FL MORRIS / FMORRIS@STARBULLETIN.COM
Passengers like those boarding the bus downtown yesterday will have to find other ways to travel if a strike takes place Tuesday.
Oahu braces
for bus strikeCommuters and city officials
consider replacement transit options
Bus rider Pat Jaehne can ride to work downtown with a relative from his home in Kaaawa.
But getting home on Tuesday may be a problem if there's a bus strike.
"I may be sleeping in the office," he said.
Jaehne said he will probably start asking around tomorrow about a ride home.
"I'll wait and see," Jaehne said. "Other people will be in the same situation."
As Tuesday's bus strike deadline approaches, commuters are weighing their options and city officials are scrambling to find alternate ways for people to get to work and school and to deal with increased traffic and parking problems if 1,300 bus workers walk off the job.
Today, Teamsters Local 996 bus workers were to begin making strike signs in anticipation of the walkout.
A last-ditch bargaining session is scheduled for tomorrow at 1:30 p.m., and at 10 a.m. the City Council will debate fare increases that will provide increased revenue for TheBus but may not be enough to pay for the salary increases workers are demanding.
Honolulu Mayor Jeremy Harris said yesterday whether a strike happens is in the hands of the City Council and the Teamsters union.
"I think it ought to be clear to everyone there's not going to be money for pay raises," Harris said. But he said his fare increase proposal will raise $6.8 million, enough to avoid service cutbacks and possible layoffs.
The council is revising its fare increase proposal over the weekend.
But Budget Chairwoman Ann Kobayashi said it's unfair for the mayor to put the burden of averting a strike on the City Council. She said the administration didn't properly budget for the bus.
"They're trying to have us raise bus fees on the backs of senior citizens, children and the disabled," Kobayashi said.
Harris said if the fare increases provide enough money to keep the same level of bus service, "it doesn't make any rational sense for the Teamsters to go out on strike."
FL MORRIS / FMORRIS@STARBULLETIN.COM
Riders climb aboard a bus at King and Punchbowl streets.
If the strike happens, it will come on the day after the University of Hawaii and several private schools begin classes.
The state's annual "Beat the School Jam" promotion is scheduled for tomorrow, when an estimated 46,000 students return to school.
State Department of Transportation spokesman Scott Ishikawa said commuters should leave 30 to 45 minutes earlier for work tomorrow and even earlier if there is a strike on Tuesday.
At Kahuku High School, Vice Principal Doug Semones says parents and students can still sign up for school bus services that are not affected by the strike. But he expects most students will catch a ride with friends or family members to get to the first day of classes on Tuesday.
According to the 2000 Census, 32,207 workers ages 16 and older ride the bus to work on Oahu, 60,009 carpool and 253,321 drive to work alone.
The city's efforts to alleviate the impact of a bus strike have focused on increasing the number of people who share rides.
City officials are setting up informal carpool sites at about a dozen locations around Oahu where drivers who have extra seats and bus riders who need rides into town can meet.
They are also organizing a free shuttle van service and taxicabs, which can pick up passengers along bus routes at $3 a ride.
Most of the city's efforts have focused on the peak commute times, when the bus carries about 22 percent of the people going to work or school.
Eudora Johnston, who catches the bus at least twice a day, said the city's alternative plans won't work for her and her children.
"We depend on the bus everyday. I gotta take my kids to school in Palolo, then go to work in town, then pick them up and get home again. We take the bus everywhere," she said.
"And I don't have other options 'cause I can't afford $3 taxi rides."
The city has also encouraged people to bike to work or to sign up for the state's vanpool and rideshare services.
Vanpool Hawaii is still taking calls from people who want to join a vanpool to get to work.
There are about a dozen vans that could be used for vanpools and spaces in existing vanpools still available, said Vicki Harris, executive director.
The agency is hoping to keep vanpool riders even if a strike does not happen or after the strike ends.
"We're hoping they like it so well that they keep doing it," Harris said.
Alvin Takeshita, who is in charge of the state's rideshare matching program, is taking his wife to work and his daughter to the University of Hawaii and then will pick up two co-workers in town to bring them to their office in Kapolei.
"We're doing our own internal ridesharing," he said.
State workers will be calling people who called last week if they have been able to match them up.
But people who call the office tomorrow may have trouble finding a match through the state office.
"It's cutting it close," said Ishikawa.
He noted that finding rides for people who work off hours or on weekends won't be easy. "It's going to be tough to come up with a rideshare for a 4 a.m. shift," he said.
The city is encouraging businesses and co-workers to help each other.
That seems to be happening.
At the Turtle Bay Resort in Kahuku, which is not on a major commuting route, workers who need rides and people who can give rides posted their names on a bulletin board and were matched up, said Sumithra Balraj, the public relations manager for the hotel.
The University of Hawaii has set up an electronic bulletin board for students to catch rides with one another for the Manoa campus and other community college campuses at www.hawaii.edu/busstrike.
But some bus riders also have chosen not to utilize the city's alternative proposals.
Shawn Pundyke, who is a security guard at Honolulu Hale and lives in Kalihi Valley, does not plan to register for the city's free van service because others live farther away and need the service more than he does.
"I dunno if I'm gonna walk, ride a bike, or catch a ride. I dunno what I'm gonna do. But at least I'm in walking distance," he said.
Star-Bulletin reporter Liz Fong contributed to this story.
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City plan adds $6.50
to cost of youth bus pass
The latest fare proposal to emerge at the City Council would hit children who ride TheBus especially hard, with a nearly 50 percent increase in the cost of a monthly youth bus pass, to $20.
"It looks like they are disproportionately trying to balance the budget on the backs of these students," said Greg Knudsen, spokesman for the Department of Education, said Friday. "It's an unfortunate burden on families with multiple children."
The plan proposed Thursday would hike the youth fare for the city bus to $1 from 75 cents, and the monthly youth pass to $20 from $13.50.
By comparison, the adult pass would go to $35 from $30, an increase of 17 percent.
Many public school students rely on TheBus to get to and from school.
About 14,000 youth passes are sold every month. Youth fares apply to children aged 6 to 17 as well as 18-year-olds who are still in high school.
The administration's fare proposal had originally called for youth to pay 85 cents a ride and $18.50 for a monthly pass. The City Council will hold a public hearing on the proposed fares on Monday at 10 a.m.
The Department of Education provides school bus service for students in rural areas. Fares for those bus rides are supposed to rise to 35 cents, from 25 cents, some time this year.
The department also buys 1,100 city bus passes every month for students in the Honolulu area who would otherwise qualify for school transport, Knudsen said.
