How Cincinnati Metro Turned Crisis into Comeback with Steve Anderson, Sr. Director of Development and Innovation (Replay)

Stop Requested. Welcome to Stop Requested, the podcast where we discuss everything transit. I’m your co-host, Levi McCollum, director of operations at ETA Transit. And I’m your co-host, Christian Londono, senior customer success manager at ETA Transit.

Welcome back to Stop Requested. Christian, how are you doing today? Doing well, Levi. How about yourself? I’m doing very well. And, uh, again, we have another excellent guest with us, someone who is near and dear to both of us, having spent time at Palm Tran, the three of us. We’ve got Steve Anderson, senior director of transit development and innovation at SORTA in Cincinnati, Ohio. Steve, how are you doing today? Oh, I’m doing great. Thanks for having me.

Yeah, great to hear. Glad to have you here. This is a real pleasure. It, it’s really, truly an honor. Uh, you know, Steve is, is a, quite an accomplished professional in the transit industry. He’s worked, uh, at, you know, different transit properties, different modes. Uh, so very excited to, you know, hear about his experience. And I hope our listeners, uh, really pay attention to some of the things he’s gonna have to, uh, he’s gonna be sharing with us today. So, to get started, how about we learn a, a little bit about your transit, uh, career,

Steve. So if you could share a little bit of your career path. How you got into transit and the different roles you had, uh, as part of your career and, you know, how those experiences led you to where you are today, uh, you know, being, uh, the executive level at a, you know, one of the largest transit agencies, uh, in the country and in, in Ohio.

Thanks, Christian. I, I appreciate that. You know, we all have a different journey to transit. Um, mine really started when I was a little kid. I used to draw these… You know, we would go on road trips and I would have my spiral notebook and, uh, I would draw, like, telephone poles.

Like, you know, something so kinda ubiquitous. Um, but then that started kind of turning into me making fake maps of places that didn’t exist. You know, by, by the time I was in sixth grade, I was playing SimCity, SimCity 1, SimCity 2. Um, but then by the time I got to college, I, I really, you know, I didn’t have the strongest, you know, math background. So I said, “You know what? I’ll be a lawyer. That sounds good. I’ll get a history degree.”

By the time I graduated from University of Florida, shout out, Go Gators, in ’03, I, I still didn’t really know what I was going to be. I didn’t really want to go to law school. I didn’t really wanna be a lawyer. And so, um, a gal I was dating at that time was in architecture. So she told me about this thing called the

Planning School, and it was, uh, on the very top floor at, at the UF Architecture wing. Very small floor. So I started, started going to Planning School as a grad degree and got into GIS, that’s geographical information systems. Started learning how to make maps on computers. This was like Arc,

Arc 3. And, you know, I got an internship as part of, you know, just a small network of planning back then and started, officially started my career at Tyndall Oliver & Associates, um, which was based out of Tampa at that time. That was about ’06, ’07. I did another internship with the St.

Johns River Water Management District. It was really GIS that led me to my first job at Tri-Rail, South Florida Regional Transportation Authority, which is located in Broward

County, Florida. So, I picked up my things from Gainesville, went there and basically started working on the GIS projects, you know, with the rail corridor and some shuttle bus services, learning more about operations and planning. Um, time went by, I started getting more familiar, started networking and kind of realized, well, buses are probably more of a growth mode. It takes a long time to put new train tracks down.

So I headed north, uh, to the next county, Palm Beach County, Palm Tran, where I met you. Um, Palm Beach has so much awesome going for it. Learned a lot in my time there. Climbed the ranks in six years. Then in 2021, uh, I followed one of my mentors, uh, to Cincinnati, where I’m now the senior director of development and innovation, all planning and scheduling go through me. But it’s a lot more than that. Uh, Cincinnati, we, we’ve kind of entered a renaissance, a golden age in transit after being down bad for a long time. Um, thank you, levy money. But- Mm-hmm. … yeah, this is exciting and, uh, it’s always great to talk with old friends. I, I consider both of y’all friends.

