Cambria County (PA) Transit Authority Unit IDs

Urban Division

How the Portable Numbering System seems to work

It appears that Portable 1-6 for the longest time (before 6 for example was reissued) was assigned in alphabetical order, then 7-9 went Op Dir, Man, and Sup. It appears that in 2004 when Cambria County Area Agency on Aging combined HQs with the Rural Division in Ebensburg, they choose 10 for the Ebensburg Senior Center, because 1-9 were taken, but then eventually CamTran needed 10, so now there is technically two Portable 10s on CamTran Radios except different agencies.

Portables (mainly Supervisor and Above Units)

• Portable 1 - Appears to be broken into 1-27 and 1-28.[Speculation]

• Portable 1-24 - Ebensburg Maintenance (Mechanics/Technicians)

• Portable 1-25 - TC Custodian - New as of 1/13

• Portable 1-27 - Maintenance Director (Mechanics/Garage (Portable 4)) (See Note 4) [Verified]

• Portable 1-28 - Buildings & Grounds Supervisor (Bus Cleaners & Transit Center Maintenance) (See Note 4) [Verified]

• Portable 2 - Operations Supervisor - Formerly Dispatcher Use (Same Person) (see Note 2) [Verified] - Does driver training. Handles most GPS issues.[Verified]

• Portable 3 - Buildings & Grounds Assistant [Verified]

• Portable 4 - Mechanics/Garage [Verified]

• Portable 5 - Reassigned Dispatcher Use 4/12 - Former Operations Manager [Formerly Operations Supervisor/Road Supervisor & Formerly Dispatch Supervisor but took over Portable 9's jobs] - Handles various GPS issues [Verified] Left Company

• Portable 6 - Reissued to new Operations Manager (Formerly Dispatcher Use by another person) (see Note 2) [Verified] (Previous Dispatcher left the company)

• Portable 7 - Currently Manager of Safety, Security, & Risk Management (Formerly Retired Director of Operations, Safety, Security, & Risk Management [Verified] For a brief time around May 2010, he was removed from Director of Ops and made Saf, Sec, RM, only, due to Ops and S,S,RM being made separate departments.

• Portable 8 - Director of Operations (Formerly Operations Manager) - Handled some GPS issues such as wrong schedule in GPS unit [Verified]

• Portable 9 - Currently Purchasing/Service Manager (Maintenance) - was Retired Road Supervisor [Verified]/Operations Supervisor

• Portable 10 - Number appears to be some kind of temp number as on Rural it's used by the Ebensburg Senior Center, was heard during the 2008 Halloween Parade yet unit never spoke to discover who it was, never again until Oct '11 for Dispatcher Use until said unit became P11. Also driver acting as helper bus IDed with this number twice.

• Portable 11 - Dispatcher Use - (Note: As stated above, this is the unit who IDed as 10 before.)

• Portable 12 - Dispatcher Use 4/12

• Portable 13 - [Speculation] - Assistant General Manager/Rural Director (hired 08/12)

• • Note 1: Portable numbers are mainly used on Urban. Also the Cambria County Area Agency on Aging has a Portable 10 and shares Rural's channels, so normally Portable 10 on Rural channels is theirs not CamTran's.

• • Note 2: Dispatcher Use is when a Dispatcher goes on the road (each has their own number) to do road detour work or some special assignment (normally special events like parades). Two new Dispatchers appear to have been hired and most likely they will end up with 12&13 or they could take 5&9 which currently are not in use.

• • Note 4: Portable 127 & 128 seem to sometimes be working in the Urban division but seem to work at the Inclined Plane other days. It's almost like a coin-flip as to where they will work at times.

Chain of Command (Highest to Lowest)

• Executive Director (Does not appear to have a Portable Number)
• Portable 8 - Director of Ops
• Portable 6 - Urban Ops Man & CamTran+/Rural Ops Man (New Hire Aug 2011)
• