Transit performance evaluation in the U.S.A.

Performance of transit agencies in the United States improved during the 1980s. At the beginning of the decade, Americans had become disenchanted with transit; legislation was passed that required agencies to report performance and accept regular audits. Theory underlying these policies is examined in four components: dimensions for policy objectives, indicators, information systems and incentives. Three programs are examined: federal triennial reviews that monitor compliance with planning and grant requirements, California performance audits that analyze goals and track performance on five indicators and the Los Angeles program that encourages improvement by offering incentive payments for better-than-average performance. The California audits have been the most successful.     

The S.K. people mover

The S.K. people mover has presently been operated for more than six years during each exhibition at Paris - Nord exhibition lot at Villepinte. During two major exhibitions - EXPO'86 at Vancouver, Canada and YEs'90 at Yokohama, Japan - it was operated twelve hours daily during six months in each case with very short night maintenance shifts. The small cable-driven cars carried ten million people quite trouble-free with an availability better than 99.5%. After those installations on exhibition or entertainment sites, a new S.K. system is under construction in Marne-la-Vallée (near Paris, France) to link a newly-built urban development area and a regional railroad station. A S.K. is also to be installed in Roissy-Charles de Gaulle Airport. Other projects are being studied too. Presently entering a new class of systems, the S.K. people mover features a number of newly-designed components intended to further improve comfort and reliability.