News Release
Release date: August 18, 2000
Amazon.com joins Metro's acclaimed
FlexPass program for commuters
Amazon.com of Seattle is the
most recent addition to King County Metro Transit’s nationally recognized Commute
Partnerships program for providing transportation services to company employees.
The Web-based shopping site
joined the program Aug. 1 and distributed 1,750 bus passes among its employees
during the first week. The passes work on Metro buses in King County and Sound
Transit buses and forthcoming light rail systems in King, Pierce and Snohomish
counties.
In 1999, similar partnerships
with 425 King County employers reduced drive-alone commuting at their work sites
by eight to 40 percent. Partnerships are with private companies, social service
agencies for welfare-to-work transportation, cities, developers and institutions.
Participating employers include
CH2M Hill in Bellevue, Costco headquarters in Issaquah, Nintendo in Redmond, Weyerhaeuser
in Federal Way, the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle and Boeing
plants in Renton, Kent and Seattle.
Besides bus passes, Commute
Partnership "products" can include guaranteed emergency rides home, vanpool fare
subsidies, carpool incentives, vouchers that encourage walking and biking, discounted
parking for carpools and vanpools, shuttle buses and services for low-income clients.
Also available is Flexcar, a new public/private partnership with a fleet of shared
cars stationed in selected Seattle neighborhoods.
Metro’s Commute Partnership
program is one of 100 semi-finalists out of 1,300 applicants nationwide
in the Ford Foundation's prestigious Innovations in American Government Award.
The 25 finalists will be named later this month.
Metro’s Commute Partnerships
program stems from King County’s Six-Year Transit Development Plan. The plan authorized
county funds to match private money as a way to expand public transportation opportunities
-- both for transit and for other alternatives, especially in areas not well served
by transit.
The partnership approach reduces
risks for both the county and its partners in trying new ventures. For example,
county partnership funds have "seeded" employers' initial investments in their
employees' alternative commutes.
After successful demonstrations,
employers assume the full cost. Further, partnership funds have been matched against
private funds to help reduce the county's exposure when introducing transit service.
Last year, $600,000 in county
funds leveraged about $3.4 million from employers and other partners for public
transportation products and services.
Here are some examples of how
other Commute Partnerships are working:
- Fred Hutchinson Cancer
Research Center. Since starting its FlexPass program in 1996, 1,900 eligible
employees have decreased the drive-alone rate to the Hutch from 48 percent to
34 percent. Transit use grew from 9 to 19 percent in that same time. Partnership
funds provided startup incentives.
- Boeing. In 1998, King
County and Boeing agreed to demonstrate a new call center approach for Home Free
Guarantee (emergency ride home) service for all Boeing employees in the
Puget Sound region. King County and Boeing share costs over the first three years,
with the public contribution gradually declining as the service logistics become
established. More workers use alternative commutes when they know there's another
way home "just in case."
- CH2M Hill. CH2M Hill
began its FlexPass program in 1996. By 1999, 45 percent of CH2M Hill's 280 downtown
Bellevue employees rode the bus to work, and only 37 percent drove alone. Partnership
funds provided startup incentives to CH2M Hill.
To learn more about King
County Metro’s Commute Partnership program call Market Development at (206) 684-1621
or visit:
http://transit.metrokc.gov/programs_info/employer/empcommute.html.
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