questionnaire was conducted at Milligan & Company, LLC’s offices. The second pilot was conducted at DART First State in Wilmington, DE and included both transit users and operators. At both pilots, comments from the respondents and reviewers were recorded and data integrity verifications were performed on the electronic collection system. A representative from FTA’s Office of Safety and Security attended the DART study and provided additional input.

Following the pilot study, suggested revisions to the questionnaire form were submitted to FTA’s Office of Safety and Security and approved for use in the remaining sites.

Response Collection
Each selected transit agency received an introductory letter from the Director of FTA’s Office of Safety and Security explaining the process. This letter was followed by communication between Milligan and Company, LLC and each transit agency’s designee to coordinate logistics. System schedules and route maps were collected for each system prior to arriving on site to conduct the interviews. This information, along with consultation with the transit agency designee, provided input into the locations for response collections.

Customers were interviewed on transit vehicles, at transit stops and stations, and at transit operating facilities (in the case of operators). The respondents were provided with a large-print copy of the questionnaire, and their oral responses were recorded electronically, using a program developed for electronic personal data assistants. Responses to questionnaire were collected electronically to minimize paperwork and maximize the efficient processing of results. The printed questionnaire was made available in English and in Spanish.

On average, 100 customer and 25 operator interviews were conducted at each of the transit agencies selected. A total of 2,593 customer and 634 transit vehicle operators were interviewed during this project. Collection times were staggered to obtain customer input from a range of service hours.

After responses were recorded electronically in the field they were downloaded into a Microsoft Access database. The data was compiled, verified and analyzed using both database and spreadsheet media.