Modificaciones que afectan al Código Civil (DF 1ª)

Establishing a comprehensive approach to mobility improvements essentially means adopting a holistic view of transportation services that serve the county. It means looking at the travel needs and travel options of all travelers. It also means examining the travel needs and transportation options throughout all parts of the county and beyond its borders, including their interconnections with regional services. It means operating more cost-effectively and more effectively

communicating travel options to travelers.

The combination of such activities has become known as “mobility management.” The American Public Transportation Association recently reported that: “Mobility management involves the creation of partnerships with transportation providers in a community or a region, and finding ways to effectively make known those travel options to the public. In the process of doing this, resources are coordinated efficiently, customers are able to make better decisions and focus is on the goal of mobility for the customer.”1 Mobility management focuses on:

 Offering a full range of travel options to the single-occupant auto, not just the mass transit mode.

 Innovation, changing usual business patterns.  Cultivating partnerships and multi-agency activities.

 Offering a single point of customer access to multiple travel modes.

This perspective is the kind that is needed to improve transportation services in Will County, noting that the focus of this project is on first addressing the mobility needs of older adults, persons with disabilities, and persons with low income.

“Mobility Management: A New Role for Public Transportation,” American Public Transportation Association, Washington, DC, May 2008.

In order to facilitate a high level of coordinated community transportation, Will County should take two important early steps to establish an advisory body of stakeholders to help guide coordination in Will County, as well to designate, hire, or retain a specific person (or group) to champion, facilitate, instigate, lead, and possibly manage coordination efforts focused on this mobility management effort. Together, the creation of the Will County Paratransit Coordinating Council (PCC) will provide a forum for leadership and decision-making that can guide the improvement of coordinated transportation in the county, and the establishment of a Mobility Manager who can lead the charge of coordinated transportation in the county will ensure that the implementation strategies suggested in this chapter can be actualized.

As Chapter 4 indicates, there are varying levels of coordination already taking place in Will County. With the leadership of the PCC and the Mobility Manager, projects furthering coordination can be pursued. However, a do-nothing alternative would perpetuate the

shortcomings identified above, without much of a chance for expanding coordination. The bottom line is that a PCC and a Mobility Manager are necessary for Will County. Once these are

established, it then becomes the responsibility of the Will County PCC to help shape its Action Plan for Coordination, and the responsibility of the Will County Mobility Manager to lead the implementation efforts.

Ultimately, we believe that a countywide paratransit system, the goal of this project, is an end- product that is achievable. The design that would be most beneficial for Will County, and which has the support of the Steering Committee, is a consolidated county-wide call center manager (under contract to Pace) through which sponsored residents all over the county can call to arrange transport. In this design, this call center manager would partner with the current set of operators – township/municipal operators, Pace contractors, private, not-for-profit agencies, and taxis and private for-profit carriers. The concept is that these local partners would save money on call center labor and potentially increase revenue if they choose to remain as service providers under the new service umbrella, both of which would lead to improving the efficiency of their operations. Additionally, other mobility management efforts and new mobility options would be undertaken/managed by this call center manager.

However, there are some practicalities that must first be addressed to get there. The first is that the term of Pace’s current contract (that serves ADA paratransit service and a consolidated Dial- A-Ride service in Western Will County) is up in 2010. Pace must go through a procurement process in 2010, and needs to know whether a consolidated call-center and the addition of mobility management efforts should be a part of this contract, and what the timing is. The term of these contracts typically range from three to five years. The other practicality is that some

potential partners to this ultimate design may be a bit reluctant to “come to the dance,” even if it is voluntary.

Once the PCC and Mobility Manager are in place, we believe that the best chance for maximizing interest and participation of local partners is to first establish some simple coordination efforts that focus on coordinating information – both for customers and for service providers. Building on these efforts, this organizing of information can progress to the implementation of more complex partnerships that focus on creating a one-stop access point for information for customers. And, as providers become more familiar and comfortable with sharing policies and practices, they can explore the joint sharing and/or acquisition of support resources, and introduce new

“sponsorable” supplementary mobility options. With these partnerships more established, there will be more support for migrating to and participation in the ultimate design model above. This three-phased implementation framework, including specific coordination projects that fit into each phase, is described in more detail later in this chapter. These three phases build on each

other and provide a clear means of understanding what coordinated transportation means for Will County.