Absolutely. This is gonna be such a good conversation and I’m just really glad to, to, to hear some of the, the stories that, you know, I, I didn’t know. Like, for example, I, I didn’t recall that you had a history background and that… The interesting thing that you mentioned there too is that you drew cities on a, a spiral notebook. We’ve been hearing that a lot lately. In, in fact, we, we heard that from Jacob Lubica, uh, the planning manager at PSTA, that he was a, a really big fan of just drawing cities, drawing these imaginary cities. So, uh, it sounds like that there’s a, a lot in common with, uh, some of the folks who are at the top levels of transit agencies around the country. Um, so you’ve been at- And, and, and they’re also part of the, the planning area, right? that, that’s very common with the transit planners.

Exactly. Exactly. Thanks, Christian. So Steve, you’ve been at SORTA now for over four years, if my math is right. Uh, can you give me, uh, you know, an overview of, you know, what’s happening at SORTA? What was it like when you started versus what’s going on now? I know you said that you’re entering in this sort of renaissance. Uh, you’ve got the street car there. Can you, can you give us a, just a… What’s a day in the life like in Cincinnati right now?

Sure. So, SORTA is the, kind of like the official name. Uh, the locals here kind of refer to it as Cincinnati Metro.Um, it’s a mid-size agency in a mid-size city. Cincinnati’s a very old place, you know, they’ve had street cars, you know, since the 1800s. Very hilly. Topog- topography is very different than South Florida or, or most places. It’s probably more reminiscent of like a, a San Francisco, Pittsburgh is pretty similar. Mm-hmm. Um, but we’re a mid-size agency. We have about 300 buses, uh, 50 paratransit vehicles. Um, we run, uh, two, about to be three

Mobility On Demand zones. Those are dubbed Metro now, um, those work just similar to a Uber. You know, you book, book your trip on the phone and within 15 minutes or so, a, a very nice van shows up. Um, we are on the cutting edge of a lot of the things that we talk about in the transit industry. But when I got there in 2021, we were still in COVID, we were still wearing face masks. We had still operated off Windows 98 when I got there. So it was an agency that needed an infusion of not only people talent, but of resources because for years and years and years, they had gotten kind of what I refer to as like a death spiral where, you know, they lose ridership, they raise fares, they cut service, they continue to lose ridership, they continue to, to raise fares and cut service, trying to make up the, the shortfalls, but doing so much damage to the end user.

So when in 2020, the great folks in Hamilton County, that’s the county Cincinnati, Ohio is located in, passed the levy or Issue

7, that replaced a city’s earning tax with a county-wide sales tax. Now, now we have to provide. So before we were primarily a city agency, most of the routes stopped at the city line, uh, the city limits. Now we have to reach out further into Hamilton County. Good thing I worked at a, at a regional rail agency, you know, 10 years before, ’cause I understand the concept of regionalism, you know. And what we try to just focus on is really making it all about the end user, the rider experience. We make data-driven decisions. So our big ticket project right now is bus rapid transit. Uh, that’s a 350 to $400 million project. It’s currently in project development. Um, we are watching very keenly the, the movements of the FTA. They’re going through a bit of transition and, uh, yeah, we’ll continue to work with them, but we’re hoping to cut the ribbon on BRT in 2028. We have a whole lot more going on at Metro, um, but I’ll pause there. So, it, it, you know, BRT is very exciting and I think that, uh, that was one of the, uh, modes of service or, or, you know, that, that’s kind of like the next level for bus service, right? Like, being

BRT, bus rapid transit, right? Bus rapid service and, and, you know, we, we talked about, uh, doing that for Palm Tran and, and doing that e- e- you know, e- e- for decreasing the travel time, which makes the transit more competitive and, and a lot of those choice riders are folks that maybe are driving today, then they’re like, “Wait a minute. I’m, I’m getting now stuck in traffic and then the bus is going and it’s getting faster to places, maybe I should be on that bus.” Um, but then sometimes you have a, you know, a good strong BRT with all the different, uh, infrastructure for, you know, a, a proper BRT and then you have BRT Lite where you only have BRT in some portions of the route and, you know, sometimes you have traffic se- uh, prioritization, sometimes you don’t have that.

