Complaints about Darts build up

The number of complaints filed against the city of Hamiltons’ para-transit service “Darts” — was being discussed at Friday’s Persons With Disabilities subcommittee meeting. The service has received more than 12-hundred complaints since the beginning of the year. That’s closing in on the total for all of last year.

Darts CEO says the quickest solution to many of the complaints is more service. But one passenger says the current model isn’t working.

Terri Wallis is on the advisory committee for Persons with Disabilities and a Darts user. She says changes are needed at Hamilton’s para-transit service: “You’re not sure how long it’s going to take to get to your destination, so you’re not sure what time you’re going to be there. And a lot of the time it’s hard to know when you should book when you’re getting picked up if you don’t know how long the event is going to last.”

At their call centre, Darts monitors the length of time each passenger has been on a bus through GPS. An hour is considered the longest acceptable time to be on board — Darts CEO Mark Mindorff says once a passenger is on for about 45 minutes, their ride is flagged: “Basically, we try to clear any further pickups on that run and we try to get the passenger order of drop-offs reorganized so that the person who has been on board a long time is actually next off the bus.”

Reports say more than 12-hundred complaints were filed against Darts in the first five months of this year. The total number for all of 2013 was 1,390.

Terri Wallis: “The complaints they get is a small portion because a lot of us don’t complain anymore. When you have a disability you have a lot of complaints and a lot of times those complaints fall on deaf ears so you stop complaining.”

In 2012, new legislation required Darts to expand eligibility to anyone unable to use regular transit. Mindorff says an increase in demand has created an increase in capacity complaints: “We have received more funding as we’ve tried to deal with more rides, but the rides are coming on faster than we can actually get service on the road.”

He says there is a solution to most of Darts problems: “Basically, just more service would be the quickest solution to a lot of the complaints.”

Recently Darts increased their number of vans from 26 to 34 to accommodate walk on passengers. He says ideally, they would also add more buses to their current fleet of over over 70: “But these are all costs to the taxpayers.”

He says they are working with the city on extending the service.

During the week, Darts schedules about 18-hundred to 2,000 passengers per day. They service all of Hamilton right to the outskirts of the city like Winona and Freelton. The non-profit service costs about $14 to $15 million to run annually.