The city of Sedona is planning to launch its long-awaited microtransit service on Thursday, Aug. 29, although that launch date may be subject to adjustment.

Sedona Transit Administrator Robert Weber explained that the two-year delay in launching the service was largely attributable to the city’s desire to maximize the federal funding for the buses and to provide Americans with Disabilities Act-accessibility for that service.

Weber also outlined that the proposed service will be optimized to reduce human interaction for efficiency, improved surveillance, more possible federal grants in the future and creating incentives for visitors to park once to mitigate traffic congestion.

Supply

“Five months into production after the orders [for the buses] were placed [in early 2022], the manufacturer basically announced they’re no longer making the product,” Weber said. “We’re using federal dollars as part of this procurement, which requires that these vehicles adhere to federal guidelines … Meanwhile, the Trump administration lifted the ‘Buy America’ waivers which meant that manufacturers in a number of different industries, including the bus industry, had to then retool, because there were waivers in place that allowed them to use certain components that were not ‘Buy America’ … So there was nothing on the market that would meet Altoona [testing] standards.”

As a result of the delay, Weber said, the city changed its order from the planned 10-passenger Dodge Ram Promaster 3500 van to the 14-passenger New England Wheels Frontrunner model, “a purpose-built, light duty transit vehicle,” built on the same chassis, at a cost increase of “approximately $50,000” per vehicle over the $110,000 initial estimate for each van.

Residents have questioned why the city did not buy existing passenger vans to start the service.

“We had federal money involved,” Weber said. “The feds basically bought two of our five vehicles,” which would not have been possible had the city purchased used vehicles. “Yeah, we could have gone to the Ford dealership and bought four or five vans and thrown them out there, non-ADA compliant, which again, that’s a problem. These are fully ADA-compliant. They can take two wheelchairs.”

Weber described the call for ADA accommodations on the city’s existing shuttles as “very minimal.”

“If we want to continue to pursue federal funding, we can’t just take a whole portion of our fleet and say this won’t be ADAcompliant, even if there’s not a huge demand for that service,” Deputy City Manager Andy Dickey said.

Weber agreed that the priority of meeting the federal standard for the grant overrode the need to get a service up and running as soon as possible.

“I understand the community’s disappointment that we didn’t launch sooner,” Weber said. “I think we’re doing the right thing by launching it the correct way the first time.”

Demand

Planned fares for the microtranist service will remain at $2 each way or $1 discounted fares for seniors, the disabled, veterans with ID and Medicare and Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System card holders. Per direction from the City Council, the proposal to offer free rides to trailheads has not been pursued. Weber is currently projecting an average of 150 trip requests per day.

“We did several simulations with a microtransit software provider,” Weber said of how that estimate was derived. “The problem that Sedona had is we didn’t have any transit data because we don’t have a transit system, so it was a bit of a challenge to do the simulations … so we’re going to look at anything from 50 trips a day to 300 a day … So we went right in the middle … We just didn’t throw a dart at the dart board — maybe we did, a little bit.”

Weber stated that the operating expenses for the first year of microtransit are estimated at $1.1 million, 34% of which will be paid for by federal grants.

The city’s 2018 transit implementation plan estimated that the cost per passenger trip for a fixed-route passenger service would be $2.31, while the same cost for a demand-response microtransit service would be $11.20 At 150 trips per day, four days per week, or 208 days a year, the cost per trip would average $35.26.

“When that plan was written, the technology that’s driving microtransit was in its infancy,” Weber said. “These microtransit algorithms are using a whole different technology. It’s basically an automatic dispatching system … requiring very little human interaction. This approach has proven to be far more economic and far more efficient.”

As part of this digital technology-heavy approach to transit, individuals wishing to ride will have to download two deep-linked mobile apps in order to book. Reservations can be made up to 14 days in advance. However, Weber said, “we fully recognize that there are folks that aren’t going to leverage that technology, so we will have a dispatch office with a live reservation so they can call and talk to a human.”

He described getting older residents or those who simply don’t like smartphones to use the system as a “huge challenge,” but added that there would be “a lot of cost” involved in developing brochures and schedules for a fixed-route service.

Each bus carries eight cameras both inside and outside the vehicle.

“We’ll see through heat maps where people are getting off, when they’re getting off, time of day, day of week,” Weber said. He clarified that the microtransit service zone will not offer curbside service in congested areas like Uptown and Hillside Sedona, but will stop at two fixed stops, one at Jordan and Mesquite and the other at Tlaquepaque.

“One is affordability, and frankly the other one is safety,” Weber said when asked why it was considered more beneficial to residents for the city to build its own transit service rather than expanding its contribution to the Verde Shuttle network or contracting with an existing shuttle provider. “A $2 fare can get you anywhere in the city.”

Given that the Verde Shuttle charges a $1 fare for rides on a fixed route within Sedona, while a five-mile trip in a car getting 20 miles per gallon would cost less than $1, what other factors does Weber expect to drive residents to choose microtransit?

“I think one is, they can’t drive,” Weber said, referring to elderly and disabled individuals. “Two is parking … You can create incentives for folks to park once.” He is planning a hotel marketing campaign “through the concierge, through the lodging council, hit the lodges, the businesses, to really upsell the service … There’s videos going to be running in the hotel room, concierge saying, ‘Hey, look you really don’t want to go park in Uptown, it’s a nightmare, just call these guys.’”

“As for residents, they’re going to have to make that choice … they don’t go to Uptown,” Weber said. “This might give them a new freedom … more convenience. That’s what we’re trying to sell.”

Connectivity

“I think Aspen [Colo.,] would be like a model to go after,” Weber said of his vision of the ideal transit system for a Sedona-sized city. “They have this beautiful shared use path system, park once, here are your options … bikes, ped, e-skates, scooters, whatever, and then transit.”

Dickey said that the city has no current plans to facilitate micromobility replacement of cars by introducing a bike-sharing system.

“We intend to work with vendors that might want to provide that service, but the city doesn’t intend to provide that service,” Dickey said. “It may be a permitted thing, for instance.”

According to the city’s latest tourism study, the results of which were presented to the City Council on Aug. 14, only 0.8% of trips in Sedona are made by bicycle.

“The whole transit implementation plan really calls for service on a regional level,” Weber said of the long-term possibilities for Sedona transit expansion. “The vision would be you board a bus in downtown Sedona, which takes you out to the VOC, where you connect with Yavapai-Apache Transit, who is interested in providing services to the VOC and potentially into Sedona … [the] Yavapai-Apache Nation is already connected now to Prescott.”