Uh, could you tell us a little bit more of what’s the vision for this corridor, how long it is, what infrastructure you guys are adding and kind of like putting all those pieces to make it a, a successful BRT project?

Gladly, Christian, great questions. Um, so, you know, you mentioned BRT versus BRT Lite. Um,

Cincinnati is a old city. Um, the roads are not straight, but they are narrow. So we have a, some to- to- topographical… Eventually I’m gonna get that word right. We have some challenges, especially in some of our older neighborhoods on right of way, right? So you have other cities, you know, Indianapolis, uh, Columbus, some of our Midwest peers, they have much w- wider right of ways. So our challenge and we’re, we’re working with our city partners with that, is to make sure we don’t sacrifice too much speed because ideally, we want something that is at least 25%, 35% faster than regular bus service because truly time is gold in our industry. The time, we all have time, how long does it take to get to point A to point B? If you’re not competitive with the automobile, you’re really gonna struggle to get, you know, riders across the spectrum. So we’re looking at something that’s gonna go at least 25% faster than regular bus service. Um, but in o- other areas it’ll operate, you know, with dedicated laneage. We have BAT lanes, business access transit lanes for some of it. And, and in other parts of the corridors it will behave in mixed traffic. To help mitigate that though, uh, you know, we are looking at doing transit signal priority, queue jumping in some of our more congested neighborhood areas because geographically when you look at Cincinnati, um, it’s a, it’s a downtown that is, you know, in a basin. You have a river to the south.

You go up the hill and then you have kind of these, these valleys and hills. Of all these towns that were individual towns, um, until the turn of the 19th or 20th century, we’ve annexed some of them and some of them have remained independent. But everyone is very fond of their neighborhood business district. You know, we still have these small areas with shops, stores and, and not a lot of parking and not a lot of right of way. So our challenge will be to continue to prioritize the speed and, and the end travel time for the user while still respecting our neighborhood business districts, making sure that businesses are not suffering unduly with construction or a lack of access to parking, knowing that eventually with the great thing about BRT is you can always improve it.

So I, I think our plan is really, let’s just get it in the ground and over time we can make tweaks to it. And so we’ve seen that in some of the cities that we visited as part of our planning process. We’ve, we’ve been to Austin, we’ve been to Eugene, Oregon, Seattle, Richmond, Virginia. They have BRT systems that we borrow just a little bit from.Um, other than that, uh, the vehicles are gonna be 60-foot articulated. We’re gonna have doors on both sides, ’cause we’ll have stations on both sides, um, bike parking, um, off-bare- off-fare board payment, the works. Um, hopefully these will be some form of green fuel, whether it’s electric or diesel hybrid, um, but again, we’re watching the feds for guidance on that issue.

So, I think that’s, that’s BRT in a nutshell. We’re dubbing it Metro Rapid. Nice. That, that’s a cool name for it too. And do you think… Well, that’s a separate question in terms of rebranding. You, you mentioned you were more known as

Cincinnati Metro, uh, not really a sorta, but i- i- you know, in terms of the amenities, you mentioned, uh, right-of-way constraints, and when it comes to amenities in stations, that’s what sometimes could be very frustrating, because you’re just not able to set up the infrastructure, um, but it… You know, with the shelters and the structures, eh, are you just picking up something off the shelf, or are you getting a little creative with the design? Oh, that’s, that, that’s such a good question. Um, yeah, Cincinnati prides itself on its…

You know, I told you, we’re old. We have a very long and established architectural history. So the Roebling Bridge, that’s one of our icons. Um, any time, you know, there’s a Bengals game or, or they’re doing anything in

Cincinnati, they make sure to get a shot of that. It’s basically a smaller, older version of the Brooklyn Bridge. Um, I told you I was, uh, a history major, so this is a good city for me to Right.

