Pace may have hit on a way to get suburbanites out of their cars and into mass transit, however unorthodox that transit may be.
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The Pace V.I.P. Vanpool program has received such a warm response since its rollout last autumn that the Pace plans to nearly triple the size of its van fleet to 65 vehicles.
The plan represents mass transit at the grass-roots level: Pace puts together a pool of riders with a volunteer driver, gives them a van, bills passengers their fares, pays for gasoline and upkeep, and lets pool participants take it from there. They set up routes, stops, schedules and contingency plans in the event that a driver takes ill.
Originally, the agency intended to buy 24 vans in the first year of its program and perhaps 40 the next year. But its board of directors now believes there is enough demand to justify buying 65 vehicles at a total cost of $2.7 million.
The expenditure will be made out of Pace`s positive fund balance for capital projects and will not need special authorization from the board of the Regional Transportation Authority, said Pace spokeswoman Mindy Laflamme.
No previous van pool promotion here has taken off the way Pace`s has. The reasons likely are convenience and economics.
In exchange for fares averaging $78 a month, Pace picks up the costs of fuel, insurance and vehicle upkeep. Pace owns the vehicles and essentially lends them free to volunteer drivers, whose fares are waived in exchange for their taking responsibility for the vans and their routes.
The provisions address the biggest objection to van pooling. Most other programs place a heavy burden on the driver, requiring him or her to sign a van-leasing agreement and take responsibility for making lease payments and collecting fares from riders to recoup his or her costs.
The successful van pool programs here, such as that at Allstate Insurance Co. in Northbrook, make it easy for participants by having a third party-typically, one`s employer-own the vehicles and take care of upkeep and billing.
Pace estimates that it will need at least 25 vans just for Sears, Roebuck and Co., which is expected to move 5,000 Merchandise Group employees from downtown Chicago to Hoffman Estates this fall, said Terrance Brannon, planning and development manager for Pace.
So far, 70 Sears workers have signed up to be drivers or backup drivers, said Shamus Misek, supervisor of van pool services for Pace.
The volunteer drivers will be screened and will have their credit and driving records checked. Besides getting a free ride to work and limited personal use of the vans, drivers may be able to buy their vehicles from Pace after a prescribed number of years or miles, Misek said.
Pace now will match up interested employees who live in the same area as the drivers. Participants usually will be able to decide the number of riders in their pool and hence, the size vehicle they need-a 7-passenger minivan, 12- passenger conversion van or 15-passenger maxi-van.
A bigger van means more riders and lower fares. Many people, though, have opted to pay an extra $10 or so a month to get a mini-van, which means more leg room and fewer stops.
”The main thing is to see that the group is going to be viable,” Misek said.
Six more employers, including Du Page County at its Wheaton governmental center and Pace at its Arlington Heights headquarters, have concrete plans to start van pools, Misek said. Van pools are operating to such destinations as Ameritech Services Inc. in Hoffman Estates and United Airlines in
unincorporated Elk Grove Township.
Indeed, a group of United employees from the south suburbs had been renting a van on their own but switched to the Pace program as soon as it started.
”It`s worked out very well,” said United spokesman Joe Hopkins. ”It`s a good marriage between Pace and our employees.”
That is the kind of situation private van pool companies such as VPSI Inc. fear.
The subsidiary of Chrysler Corp. filed a formal complaint with Pace last winter, alleging that publicly subsidized Pace was competing unfairly with private transit operators, which VPSI said was a violation of federal law.
Specifically, VPSI contended that it was in danger of losing to Pace three van pool groups at American Telephone and Telegraph Co. in Naperville, because the Pace program offered lower monthly fees to van pool riders.
Pace responded that VPSI was in the business of leasing vans, not providing transit, and said VPSI had no standing to bring its complaint.
VPSI had supplied vehicles for a van pool experiment sponsored by the RTA and the Chicago Area Transportation Study. The largely unsuccessful 30-month promotion ended in early 1991.
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Pace expects to subsidize up to 32 percent of the fares of van pool passengers, though the program presently is breaking even on operating costs because maintenance is low and the relatively new vans are still covered by manufacturers` warranties, Laflamme said.
Pace officials said their portion of operating costs covered by van pool fares is at least 68 percent, nearly twice the target of 35 percent that Pace sets for its conventional bus routes.
Pace has been sending representatives to large suburban employers, especially those planning on relocating or setting up a new office.
When companies move to or around the suburbs, Misek said, employees are often left without their usual public transportation, and they cannot count on working close to home. Those workers usually are the most receptive to van pooling.
When Sears, for instance, surveyed its Merchandise Group employees, it found that most live in the Naperville area, in the southwest suburbs or on Chicago`s South Side. Sears spokesman Greg Rossiter said that some people have been with the company since before 1973, when the company moved from its old West Side headquarters to Sears Tower.
Many companies may be forced to adopt van pooling and other programs to comply with the federal Clean Air Act, which by 1996 will require companies with 100 or more employees to take steps to reduce driving by their workers by at least 25 percent. The act will affect an estimated 5,400 companies, with nearly 2 million workers in the Chicago area.