Acquisition and Development of a New Maintenance Facility

The Greater New Haven Transit District (GNHTD) operates a fleet of over 45 vehicles serving 400,000 residents of New Haven County. GNHTD decided to bring all bus operations in-house after 20 years of contracting out its paratransit bus services. The agency selected TRC as the project managers to lead the District through the implementation process.

To implement a prompt public takeover of the transit system, GNHTD needed to acquire its own maintenance/administration facility. As project managers for the takeover, TRC conducted a planning analysis to determine the optimal location for GNHTD’s maintenance center. Once the best area was identified, TRC then conducted a comprehensive search in this area for existing industrial-rated properties that might be suitable as a transit maintenance center. Many candidate sites were identified which TRC examined through extensive field visits and follow-up analyses.

These assessments evaluated each property for such issues as access to the road network, zoning, capacity for current and future operating requirements, functional layout, structural integrity, and potential conflicts with surrounding neighborhoods. Through this process TRC identified a preferred site that best met GNHTD’s needs. TRC then assisted the District in acquiring the site and preparing it for occupancy. In this final phase of the project, TRC assisted the District in the negotiations for the purchase of the property, and managed all of the implementation tasks including environmental assessments, final functional design, shop layouts, selection and acquisition of vehicle lifts and other shop equipment, and installation of fuel tanks.

Electric Bus Implementation: Following the acquisition of its new maintenance base, the Greater New Haven Transit District (GNHTD) became the recipient of demonstration grant funds to implement an all-electric shuttle bus system for the downtown New Haven/Yale University area. The bus fleet of six vehicles was pure electric battery-drive technology. GNHTD retained TRC as advisers on garage modifications to accommodate the servicing and maintenance of the electric buses and the battery packs. TRC also designed the data-capture methodology to measure the technical performance of the electric buses during the evaluation phase of the project.