It’s basically a little older, but is, is basically the Brooklyn Bridge. It’s built in, like, the 1840s or 1850s. So, our stations will pay homage to that bridge, because it’s so i- i- iconic here. Um, but no, no off-the-shelf. Um, we have a team of architects. You know my boss. Khaled’s an architect.

We have a team, uh, developing these stations to pay homage. They’re not gonna be slender, off-the-shelf structures at all. You know, we get all the seasons and then some here in Cincinnati. You know, the temperatures can change 30, 40 degrees in a day. Uh, so we wanna- Right. … make sure our folks feel comfortable, that it, it looks good, that we’re incorporating, uh, some of the neighborhood district branding as well. We want the stations to look similar, but not identical. In addition, in some of those neighborhood business districts, the conversations we’ve been having with the private sector is, “We really love BRT. We understand that it’s going to bring not only, uh, customers, but employees to our places, but can the station just be a little smaller?” So, we’re, we’re probably going off three or four, uh, design types and, and, and make sure they’re scalable for areas where we don’t have a lot of right-of-way and areas we do.

Yeah. That, that, that’s very clever, and, you know, I… It just reminds me, as some of the challenges, uh, we had at Palm Tran, and, and we talked about, you know, having only one shelter design and a contract and, um, trying to make it work for every single location. It, it was just not doable. And, uh, when we put the contract together… And actually now they’re, they’re… I know they’re, um, actually working on putting shelters up, and awarded a contract and everything. One of the things that we made sure was on it was to have different sizes, to have a small, medium, and large, uh, type of design to give the flexibility, uh, to accommodate different types of right-of-way, and also to add an element of, um, customization to work with those municipalities. Like you said, it’s just make it theirs. It’s in their communities, in their cities, in their, you know, neighborhood, and then, you know, work with them so it’s theirs. It’s not the transit agency shelter, but it’s the community’s infrastructure. And it reminds me, also, of the, uh, the shelter for the, uh, Ball Park of the Palm Beaches in Palm Beach County. So, I think, though- Okay. … it was maybe the first ever, uh, you know, custom shelter that Palm Tran put out there. And, you know, Steve, uh, was pretty much the one that led the design. And, and every time that I drive by it, it, you know, it still looks like a million dollars, man. I tell you, it still looks like when it first, uh, got installed. So that, that’s legacy right there, but if, uh, uh, you know, Cincinnati Metro’s, eh, infrastructure is gonna be anything similar like that, i- i- it’s gonna look phenomenal.

It’s gonna… It’s definitely gonna meet, if not exceed, that. Um, the, the thing about the bus stop, I love bus stops. You know, you work in a transit agency long enough, people can sometimes vary between ambivalence or excitement, but that’s really where it all starts. That’s the first, you know, interaction point folks have with your system, and it, it tells you a lot about how it’s gonna be.

So, whether it’s at Palm Tran or even Tri-Rail was looking at doing bus stops for the shuttles, we always have to prioritize our bus stops. And to that end, we have a very innovative partnership going on right now with the University of Cincinnati’s Design

Architecture Art Planning School, that we’re actually gonna completely redo all 4,000 of our regular bus stops. Wow. That’s a project that I’m P… project managing, um, and it’s federally funded, so there’s a lot of moving parts there. But the- these bus stops are going to look like nothing that exists in the country, and folks will be coming, uh, to our city and admiring these bus stops, and we’ll probably get to do a few conferences just talking about the design and the installation. So, that’ll be in the next year or so. I can’t wait to get that project started. All that to say that the bus stop was a community design and that you’re absolutely right, Christian, that you have to incorporate the folks that, uh, live in there and using it every day in your bus stop design.

