Frequent Express (FX) Grand Opening Celebration

Target Audience: The key target audience for the FX2-Division Grand Opening Celebration was existing transit users, especially the underserved areas of Division Street in outer east Portland and Gresham. Riders would feel the immediate impact of the ease, speed, and reliability of our bus service from Downtown Portland to Gresham. The second target audience was residents and businesses along Division Street whose safety is directly affected by the thousands of feet of new sidewalks, miles of new bike lanes, and protected intersections in what has been a high-crash corridor. Much of this audience were Latino or AAPI community members—we advertised in various languages to best reach them. A third target audience was our community partners and vendors, some of which were key financial sponsors of the event.

Strategy Objective:We sought to bring awareness to our new FX line with a citywide Grand Opening Celebration. We secured key corporate and community sponsors that donated $158,000. Our presenting sponsor, Raimore Construction, had the largest construction contract for a DBE in Oregon for the FX project. An ad campaign promoting the event included TV, radio and social channels in addition to earned-media opportunities. Our free event had three festival locations along the route featuring free FX rides, exclusive prizes and live entertainment. We thrilled riders with dances from various ethnic groups, martial arts displays, live bands, a diverse collection of vendors and an art mural. Dignitaries included mayors, members of Congress, commissioners, ODOT and other key community representatives.

Situation Challenge: With the emergence from the worst of the pandemic and ridership increasing slowly, we felt we needed to reconnect with our community and industry partners by creating a large-scale, celebratory and inclusive event. This full-day event, which occurred the day before FX2-Division service launched, followed our awareness campaign ("A Division of Possibilities") to get them excited to ride and reacquaint people with public transit. We had generally been dormant with large public events since the Covid pandemic began. TriMet, and the Portland metro area in general, was ready for this community celebration to commemorate our first high-capacity bus rapid transit line.

Results Impact: We attracted and engaged with thousands of community members during the Grand Opening Celebration. Our public-awareness campaign helped bring the entire community together. TriMet was able to reconnect and forge new relationships with many partners and the general public to pull off a successful, and complex, event. We compared boardings three weeks before FX's launch and three weeks after (through Oct. 15, 2022) and found ridership increases across the board: *Weekday service to Gresham rose 16.6% *Saturday service to Gresham rose 19.2% *Sunday service to Gresham rose 14.3% *Weekday service to Downtown Portland rose 18.6% *Saturday service to Downtown Portland rose 15.1% *Sunday service to Downtown Portland rose 12.6%

Why Submit: TriMet brought excitement to its riders with a special event targeting our communities via digital, social, print, radio, video channels, and in-person outreach. Our Grand Opening Celebration got people excited to ride the new buses, as reflected in our data with a huge ridership increase. After being dormant with large public events since 2020, TriMet attracted and engaged with thousands of community members during the event where we had a fun, passport-style approach where attendees had to get at least two of three FX stamps to receive prizes such as: *Custom FX bus mini-fig LEGO set *Commemorative FX event posters created by a local artist *Limited-edition FX electronic-fare cards with day-pass values *Ice cream coupons *FX foldable bus bank *FX-themed super-hero capes for kids