AATA CEO Michael Ford, hard at work. Ford took the helm of the city's transportation system in late July.

James Dickson | AnnArbor.com

After Michael Ford was hired as the new CEO of the Ann Arbor Transportation Authority in July, Mayor John Hieftje showed him a photograph. It felt like a rebuke from history.

Taken sometime in the early part of the 20th century, when Fielding Yost still prowled the sidelines for the Michigan Wolverines, the photo depicted a crowd arriving by the trainload to a Wolverines home game. That image contrasted favorably against the gridlock that's become commonplace on football Saturdays a century later.

Maybe they had it right back in the day, Ford said.

Football fans arrive in Ann Arbor by the trainload on a football Saturday in October 1909.

Courtesy, Bentley Historical Library

"That infrastructure is still in place," Ford added. "The challenge is crafting alternatives that are reliable and attractive" enough to convince thousands of people to avoid driving their cars into the heart of town on game day.

But that photograph was taken before automaking became southeast Michigan's bread and butter, and before the automobile became synonymous with Americana itself.

A child of the Pacific Northwest - raised near the University of Washington in Seattle and a graduate of Pacific University in Oregon - Ford was surprised to see the extent to which Michiganders hold the automobile in high esteem, even in walkable, bike- and transit-friendly Ann Arbor.

"A lot of people out this way have fathers and grandfathers who worked in the factories," Ford said. "It's a proud history that I've gained an appreciation of."

Ann Arbor has long offered residents alternatives to the automobile. But if the city is going to address the congestion that's become endemic on football Saturdays and in certain parts of the city during the work week, it's going to take a bold move.

With the aging of the population and gas prices like they are, transit is at the heart of the city's efforts to get residents to trade in their cars for bus passes. It is also crucial to Ann Arbor's financial health, Hieftje said.

If gas prices return to the $4 to $5 a gallon range, employers need assurance their employees will still be able to make it to work. Seventy thousand people a day commute into Ann Arbor during the work week, Hieftje said. If high gas prices come to make that commute too costly, some of those people might find work closer to home, sapping talent from the community.

That's why the AATA recently decided to use $220,000 in stimulus funds to cover a shortfall and continue service to Ypsilanti. Ford said thousands of Ypsilanti residents who work in Ann Arbor rely on that service to earn a living. Limiting their ability to get to work would hurt Ann Arbor's employers as well, who would be forced to find, hire and train new talent.

Fortunately for Ford, a lot of the groundwork for bringing more people into the system has already been laid.

According to city estimates, 91 percent of households in the city are less than a quarter-mile from a bus stop, and 99 percent of households are within a half-mile. People who want or need to ride the bus are generally able to.

Since the year 2000, Ann Arbor's GetDowntown program grants unlimited bus rides and discounts at local restaurants to downtown employees who forsake their cars for the bus system. In the 2007-2008 fiscal year, 5,739 downtown employees took about 400,000 rides on the AATA system.

Total ridership is also up. Less than 5 million riders took the AATA in 2004. But in 2008, just under 6.23 million riders used the system.

Beyond 'alternative'

Despite these alternatives - not to mention the city's Park and Ride lots, congestion remains an issue, particularly in the downtown area and along Washtenaw Avenue.

Ford's task is to take the AATA to the next level, from a mere alternative to the automobile to an alternative that offers what driving a car through town cannot - reliably quick travel, not to mention the ability to multi-task while getting from Point A to Point B.

That's not the choice AATA offers now. Commuters forced to travel on Washtenaw Avenue can choose between slow-moving traffic in their own cars and slow-moving traffic on a bus, alongside strangers.

Depending on what the community wants, needs, and is willing to pay for, upgrading parts of the bus line to a Bus Rapid Transit system, establishing East-West service from Ann Arbor to Metro Airport, and implementing some light rail are all possibilities, Ford said.

Ford cautioned that much more work remains before he presents his full vision to the community. But the possibilities are exciting.

Bus Rapid Transit, for instance, would give buses priority at traffic lights. If drivers on Washtenaw or Packard saw buses whizzing by while they are stalled in traffic, more people might consider making the switch.

To get a sense of the transit system's strengths and weaknesses, Ford said he's been spending "a fair amount" of time riding the system, gauging the concerns of people who rely on it to live, work and play.

"Most of what we're hearing is that people want more routes, more service," Ford said. "I'm not going to say that if we build these new systems, people will come...but I do see opportunities."

James David Dickson reports on human interest stories for AnnArbor.com. He can be reached at JamesDickson@AnnArbor.com or Twitter.com/JamesDDickson.