Yeah, couldn’t agree more there, Steve. Uh, you know, we’ve often talked on this podcast and, y- you know, outside of the show about how the bus stop is the gateway to the transit system. Um, i- it’s the arches, so to speak, you know. It, it gives you that sense of community if it’s done right…. it a- l- gives you access to that opportunity, to borrow a phrase from, you know, Mr. Clinton Forbes. Uh, the, the bus stop really i- is critically important and often overlooked. Uh, so it’s good to hear that you all are taking that step to not only just build bus stops or build, you know, nice bus shelters, but to go above and beyond. I’m really looking forward to hearing w- what you all come up with. And m- maybe I’ll be able to attend some of those conferences and hear you speak about it. We’ll fly you first class to Cincinnati, Levi. Whoo, man. You let Christian come, too. We’re very, we’re very ex-

Excellent, sounds good. I, I will take you up on that. So you mentioned- I will take Coach. So, Steve, you mentioned, I think, several i- innovative projects that you’re working on. Um, and I know that’s part of your title, uh, Senior Director of

Transit Development and Innovation. Uh, you know, what does innovation mean to you at SORTA? How do you, how do you take that as a title and then turn that into action? Yeah, great question, Levi. And, and to be honest, when

I joined here, I asked Khaled Sharmout, who Christian got to work with briefly at Palm Tran, um, agency or agency after agency he has led innovation, like, “What, what’s up with that title?” Right? Um, why wouldn’t it just be the Senior Director of, you know, Development, Planning, and Scheduling or something like that? And basically, the answer was, we always need to keep innovating. So when you ask me what innovation means to me, uh, when

I got to Cincinnati, we hadn’t, we still didn’t have Outlook. We were using Windows 98. So is that innovation, just catching up with the times? And there was some of that in the early years. But really, innovation means, you know, what are you able to do to stay ahead of the curve? ‘Cause

I don’t know if you guys have looked around, uh, some of the larger transit agencies. Transit is, is under some pressure right now. We have some agencies that are looking at huge, you know, financial cliffs, some of the larger agencies that relied a whole lot on, you know, passenger fares. Now, Metro, we don’t run heavy rail, we don’t run commuter rail, but we need to be able to leverage the money and resources that we do have into staying ahead of the curve. So innovation here at Metro is really, you know, example. So, okay, we have a scheduling software that we’re working with now. Well, we know we’re gonna continue to have labor challenges based on the economics.

What other opportunities are out there in the scheduling realm? Is there any other software out there that could maybe make our run cuts more efficient or maybe, you know, their algorithms are more powerful that we’re allowed or able to put out more service on the street with fewer operators? Or, for example, a, a company we worked with, uh, a couple months ago, we wanna reward our riders for riding. Is there any software solution that will integrate into our current ITS, our EasyFare fare payment via the Transit app? Can we reward the riders and incentivize, almost gamify riding transit? So, we’re the first agency in Ohio to work with this company called Velotia. I gotta shout them out. Um, they are Canadian-based, but basically, you can ride transit in your app. The app records these rides and rewards you. So, you know, you get a $5 off a

Starbucks or a $5 off a Redd Bike, which is our bike share here in Cincinnati. So those are the kind of things that we want to not only… We wanna hear more from our riders, we wanna put more service out there, but we know that we, we’re under pressure. We’ve got some financial challenges, the job market. So what are we doing to squeeze every little bit of juice out of that stone? And so, even when we look at people development, let’s innovate. Okay, we have planners and schedulers, but we know that big data, AI, these things are coming. We can’t put our head in the sand. How do we turn our planners and schedulers into more data science? We have all this data we record, you know. You guys know AVL, you’re an AVL business. Data, data, data, data, data. But how are we processing it? Do we have the ability to monitor things and flag things that are impacting our customers while we sleep? So that, that’s the kind of area we’re trying to get to in terms of innovation, really getting ahead of the curve. Um, and I have to plug Khaled’s book. If you all have not seen this book, I definitely recommend you go out and get it. It’s written by Khaled Sharmout.

It’s called The Implosion of Public Transit and the Case for the Infinite Game. I have a copy. I’m pretty sure either Christian or Levi may have access to a copy. But we’re really kind of… And I’ve been indoctrinated. I’m, I’m, I’m not gonna front on you. But I really do buy, I really do buy into that we have some pressure on us in transit.

