We continue our conversation with Nathaniel Ford, Muni's executive director. If you need to catch up, here are parts one,two, three, and four and five.

Eve Batey: While we're on all these initiatives, how about TransLink? What's going on there?

Nathainel Ford: Okay. I guess Translink has had its challenges. It’s a new technology. I’m part of the TMG, which is the Transit Managers Group. We are working with the MTC to try and bring this project home and move it forward.

Right now there’s implementation on AC Transit and Golden Gate. The schedule from our contractor, ERG, is for BART and MUNI to be installed by January of next year. Full installation.

With a problem this complex, there have been some issues, however we’re trying to work them through, and on that TMG you have myself, Michael Burns, all of the executive directors and our general managers, Rick Fernandez, Celia Kupersmith from Golden Gate, all the general managers and executive directors for the agencies that are going to be part of Translink.

Now I’ve had the experience in Atlanta where we implemented the Breeze card there, and they’re almost complete with the installation. It’s significant improvement in passenger information, major improvement in terms of passenger revenues. At some of the stations they were talking about a 25 percent increase in passenger revenues, because it eliminates a lot of fare evasion issues, and you get better control. You have, you know, these full functioning gates and all the other pieces of the puzzle, so I’m excited about Translink.

I know it’s been years coming to the Bay Area, however I think we’re at a critical point with the Golden Gate installation as well as the AC Transit installation. We’re watching that very closely with BART as well as with MUNI. As you get to the larger systems, we want to make sure that everything is flushed out, and any learning curve that the contractor has to go through, they do it over there, before they start installing it on our busses.

EB: So in addition to pushing forward Translink and this panel you’re on, what else are you doing to integrate MUNI with all of the zillions of other transit agencies in the area?

NF: Well, the interesting thing is, is that between the Transit Managers Group with Translink, part of the offshoot – and then I sit on the CalTrain board, and then there’s the Transbay Joint Powers Authority board.

The MTC also has a working group amongst all of us, so the agency heads and our staff spend quite a bit of time together during the course of – you know, a week or a day. There are numerous meetings that require a lot of interagency work. So I think while we may have a plethora of transit systems here, from an agency standpoint we’re working very well with each other.

I’m not so sure in terms of the customer’s experience at this point if it’s been maximized and if it’s as seamless as it can be, but I think Translink will go a long way in that regard, that you’ll have really – you know, for the customers – you don’t really see the difference, because you’re carrying 3 or 4 different fare cards. But we work very well together, we share a lot of lessons learned, we communicate with each other often.

We have, I think, a strong relationship with BART because, you know, of the amount of transfers that come from the BART system into ours and vice-versa. And then I used to work for them, so, you know, that’s just naturally incurred. In terms of CalTrain, I’m on their board, and we’re all working closely under this Transbay Terminal project, which affects SamTrans, Golden Gate, AC, BART and MUNI. So, we’re joined at the hip, all of us.

EB: Do you foresee a time when all the schedules become a little more integrated?

NF: Definitely. I think with technology the way it is, there’s definitely opportunities for that. And our work with the MTC and then overall as agency heads, we see the need for that. We understand the distinct nature of each of our operations but we want to make those transfers and the coordination of schedules as invisible as possible. I mean, none of us would want anything less than that. We recognize the challenge of operating these multiple systems in this region, but for our customers that shouldn’t be a challenge for our customers to navigate in the Bay Area.

When you send a complaint to Muni, where does it go? Find out tomorrow!