This session will provide an introduction to National RTAP's free General Transit Feed Specification (GTFS) Builder, which helps you get your route and schedule information into online trip planners, such as Google Maps. 

Presenter: Marcy Jaffe, Transnnovation Inc.

Marcy Jaffe, MBA, MPA supports and guides rural, tribal, and intercity transit partners with technical assistance related to General Transit Feed Specification (GTFS) and National RTAP’s GTFS Builder. She has taught GTFS workshops at national, regional, and state transit conferences, effectively guiding those with no prior GTFS experience to successfully launch their data on Google Maps or other trip planners. Marcy has worked at the Washington State Department of Transportation as well as San Francisco’s regional planning agency, the Metropolitan Transportation Commission. In 2016, the balance of Maryland’s statewide digitized transit network was built on GTFS Builder.

Tribal Transit Planning is an interactive session that provides an overview of the steps required for a comprehensive transit planning process and translating the Transit Plan or Feasibility Study to proactive implementation of service on the ground. Additionally, the discussion will cover community engagement for program development, transit committee member recruitment and retention, transit service planning, and transit plan updates. Examples will be shared of how tribes have overcome common program challenges (e.g., transit staff recruitment/retention, low-density population, large service areas, long travel distances, and dispersed destination, service coordination and technical capacity, territoriality, and unwillingness to coordinate services, etc.). Workshop attendees will:

• Review a sample Community Transportation Survey template
• Obtain tips about drafting/updating Transit Plans/Feasibility Studies and consultant solicitation for the said plan or study development
• Brainstorm about how to do effective marketing of new tribal transit service and with which agencies they might seek to partner.
• Session attendees will leave with information as to how to obtain support from their State DOT transit program and tribal liaison(s), and some tribal transit program guidebook and online resources.

Presenter: Michia Casebier, M.G. Tech-Writing, L.L.C. 

Ms. Michia Casebier is President of M.G. Tech-Writing, LLC, a multimodal transportation planning, grant and technical writing sole proprietorship, which has funded nearly $20 million dollars in grants. Michia has worked with federally recognized tribes across the U.S. since 1991 and with the National Rural Transit Assistance Program as a Tribal Transit Program training facilitator since 2019. As an Alaska tribal transportation consultant, Casebier has written six Tribal Safety Plans for Alaska Native Villages, and funded grants for both a road safety assessment in the Native Village of Tanana and an FTA capital grant for the startup of Craig Tribal Association’s Public Transit system.

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How to Write and Update a Tribal Transit Plan

The general mission statement that can apply to all local public transit providers is to provide mobility to a community’s citizens that is safe, reliable, cost-effective, and customer-focused. This session will focus on how to provide and manage the safety component of that mission statement. 

All tribal and rural transit systems include the function of safety. However, this effort is often provided without a safety plan and an effective organization wide safety management process. Often the responsibility for assuring safe transit operations is fragmented among different transit personnel, from trainers to supervisors. All transit providers need a designated champion for safety to lead the planning for safety and implementation of safety risk management. 

This session will focus on the hazards, operating conditions, and approaches to good safety management for Alaskan Native tribal and rural transit. This focus aligns with FTA intent to improve safety by guiding all levels of transit agencies to manage safety risks more effectively, and proactively in their systems and to predict and reduce the frequency of adverse safety events.

Presenter: Walt Diangson, Diangson, Inc. dba WRLDCO

Walt serves as a consultant to various public transit systems as a certified safety officer, transit management operations consultant, and management development instructor. Walt provides training and technical support in safety risk management and transit management and operations. His safety risk management experience includes transit safety and security, property and casualty insurance, loss control, transit management, safety, and leadership training, and FTA’s Transit Safety Management Systems (SMS). Walt’s transit experience includes management and operations of local fixed-route, general-public paratransit, ADA paratransit, and human service transportation. He is a graduate of the University of California, Berkeley, with a Bachelor of Architecture and of Columbia University with a Master of Business Administration, with a special emphasis in urban planning and economics.

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Tribal Transit Program Technical Assistance Assessments