Um, you know, driverless vehicles, all these things are coming. So how do we continue to have a seat at the table and really drive the change rather than just reacting to it? So that was a very long-winded, um, definition of innovation, um, but I found value in, in laying out that approach. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense and appreciate that perspective. Um, I, I don’t think it was long-winded at all. I think it was thorough and that’s, that’s what we need, right? We, we need to be thorough. We need to show that there’s a strategic approach to the planning process that is not just fly by the seat of your pants and throw some service out there and just hope for the best. Right? You, you touched on it. It, it is about data. Um, so glad to hear that you all are taking that approach regarding hiring, regarding, uh, you know, what type of talent you’re looking for, uh, whe- whenever you’re, you’re getting new planners or data analysts on. Uh-It sounds just super exciting, and I’m, you know, always following sort of in the news, because

I want to see what you all are doing. I think you’re setting examples that other agencies should try to follow, or, you know, at least glean something from and go back to their own transit agency and apply.

Thank you. And, and, you know, if I might, uh, I may chime in here, you know, I was reflecting on, on what you were expressing in terms of why innovation in the title, right? And then referring to catching up, uh, you know, with no innovation, catching up is not innovating.

It might be innovative for the agency itself because they haven’t seen it, but really in the industry, and, and when you look at the, uh, you know, perspective overall, y- you’re not really innovative. You’re just trying to play catch up and then you’re also playing safe. You know, when, when you’re innovative, in- innovating, you’re taking some risk. And of course, you’re, you know, trying to be data-driven and, you know, to do your due diligence to ensure the success of a project. But you take more risk because you’re, you’re delving into the unknown, maybe you’re implementing newer technology. Uh, when you’re catching up, you’re just copying and pasting. You’re, you’re really just doing what is being done, and, and there’s s- several examples and recommendations and, and even a step-by-step guide on how to do things that everybody else have done. And I was,

I was thinking, some agencies, and, and even any of our organizations that we’re part of, there’s a piece where you first have to play catch up because, you know, you cannot jump from zero to, like, innovative right off the bat. I think that you at least have to catch up, uh, and get, you know, the low-hanging fruit. But then those that are innovating, that says a lot, because when you’re innovating, it, it means that you’re already caught up, that you’re looking at how you could be better than anybody else, and then set up the example. I mean, you know, I heard you saying our bus stops are gonna drive people from motor, uh, transit systems in other places in the country, and they’re gonna come in and, and look at them and say, “Wow, yeah, this, this is the latest and greatest, and I, and I wanna catch up and play catch up.” So, uh, I think that… I really like the way, uh, you explained why innovation is so important for Cincinnati and for you, and that you guys are driving innovation. You know, Levi and I, we work in the, uh, technology sector and providing technology to transit agencies, and that’s constantly in our minds, like, how can we help, uh, provide technology that is gonna help agencies streamline their operations? And ultimately, everything is about the riders, right? And, and technology, a lot of times, have that capability of, uh, touching the riders’ lives and enhancing it and, and enhance the riders’ experience. Um, so thank you for sharing that. And, you know, on that note of what’s coming for, uh, Cincinnati Metro and the future of, of public transit in Cincinnati, in the next five, 10 years, w- what’s your vision? What will be, you know, some kind of like main goals that, that you would want to come to fruition? see

