Auditor General Eugene DePasquale recently released his most recent performance audit of the Port Authority of Allegheny County, which found that the Port Authority’s 97 bus routes are on schedule 67 percent of the time.
The Port Authority’s on-time rate lags behind those of other metropolitan systems such as Minneapolis, at 84 percent, and Baltimore, at 74 percent. DePasquale said that the audit’s findings suggest the system could improve its route management to serve its 180,000 daily bus riders better.
“Our audit found that buses do not operate on schedule nearly one-third of the time – and that’s using a measurement with several minutes of leeway already built in,” DePasquale said. “Five or six minutes may not seem like a long wait, but those minutes can feel like an eternity when you’re standing in the elements and trying to get to work on time.”
In response to the audit, which covered Jan. 1, 2016, through Dec. 31, 2017, the Port Authority said it is conducting an operations analysis and has created a cross-functional team to work on improving overall on-time performance.
The audit also examined the Port Authority’s service request evaluation process, which aims to give the public a voice in changes to bus and light rail routes and found it to be “overly complex and time consuming with the results having little to no impact” on operations.
“During the audit period, the Port Authority received more than 800 service requests that staff then spent many months analyzing and prioritizing,” DePasquale said. “However, of the 76 requests that made it into the approval pipeline, only two became reality due to budget constraints.”
The audit also included the Port Authority’s hiring process and found that the agency failed to document the process in formal policies and procedures and had inadequate documentation for certain applicant driver and criminal history offenses.
DePasquale noted that the Port Authority resolved contracting and procurement concerns identified in a 2014 audit.
“I commend Port Authority leadership for addressing the issues found in my last audit,” DePasquale said. “I’m encouraged that the agency continues to make progress in keeping its fiscal house in order.”