De Lijn has already implemented 30 adjustments since the introduction of the basic accessibility plan. It concerns changes to a stop or the hours of a journey to better align with school hours. In total, more than a hundred adjustments will follow. The transport company announced this on Sunday, a month after the rollout of the second phase of the plan.
On January 6, De Lijn took the second and most important step in the rollout of so-called basic accessibility, in which buses and trams are concentrated on lines with greater demand, between residential areas and other important junctions. The downside is that travelers who want to commute to suburbs or more remote areas have to rely on flexible transport with dial-up buses, whether or not in combination with shared cars, bicycles, scooters and scooters.
De Lijn transported approximately 950,000 passengers per working day in January. The public transport company received 4,190 responses and complaints in the period from January 6 to January 31. The volume was especially high in the first days after the start-up, but a decrease has been noticeable since Monday January 15. The daily number has now been more than halved, it sounds.
In consultation with local authorities, regional transport councils, schools or tailor-made companies, it was decided in 132 cases that an adjustment will be made. 30 have already been carried out.
According to De Lijn, travelers are also finding their way to ‘flexible transport’, the successor to the dial-up buses. 59,700 reservations have already been made, good for 73,000 travelers. There has also been a slightly increasing trend since the start-up in the number of flex users, according to the transport company. About 75 percent of reservations were made via the Hoppin app or website.
De Lijn acknowledges that it “was a big challenge”. “In the first few weeks there were many questions and complaints from various angles. Fortunately, we also heard customers and stakeholders who were satisfied with their new offering. In the meantime, we have also been able to correct a number of teething problems on the ground,” explains Ann Schoubs, director general of De Lijn. “We started working from day one to monitor and investigate the operational issues and provide a suitable solution as quickly as possible.”