Well, thank you, Christian. Uh, I mean, first front of mind is, is getting the bus rapid transit, uh, done, and I, I, I failed to mention that it’s 400 million because we’re actually doing two corridors at the same time ’cause we’re, we’re Cincinnati. We don’t make sense, we, we make bus routes. Um, but we’re, we’re gonna lift, lift up the next two corridors. Hopefully the overall plan, uh, will call for four corridors. Um, again, we don’t have the money for the four corridors. We have the money for the two right now. But we’re definitely, uh, pressed for doing that. Um, we’ve gotta figure out AV, um, automated vehicles, how it works, how we maybe use it for low density suburbs. We have plenty of those in our metro area, um, but we don’t have plenty of bus drivers. Um, you know, the recruitment, uh, game of bus drivers is, is something that’s always gonna be front of mind because, you know, the competition is even different now than it was even 10 years ago. You didn’t have DoorDash, uh, you didn’t have Amazon Prime and what have you. I’d say in the next 10 years, uh, look for us to introduce more regional service, certainly. Um, we know that folks commute a long way. They commuted a long way in South Florida, they commute a long way in Southwest Ohio. Um, we need bus service over the road, coaches or whatever it may be, that gets folks from our other adjacent counties into downtown Cincinnati. Um, we’re gonna continue to work with our university partners. One of our huge opportunities, which I’m really excited about is developing some type of tuition-based bus pass for the students. I mean, University of Cincinnati, you may not know it, uh, they keep switching divisions in sports, but there are 50,000 enrolled with another 10,000 on the way. And as we’re pretty landlocked and dense city, we cannot continue to build parking garages and build our way out of congestion. We used to say that all the time in Florida. So, these folks need to be able to move around, uh, their, their school and further areas from employment, um, on our buses.

And so we think the easiest way is if, if university and metro just partner with, you know, a… basically a university pass. They do it at other schools. Ohio State, to be exact. Uh, University of Florida did it.

Again, other schools are doing it. But, you know, look, we wanna get to 20 million riders by 2030. We’re at about 14. We’ve got a long ways to go. Certainly that’s, that’s one big way to do it. And so now I’ve taken you out to about 2036. By that time, by 2036, it’s, it’s crazy to just even say it as a year. Um, by then, you know,

I wanna see us putting Amazon packages on the bus ride for transit lines. Like, is there a way to use deliv-… Is there a way to use this lane for more than just moving passengers? Can we move freight on it?Um, nothing, nothing is outside the, the realm of contemplation. Um, we’re really excited though. Uh, we are saying goodbye to our CEO. He’s retiring, he just had a retirement party last night. Um, we’re gonna name a

CEO soon. Um, so yeah, we’re just looking to, to do it bigger and better. Um, we recently overtook Columbus as the second-largest transit agency in the state. Uh, we’re a little competitive in Cincinnati. We want to, uh, catch

Cleveland eventually. So, that what I’d say with my 10-year outlook. Again, I’m probably forgetting things that are, are front of mind, but that’s, that’s top of mind. You know, I, I like the correlation between the ridership goal and, uh, the projects that are, that are being put in place and, and the, uh, you know, expansion of services. Right? Sometimes i- it’s interesting how some transit agencies are expected to have more riders, but then there’s no projects. There’s, it’s pretty much running the same service and it’s like, well, you know, just try to get people on transit. And it’s like, yeah, yeah, it, it, there has to be specific projects and activities that, that would correlate with that goal. And I’m pretty sure, you know, based on what you’re describing, that you’re gonna, uh, be very close to that goal, if not exceed it. Uh, you know, every time that you mention Khaled Shamoun, uh, in my mind I’m thinking, “You’re exceeding that goal for sure.” And I do have his book. I actually have, uh, a autograph and everything, and have a picture with him to prove it. So

I’m also, uh, indoctrinated and, you know- … I, I, I think that that’s a great book for, uh, people in transit, uh, specifically transit planners to kind of like understand how this, uh, you know, industry works.

Um, you know, one last thing I wanted to ask you is, uh, if you could give us and, and our listeners a piece of advice for those, uh, aspiring transit professionals, maybe just starting their transit career and, you know, any advice you could give them on how to make the most out of this beautiful, um, you know, industry. Yeah. I mean, Christian and Levi, we’re blessed to be able to literally play with buses and trains and, and make a living and put food on the table. Um, the, the drivers, the operators, the, the maintenance, those folks do the hard work. But giving advice to folks that are, are coming up behind us, I, is, is so important, um, and all of this was learned the hard way.

