april_2018

204 205 THE GREATER RICHMOND TRANSIT COMPANY beyond to make sure that we respond to the needs of the community that we serve, and that includes conducting extensive community en- gagement from back in 2015, all the way up until now.We held more than 15 public meetings in every city council district to make sure that we provided multiple, in-person opportunities to pro- vide feedback. And those meetings were very well attended; we had excellent press coverage to make sure that the word got out. So that was an important part of public engagement - to make sure that their voices were heard. “Now, we’re in the public education phase. When other cities implemented this type of drastic route re-design, they generally do about a five-to-six-month marketing campaign. And that’s what we’re doing, as well.We started with our rid- ers – the people who need to know most what’s going on.We have on-bus and in-bus advertise- ments.We updated our website to provide more information including easy-to-digest information at the top, so that, if people just want to get a quick overview of what is going on, they can scan through those bullet points to find out what is happening and how it will benefit them. In January, we started our broader media cam- paigns, including radio, television, newspaper - all the usual big ways that you broadcast to the broader public, and we also do some targeted advertising on social media – Google, Facebook, and Twitter. “We also have a lot of in-per- son assistants, called Travel Buddies. You can call customer service and schedule a free prac- tice session. A trained driver will come and pick you up at your bus stop, and will take you, turn by turn, on what your traffic pattern will be from Point A to Point B and then do the reverse. The next thing available is our outreach ambassadors.We’re calling them ‘Friends in the Field.’ They are out at busy bus stops to make sure we have coverage. People can just strike up a conversation with one of these ambassadors and get help. They’re not tied to any one bus or route, so if they start a conversation with a customer on one bus and that customer is connecting onto another, they can continue riding with that customer and continue the con- versation to make sure that they have all the resources that they need and the answers to their questions. “Lastly, we’re almost doubling our customer service department temporarily and extending its hours from 4:30 in the morning until 11:30 at night to answer