MCTS Launches Real-Time Transit App for Riders With Disabilities

Transdev Bus Driving Through Downtown. Photo by Jeramey Jannene.

The Milwaukee County Transit System (MCTS) has launched a real-time mobile app for transit riders with disabilities who utilize the county’s paratransit service.

The new app is called My Transit Manager. It was developed by TransDev, the French multinational corporation that took over paratransit service in Milwaukee County last year, and has had a mixed performance record since.

The new app will send riders messages, updating them on the arrival of their van, enabling them to manage scheduled rides and leave feedback on their last ride.

“With My Transit Manager, we’re bringing the paratransit rider experience closer to that of fixed bus route service,” Fran Musci, county paratransit director said in a statement. “My Transit Manager puts real time van trip information in paratransit riders’ hands for the first time, something our riders have been asking us about for years.”

The county’s paratransit service is called TransitPlus and it provided more than 350,000 rides last year. The service utilizes ADA accessible vans and provides door-to-door shared rides for people with disabilities. It is not the same service as the same-day, on-demand paratransit taxi service, which the county discontinued in 2023 after it fell out of compliance with federal regulations. The county utilized a private contractor for the service and did not have funding to stand up a new one in compliance with Federal Transit Administration (FTA) rules.

Riders have criticized TransitPlus in recent years for its lack of reliability. The reliability concerns were heightened in late 2023 when the county switched from two private contractors operating the service to a single contractor: TransDev. When TransDev took over it was understaffed and unable to keep up with the demand for TransitPlus. Riders were being stranded across the county. At the same time, the paratransit taxi program — a safety net transit service for people with disabilities — was getting phased out.

Since then, the quality of TransDev service has ebbed and flowed, at times meeting performance benchmarks, other times failing to meet them. Even when the service is running on time, riders still have to deal with a large pickup window when scheduling a trip. All rides have a 30-minute pickup window. So a ride isn’t considered late unless it arrives 31 minutes after the scheduled pickup, which is a standard accepted by the FTA.

The new app should give readers a better sense of where their rides are and whether they are running on time. It is available in both English and Spanish and can be used with screen reading technology, according to MCTS.