City officials gave final approval to the transportation department to use left-over federal dollars to update electronic signs outside transit vehicles that display route numbers and destinations.
Columbus City Council members on Tuesday unanimously passed the second reading of an ordinance to appropriate $24,920 of Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act funding to update the headsigns outside of the city’s transit vehicles.
Councilwoman Elaine Hilber, D-District 2, was absent. Council members passed the first reading during their meeting on Oct. 21.
During the pandemic period, the city received nearly $2.5 million in CARES Act funding.
Director of Transportation Matthew Dudukovich noted that a significant portion of that was used to buy five new cutaway buses and a 29-foot GILLIG bus.
The newest GILLIG bus, which is number 36, arrived about a month ago, Dudukovich said.
“We also upgraded the CAD AVL (Computer-Aided Dispatch with Automatic Vehicle Location), the brains of the buses that make it possible for us to communicate with our drivers at dispatch,” Dudukovich said. “… Every single one of those was 100% paid for by the CARES grant, which meant the citizen’s taxpayer dollars were not involved.”
Once the grant money is spent, transit is able to get the money fully reimbursed by the federal government.
Dudukovich said the last portion of the CARES grant funding will pay for new headsigns— the current batch of which “are outdated” and “end-of-life technology,” per Dudukovich.
“They were no longer working,” Dudukovich said. “In order to keep the technology consistent, we’re actually going with a company called Hanover, which is the one that our (newest) bus that we just procured is also aligned with.”
The team at transit “is excited that they may stop putting paper signs in the window to communicate with the community as to which bus is which bus, and randomly have incorrect information just pop up on the outside of buses,” the transit director said.
