may occur in this job.
Further duties of an employee for Dial-A-Ride are answering phones, setting up rides, cleaning both the vans and offices, checking the vans before and after rides to make sure they are safe, as well as simply driving passengers from point A to point B. Smith said it depends on the day to what the duties will be.
“I think if everyone wears a mask and keeps everyone else they are around in mind, I think we can pull through,” said Smith. “After seeing all of the nurses and all of the essential workers being in close contact while still doing what they do best flourish, I feel myself and my coworkers will be fine and get through alright.”
