Home
»
Trains Magazine
»
Forums
»
Transit
»
Transit advertising--- Wrapped LRVs and Buses.

Edit post

Edit your reply below.

Post Body
Enter your post below.
MILW205 I'm a bit confused as to why the impetus is on DART to provide the marketing data on wraps that you are seeking.  Why should DART care what the marketing data is?  All they should care about is if it makes additional money.  Instead, I would think that it is the advertisers who should be concerned about marketing data: they make the decision whether or not the additional cost of the wraps is justified.  Perhaps approaching the advertisers requesting marketing data would get you the info you are seeking?I'd be intereseted in seeing verification of your assertion for the rationale of why DART wraps buses and not LRV's.  In any event, the additional revenue that wraps bring in helps the transit system, contributing towards their ability to serve clientele that have no other alternatives.   DART is owned by the citizens of Dallas as well as those in the other participating service communities.  It is a taxpayer funded entity, and they pick-up approximately 78 per cent of DART's costs.  DART is obligated to serve the interests of all the citizens in the service area, irrespective of whether they use the services, because they are paying for it.  Under the Texas Open Records Act, DART is required to make available to the citizenry information regarding its revenue and expense streams.  DART is obligated to use its equipment, i.e. buses, light rail vehicles, as well as its facilities, in a manner that enhances the quality of life in its service communities.  Thus, when its paints its vehicles in a manner as to reduce the quality of the service provided to its constituents, which is not just a ride but a comfortable ride, it is obligated to demonstrate why it has agreed to the practice.  Clearly, those who buy the advertising should know whether wrapping the vehicle is more effective than painting their message below the windows or on the back of the bus.  I have asked some of them for data showing that wrapping the vehicle is more effective, but only one advertiser, another public agency, responded.  They don't have any data to demonstrate that wrapping a transit vehicle is more effective than an ad placed below the windows.  They responded probably because they too are subject to the Texas Open Records Act, and they probably figured out that if I know enough to challenge them, I know how to get information through the open records act. Approximately 18 months ago DART gave me a bus by bus, train by train, station by station analysis of its riders.  The data was contained in Excel spreadsheets that enabled me to slice and dice it to gain an understanding of who uses what services.  The user profiles show a different pattern between the people who use the city buses and those who use the light rail trains and suburban express buses.  The majority of people using the city buses are traveling from or to low income neighborhoods, although there are exceptions.  This led me to conclude that a high per cent of the city bus riders are from low income neighborhoods, mobility impaired, or senior citizens.  Moreover, DART told me that approximately 43 per cent of the people who use the city bus service do not have access to a personal vehicle.  I crossed checked this data with the American Public Transit Association and found the pattern to be similar to that in the other large Texas cities.The express buses, as well as the light rail system, tend to be used by lower middle to middle class patrons, many of who are commuting from and to the suburbs.  Only 13 per cent of the people who use these services do not have access to a personal vehicle.  Lower class patrons also use the light rail system, or the Trinity Railway Express (TRE), but they are usually fed onto the trains from bus routes that force feed the system, or they are dropped off at one of the rail stations.  However, this is not completely accurate, because the Red and Blue lines that serve the southern portion of Dallas pick up and drop off passengers from low income neighborhoods.DART did not tell me that they wrap the buses because the majority of people who use them tend to be lower income people.  A reasonably well placed DART official did tell me that they don't wrap the light rail vehicles because they are the pride of the fleet, and they did not think that wrapping them is appropriate.  You can draw whatever conclusion you choose from that comment.  I have ridden every bus and rail route in the DART service area.  My observations tend to support the conclusions stated above.  By contrast only a few of DART's executives and managers use public transit on a regular basis.  And the last time I check no DART Board members ride transit on the regular basis.  How is that for an endorsement of public transit?In 2007 DART's total income from Passenger Revenues, Advertising and Rent, Sales and Use Tax, Federal Grants, State Grants, Investment Income, Capital Contributions, and Other Income totaled $635.7 million.  Of this amount Advertising and Rent accounted for $9.4 million or less than one per cent.  DART does not publish how much incremental income was generated by wrapping the buses, but it would have been considerably less than $9.4 million.  I would be surprised it is was more than two or three tenths of one per cent.  Wrapping a bus with advertising is a very marginal source of income.  Clearly, whether low income rides get a transit service is not dependent on wrapping a bus or train from head to toe and front to back with an advertisement.
Tags (Optional)
Tags are keywords that get attached to your post. They are used to categorize your submission and make it easier to search for. To add tags to your post type a tag into the box below and click the "Add Tag" button.
Add Tag