A majority of commuters who take the bus to their downtown Minneapolis jobs have yet to return to their desks, but when they do, Ben Rajkowski has a promise.
"You will be coming back to a better system that is stronger and more reliable," said Rajkowski, Metro Transit's manager of transit information.
He points to 36 new real-time double-sided digital signs that Metro Transit has put up over the past two months at bus stops along S. Marquette and 2nd avenues. The stops are served by express and limited-stop routes and starting this fall by the Orange Line, the new rapid bus line from downtown to Burnsville.
The sleek new displays are connected to fiber optic lines, which will allow information to flow from buses to Metro Transit's information systems and onto signs more quickly and with fewer interruptions. That will allow riders to see trip times that are more accurate, Rajkowski said.
The old digital signs, which were some of the first that Metro Transit deployed in the Twin Cities, were 10 years old and suffered because they relied on cellular connections to pass on information. When signals were disrupted, riders saw error messages or notices like "Times temporarily unavailable. Please see schedule."
That was happening way too often, Rajkowski said, and it frustrated riders. Unreliable signs were one of passengers' top complaints, he added.
To keep the new displays in working order and fix them swiftly when issues occur, Metro Transit this summer hired two technicians to maintain them.
The new digital LED displays will also tell riders when a stop is closed. But the signs can't show canceled trips. Trips not operating, however, will be removed from the listing of arrivals. Riders can subscribe to Metro Transit's alerts to get those notifications.