So I’ll share something with you. I was not that great of an intern. And as a planner one at Tri-Rail, I was, I was not exemplary. Um, so I learned, through trial and error that, you know what? You can go sit in that cubicle, but no one is just gonna hand you work if you’re not putting the effort and the work ethic on the projects that you do have. I mean, no one’s gonna give you more work if you’re not completing and communicating updates to your, uh, supervisors. So, one of the big takeaways I have is, you know, for the, for, for the younger planners or folks that are new, make yourself indispensable. Um, that, that can be, you know, a number of ways you can do that. Um, always speak up in staff meetings, and if you’re not getting the work that you feel like you need, you need to be able to stay busy, make your own work up. Get approvals from, from your supervisors. Tell them, “Is it okay if I work on this?” It is so important to keep your supervisors and your leaders in the loop. That way they can, you know, defend you sometimes if you, if you, uh, run across another department that’s not sure. I would say another thing that I learned, and this is from the late great Clinton Forbes, bless his soul, is anticipate, execute, follow-up. A-E-F. It’s on my board right now in Cincinnati. I learned a lot from

Clinton. Um, that sticks out the most, and I know you guys can feel me on that. Um, the third thing, you know, you don’t need a title to have influence. A lot of our, our leaders can be thought leaders. Don’t necessarily fall into the, what Khaled calls the curse of the titles. ‘Cause it’s really about, you know, influence comes a whole lot of different ways. Transit’s very small industry. Everyone knows everyone else. Do not burn bridges. Um, and all of this is to say that you, you do need to have the underpin- in- underpinnings of, uh, technical skills. You need to develop your technical skills. You need to be able to speak in public, and you need to be able to write technically. It’s becoming a lost art form, folks that are reading and writing. We’re all advisors. We all make recommendations. Um, having great PowerPoint skills won’t, won’t hurt either. Dress for the job you want. Um,

I, I know you know this, Christian. Mm-hmm. You’re one of the best, best-dressed chaps in all the land. You dress for the job you want, because what, what that kind of does, it signifies to other folks. And, you know, it’s, it’s visual, you know, it’s psychological, but it, you really do play better when you look good. And when you look good, they pay good. Now, that’s not me. That’s Deion

Sanders. Another thing- Mm-hmm. … I would say that I learned from, uh, one of our former bosses, you don’t need money to plan, but you need to plan to have money.

Planning doesn’t cost anything, but you doggone better sure have a plan when you do get resources. Um, other than that, you know, emotional intelligence is very important. Self-awareness. I continue to work and train on this. Um, people really don’t all the way care what you know or how many degrees you have. They will always remember how you made them feel. And, uh, I can even speak to this from my Palm Tran time, as a younger manager, as a younger leader, I still had a long way to go in terms of how you made people feel. I was not perfect in that regard at all. Um, but I’m learning, and I’m continuing to grow. And guys, let’s just show love. You know, let’s give each other grace. Um, it’s a stressful time right now for a variety of reasons. Communication is always key. You know, it’s always better in person, but if you can’t be in person, a phone is definitely better than an email. I understand we’re all busy. If you can’t get to the email, then the text is, is good depending on how your leadership style is. But, um, that, that’s like six right there. So those are things that I’ve picked up along the way.

Uh, Steve, that’s really incredible advice, and I’m just, I’m waiting for your book. When is that coming out? Yes. Give it to our listeners

– … about the future book you’re writing. Uh, because that, that . really just packed a whole lot into a, a short amount of time. I, I know that’s gonna be valuable for our listeners. And I also want to give them an opportunity to connect with you. So, how would our listeners, you know, learn more about SORTA, about, you know, Cincinnati Metro and the, the services that you’re putting out?

If they want to go see these incredible bus shelters that you’re about to roll out or this nice BRT system that, that you’re implementing, how do they get in contact with you? Absolutely. I’m super, eh, I’m somewhat active. I’m not as active as you guys are on LinkedIn. Steve Anderson, um, Southwest Ohio Regional Transportation Authority. Our website’s really easy, it’s www.go-metro.com. We just redid our website. It looks great. We have a rebrand, um, and we’re loving Cincinnati.

So, uh, please come check us out. Excellent. Thank you, Steve. And thank you to our listeners again for joining into this conversation. This has been an excellent one, and we will see you next week.