Is the ChicagoDASH Really Successful?

To hear those who sit in Valparaiso's City Hall tell it, the ChicagoDASH bus service has been wildly successful. Since determining "success" is a subjective matter, this proclamation by City officials screams for a closer look at the yardstick they're using.

It'll be no surprise to regular ChicagoDASH riders that news articles in our local papers showthat officials do little more than count heads and pat themselves on the back when a bus is full. Their logic is t

hat if there was something wrong with the service, people wouldn't use it. This line of thinking is not only myopic and narrow-minded, it also reveals a lack of understanding of markets.

But perhaps most disturbing, this approach shows that ChicagoDASH officials have

no desire to consider rider safety, preferences and general comfort when evaluating their "success." And, by this definition, cramming yet more people into each bus, regardless of riders' comfort, means that the service is even more successful than officials could have imagined.

Unfortunately, it's easy for these officials to fall into this mindset, especially since they don't have to sit on these god awful buses for nearly three hours each day.