During May, MV Transportation Inc. was issued an Intent to Award the Sandy operations contract and many on-site changes took place. Drivers were retrained, a new operations manager and assistant operations manager moved into their office in the Sandy Operations Center, buses were inspected by MV staff to assess the fleet and were fitted with dash cameras and mobile eye systems (detection systems to assist drivers with blind spots). All Sandy drivers were issued their final City of Sandy paycheck May 29 and were officially hired by MV on May 30.

While change is always difficult and there have been some bumps in the road of transition, the benefits of choosing a contractor and returning Transit administration staff to our “typical” workloads is welcome and timely. Muna Rustam and Nancy Payne have worked many hours and were an incredible team for the past six months alongside Sandy’s professional drivers, dispatch and maintenance.

Construction on the bus barns continues at the Operations Center. This has been a larger and more expensive project than expected due to misinformation and incorrect topography in the original as-built documents from many years ago. The architectural and construction teams have been able to problem solve and move forward, with much more excavation than anticipated. The completion date has been moved to July 31 to accommodate the modifications that have occurred. The repair and rebuild of the bus wash (also pictured) was down sized considerably to off set the added cost of the bus barn construction.

Transit ridership had been increasing in 2019 and was very strong in January and February of 2020. This chart illustrates the COVID-19 impacts to Sandy Transit’s overall ridership.

The SAM Gresham route returned to full service May 1, running every half hour. The Elderly and Disabled Medical Rides driver continued to provide medical rides but with most appointments cancelled, Transit was able to assist the Senior Center for meal delivery (Meals on Wheels) Monday through Friday throughout the month.
While ridership is down, it is important to remember that in April and May there were still over 150 people per day using this transit system to get to work, family and goods and services.

Mt Hood Express continued to significantly reduce service. The Express route was combined with the Village Shuttle route, providing only 5 runs per day, down from 11. Service may be increased in June as the recreation areas reopen.

All services, SAM and MHX, remained fareless during this time as well as all Clackamas County Transit (CAT, SCTD and SMART).