Baltimore's new bus system launches in just over two weeks. Behind the scenes, countless hours of planning have been underway for the past 18 months. A major component of this has been the training of over 1,000 bus operators. These men and woman are on the front-line of navigating the new routes safely while delivering world-class customer service. MDOT MTA has trained 1,052 bus operators in intensive 3-day new route trainings. After their trainings, an anonymous survey was conducted to gauge the effectiveness of the training and to determine if our operators are ready for what lies ahead. The survey results showed that 998 of the 1,052 bus operators agreed they can apply what they learned to their job and stated that they are committed to using the knowledge, awareness and skills they learned. That equates to 94.8% of the operators saying that they’re ready for BaltimoreLink.

To further bolster our operators’ training MDOT MTA has provided new left and right turn sheets to all our operators for each new route and is using innovative new training techniques such as route specific videos that are available online and in the MDOT MTA’s various bus divisions to show the operators exactly how to navigate these new routes. We are committed to ensuring that all our operators feel comfortable driving their new routes and that’s why we are offering additional training for any operator that requests it to ensure that all our operators are prepared to provide world-class customer service from the start of BaltimoreLink. We are extremely confident that on June 18, our operators will deliver on BaltimoreLink’s promise of an improved transit system that links our customers to all of life’s opportunities.