Transportation / Bremerton, Washington

“Probably about half our services are like [those in] the rest of the country”—conventional downtown buses that run on schedule—says Dick Hayes, executive director of Kitsap Transit, the principal transit provider for Kitsap County and the wider Bremerton region. The other half—vanpools, access buses for the elderly, and ferries—represent the core of the region’s transit infrastructure. According to the Center for Neighborhood Technology (CNT), more commuters use the Bremerton transit system than in any other small metropolitan region (with fewer than 250,000 people) in the nation. In 2010 ridership reached approximately 3.9 million.

Jump in the Vanpool

In the Bremerton region, vanpools are “almost the only decent transit solution for commuters,” Hayes says. Bremerton’s communities are largely “suburban, and what someone from New York City would call flat-out rural,” Hayes notes, adding that “a regular bus isn’t going to gather anybody, [so] everyone in this region has giant vanpool programs.” In stark contrast to more urban areas, where vanpool ridership continues to decline, Kitsap Transit fielded 99 vanpools and served 812 commuters in December 2010 alone.

A partnership with the Puget Sound Naval Shipyard, the region’s largest employer, boosts vanpool ridership still further. The Worker/Driver program allows the shipyard to use Kitsap buses like large vanpools, driven by a military employee who doubles as a security clearance officer.

“The Worker/Driver program is older than Kitsap Transit; it started during World War II to get workers to the shipyard,” Kitsap Transit Executive Assistant Cathie Knox-Browning explains. The program transports 1,750 civilian and military employees to work each day on 28 buses, and resolves transit and security concerns at the same time.

The Green Bus Project

Through a partnership with several regional transit providers and Western Washington University’s Vehicle Resources Institute, Kitsap Transit hopes to make reaching needy residents a lot easier—and a whole lot more fuel-efficient. With the help of the University’s student engineers, a prototype lightweight, hybrid/electric or full-electric paratransit van may debut in Bremerton.

“We have a real focus on access out here, because our elderly population is really distributed,” Hayes says. In the region’s more rural areas, however, the vans can struggle. Some driveways are so steep they require four-wheel drive. “You can’t use low-floor buses to access these areas,” Hayes notes, “and wheelchair lifts take a long, long time—five to seven minutes [with each lift].”

The so-called Green Buses would be incredibly lightweight and fuel-efficient, attaining 20 miles per gallon. “For a bus,” Hayes says, “that’s like heaven.” The vans will be able to seat 12 passengers, with room for two wheelchairs and one driver, and will be reconfigurable for up to six wheelchair spaces. Best of all, they should come with adjustable suspension, making it possible to roll wheelchairs on and off the bus no matter how rough the road.

The Ferry Connection

Kitsap Transit connects passengers to the Seattle-Bremerton and Seattle–Bainbridge Island commuter ferries, services of the Washington State Ferry System (WSF). The Seattle-Bremerton ferry served 1.8 million passengers in 2010 and the Seattle–Bainbridge Island served over 4 million—making them two of the most popular ferry routes in the state. Both see a fair amount of drive-on traffic, but an astonishing number of passengers don’t take their cars over the water: the Bremerton ferry transported only 656,000 cars in 2010, the Bainbridge Island ferry, 1.9 million. This is no surprise: ferries can only carry so many cars.

Furthermore, WSF remains sensitive to the Puget Sound’s fragile marine environment and pays special attention to ferry terminal locations; it also studies water quality around ferry wakes and makes sure all ferries have wildlife-friendly features like vibration-dampening engine attachments.

Fuel Efficiency

State legislation helps keep Washington transit providers focused on fuel efficiency and environmental stewardship. Between a Commute Trip Reduction Efficiency Act, an extensive Climate Change Policy Framework, and efforts to protect the Puget Sound, both Kitsap Transit and WSF must meet tough standards for emissions, runoff, and whale protection.

Vanpools don’t just make sense for Bremerton’s semirural communities—they’re also more fuel-efficient than conventional buses. Forty-foot buses burn far more fuel per mile than a passenger van.

Washington’s ferries burn approximately 17 million gallons of diesel fuel per year, and the particulate matter they emit is considered “the leading airborne health risk in the Puget Sound,” according to WSF. To address the problem, WSF has started to explore the possibility of running ferries on biodiesel. In initial trials, excessive amounts of fuel clogged ferry engines, but researchers hope that a combination of better filtration systems and better fuel blends will eventually reduce the ferry system’s diesel dependence. In the short term, WSF will implement a new drive-on vehicle reservation system. Making drivers reserve a spot, rather than showing up hours early in hopes of scoring one, should streamline traffic and reduce idling emissions around ferry terminals.