24 weekday trips have been eliminated from Rapid Route 215, which runs from downtown to San Diego State University.

Headlines at the website of Metropolitan Transit System or MTS, the agency that operates the buses and light rail in the city, rave about the recent expansion of the San Diego Trolley with nine new stops that stretch all the way to Clairemont, Pacific Beach, La Jolla and UCSD.

But meanwhile, some passengers who rely on the bus -- people with places to go, people to see and time clocks to punch -- have been left waiting at bus stops. And waiting. And waiting.

Under the new contract, new hires will make $20.21 an hour.

During the October-November period, passengers lodged some 30 complaints because the bus they were waiting for simply didn't show up. The complaints are troubling, said MTS CEO Sharon Cooney, who publicly acknowledged the problem at the October 14 meeting of the MTS board of directors.

"The big (challenge) we're really wrestling with right now is missed service," Cooney told the Board.

The reason? As the post-pandemic economy has reopened, MTS hasn't been able to field enough bus drivers to run all its trips. As a result, MTS officials have resorted to canceling trips on an informal, unannounced basis.

This Route 11 schedule was accurate until Nov. 21, when MTS eliminated six of the listed trips.

"It may be you don't have enough drivers so you strategically plan it the week before. For instance, you get an unusual number of call-offs for sickness. Those are all unforeseen when you wrote the timetable," Cooney said last week, contacted by phone.

Last month, MTS officials approved an additional step. On November 21 – the same date as the ribbon-cutting of the trolley expansion – MTS quietly eliminated a total of 239 trips affecting 16 bus routes, all of which operated on the Monday through Friday schedule. In all, eight percent of weekday bus trips have been cut, Cooney said.

"It was an attempt to right-size the service levels that we publish for our customers to the number of drivers we have," Cooney said.

MTS has detailed the cuts on its website, though finding it is not exactly intuitive. It's found under the heading "Alerts and Detours" where it says "No major alerts or detours at this time. See a list of all Alerts & Detours."

Route 7 received the most reductions of any of the routes – 31 eliminated trips.

MTS chose the same November 21 date to publish updates of most of its route timetables -- none of which account for the reductions. Printing deadlines were too early, considering the volume of changes necessary to accommodate the trolley extension, such as the creation of new bus routes that act as feeders to the trolley, Cooney said.

More cuts could be on the horizon. MTS will conduct a review next month that could lead to more eliminated trips, she said.

Signs of the shortage emerged early this year. The number of applicants for open positions declined. People approved for training school weren't showing up. But Cooney is hopeful stepped-up recruitment efforts could right the ship by June of next year.

"We immediately jumped on it," Cooney said, with "serious efforts to get more (drivers)."

She said MTS has agreed to increases in pay, bonuses and health care benefits in a new contract with Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1309, or the San Diego Bus Drivers Union. A vote to ratify the contract was scheduled December 6, according to the union's website. The union's negotiating team recommended a yes vote, said union president/business agent Cesar Buenaventura, in a statement posted on the website. (An employee who answered the phone at the union office on December 7 said the contract was approved, and will go to the MTS board next month.)

"The improvements we want to make on behalf of the employees is in recognition that they have a tough job. And we want to compensate them for that," she said.

Starting pay for a bus driver is currently $19.06 an hour. Cooney said it was "pretty comparable" in the Southern California region.

Under the new contract, new hires will make $20.21 an hour. For the duration of the three-year contract, drivers will receive annual pay increases of three percent except drivers on the job more than 66 months, who will get four percent, according to the union website.

In some cases, people applying for bus driver positions may be offered employment the same day, Cooney said.

Bus driver shortages are not unique to MTS. School districts in Coronado, Poway, and throughout the county have reported severe shortages that those officials say reflect national trends. During a single week in September, a lack of drivers reportedly forced the North County Transit District to cancel forty bus trips.

"It really is a fluid situation and we're trying our best to . . .fill as many of our positions as possible so it doesn't impact our riders," Cooney said.