Last year, Connect Transit in Bloomington-Normal, IL, set out to do the impossible. The planning team set a one-year deadline to plan, design, and deliver a completely new bus system. The goal? Undo 30 years of haphazard “squeaky wheel planning.”
Kyle Boehm, transit planner at Connect, was energized to launch a system that would support the needs of the community, but he also braced himself for the strong forces of public opinion involved in such a drastic and sudden redesign.
Remix gave the planning team the agility to settle on a system proposal quickly; however, despite a staggering 4x increase in frequency across most of the network, public attention fell mainly on the handful of service cuts that only affected 7% of rides.
Boehm’s presentation at this year’s Remix Conference outlines how Connect Transit dealt with these objections and achieved the impossible: actually launching the COA in one year.
“I don’t recommend it,” Boehm says. “But you’ll totally crush any procrastination habits you have.”
You can watch his presentation here:
