As you may have read, the first issue of More Riders Magazine has gone to print and will be in subscriber’s mailboxes soon. At the centerpiece of this issue is a serious evaluation of more than hundred major transit agency websites that we performed at the end of last year.
Since the survey was performed in advance of the publish date, there are a few websites that improved dramatically in the interim. One such example is the Tompkins Consolidated Area Transit, which serves the Ithaca area of New York (including Cornell and Ithaca Universities).
When we originally looked at their website, TCATBUS.com, we weren’t that impressed. The site was ranked in the 50’s, with a score of 56 and “poor” ratings in both Time Sensitive Information and Rider-Community engagement.
At the request of TCAT, we went back to look at their website to see if they improved. The second time around we were impressed. TCAT BUS improved their score by 26 points, including making a serious gain in Rider-Community engagement.
This change highlights two important facts. First, TCAT was able to drastically improve their website despite being one of the smaller agencies in our survey. Second, they were able to do it without spending a huge sum of money.
We hope our survey can highlight where websites fall short at the agency level so that, like TCAT, change can be made quickly, cheaply and effectively.
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