The Mission Group

The Mission Group

Welcome graphic

The Mission Group is an innovative planning firm developing cutting-edge strategies for improving the functioning of cities.

The Mission Group supports organizations and agencies that are interested in producing “breakthrough service” in the fields of public transportation and urban development. We are especially effective at helping devise “big picture” strategies which are based on a rigorous analysis of market behavior and strategic goals.

The Mission Group was founded in 1996 by Alan Hoffman. A former professor of Service Sector Management and Market Research at INCAE (the Central American Institute of Business Administration), Alan holds planning degrees from both Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and is a frequent speaker at conferences and workshops across the U.S. and around the world.

JUST PUBLISHED (March 2008)

Advanced Network Planning
for Bus Rapid Transit

The Quickway Model as a Modal Alternative to "Light Rail Lite"

This study, commissioned by the Federal Transit Administration and published through the National Bus Rapid Transit Institute of the Center for Urban Transportation Research at the University of South Florida, compares and contrasts two fundamentally distinct modes of BRT: the Quickway Model and the rail emulation, or "Light Rail Lite" model.

The study's central finding is that the Quickway model, which is little understood or practiced within the United States, can offer signficant benefit to urban regions intent on creating more effective transit networks. More than being "the poor man's light rail," Quickways--fully grade-separated bus guideways--can cost-effectively support a range of local, express, and branching services that together create significant public value, lead to major increases in ridership, and even lead to "phase shifts" in the role that transit plays in a region. Quickways, rather than being a "stepping stone" to light rail, are rather a fundamental building block in creating transit networks better matched to modern city form.

In every international case cited, the Quickway model was chosen--or backed into--as a response to the absolute need to meet ambitious ridership or mode split targets which were developed exogenous to the transit planning process. For U.S. cities that choose to set similar targets, Quickway infrastructure and service planning can become powerful tools to helping achieve these goals.

The study (in pdf format) may be downloaded from the NBRTI's site here:

Click here to download report

Bus Rapid Transit Technology Seminar
Eagan, Minnesota
23 May 2006

Transit and Urban Mobility:
The Role of Bus Rapid Transit
in Shaping and Serving Cities and Regions

This seminar, sponsored jointly by Hennepin County, the Institute of Transportation Engineers, and the Minnesota Valley Transit Authority, provided a state-of-the-art look at issues in planning and design of Bus Rapid Transit. In this presentation, Alan Hoffman elaborated on the two key BRT modes--"Lite Rail Lite" and "Quickway-based" systems--and placed them both in the context of larger transportation and urban development strategies.

Click Here to Download File (9 MB pdf)

Presentation to the 2005
North American BRT Forum

Beyond "Light Rail Lite":
BRT Lessons from Australia

The North American Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) Forum, jointly sponsored by CUTA and CalStart/WestStart, brought together transit professionals from North America and Europe to review the state of practice in BRT systems design. In this important presentation, Alan Hoffman of The Mission Group challenged the entire North American transit planning community to address the fundamental distinction between two different BRT "modes": on the one hand, the "light rail lite" model that characterizes most "BRT" projects in the U.S., and "Quickway" based models, best typified by Brisbane's busway strategy, that deploys grade-separated infrastructure to support a range of branching and express services.

This presentation also challenges transit planners to develop better and more accurate operating cost models, as most current models fail to take into account the operating efficiencies of BRT services operating in express mode on grade-separated rights-of-way.

Right click here to download file (1.8 MB pdf file)

How to Overcome the Ten Barriers to Effective BRT (Bus Rapid Transit) Planning

This paper, published in the Australasian public tranport journal Smart Urban Transport, outlines ten common errors in or barriers to BRT planning in North America.

Right click here to download file (1.0 MB pdf file)

Addressing Environmental Justice:
Is Demographic Segmentation Sufficient?

Presentation to the
TRB Annual Meeting 2005
Task Force on Environmental Justice in Transportation:
Session #691 - Wednesday, 12 January 2005

Right click here to download file (1.4 MB pdf file)

Course Presentation Handouts

UC Davis Extension course on
Transit-Oriented Development
for Caltrans staff

March 2006

This course outlines key issues in promoting Transit-Oriented Development. The Mission Group offers customized versions of this course for agencies and organizations that wish to raise understanding of how to successfully pursue TOD as a long-range development strategy.

Part 1: Intro to TOD (5.0 MB pdf file)

Part 2a: Transit and TOD (6.2 MB pdf file)

Part 2b: Transit and TOD (5.5 MB pdf file)

Parts 3 & 4: Designing, Planning, Zoning, and Financing TODs (6.1 MB pdf file)

¡Ahora disponible en español!

(con subtítulos en portugués)

Presentación al
Congreso Latinoamericano de Transporte Público y Urbano
Bogotá, Colombia
Octubre de 2003

haga clic aquí (archivo pdf de 5.8 MB)

Course Presentation Handouts:

UC Davis Extension Course on
Improving Public Transportation

Sacramento, California
8 March 2006

Part 1: The Case for Public Transportation (1.0 MB pdf)

Part 2: The Strategic Service Model (3.8 MB pdf)