Biden visit to herald Detroit transportation upgrades

WASHINGTON — Vice President Joe Biden will travel to Detroit on Thursday to meet with Mayor Mike Duggan and talk about what the city is characterizing as "major improvements" to the Detroit Department of Transportation.

Biden's visit to Detroit was first announced late last week by the White House. On Tuesday, more details were released, though it was still unknown whether Biden was coming to unveil any new federal effort or funding.

Improving Detroit's bus system has been a focus of Duggan's agenda, with the mayor saying one of his goals has been to run a first-class bus system in Detroit.

Duggan earlier credited Biden with helping secure federal assistance for new buses, including the 10 new 60-foot articulated buses expected on Woodward, Gratiot and Grand River this month, saying "the vice president has taken a personal interest in solving the bus problem in the City of Detroit."

In a recent discussion with the Free Press, Detroit Department of Transportation Director Dan Dirks reiterated Duggan's pledge that the system's buses would run on their published schedules by the end of the year for the first time in 20 years.

For Dirks, the key to on-time performance is getting buses on the roads, a performance measure called "pullouts." The range for weekly pullouts for the last full week of August was between 89% and 99% of targeted buses, and Dirks said that a new class of bus drivers graduating this month would push that number to 100%.

The city announced plans to hire 100 drivers in April, and Dirks said that the city is on track with the goal, boosted by a higher starting wage (from $9.38 per hour to $11.38) and the decision to also consider candidates without a commercial driver's license and train them.

Because of the additional drivers, DDOT will be able to resurrect the "extra board" starting this month. Extra board bus drivers are available to fill in when a driver on a particular route calls off, something that Dirks estimated has been unavailable for 15 or 20 years.

DDOT also is planning to boost the frequency of buses on some key routes, an attempt to reverse some of the service cuts imposed in 2012, Dirks said. And bus security should improve with the addition of cameras on all DDOT buses expected this month.

The vice president is set to speak at DDOT headquarters on Warren Avenue at 2:30 p.m. Thursday.

Earlier in the day, Biden is to travel to Ohio State University in Columbus for a speech on the importance of preventing sexual assaults on college campuses across the U.S.

Contact Todd Spangler: 703-854-8947 or tspangler@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @tsspangler. Contact Eric D. Lawrence: elawrence@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @_ericdlawrence.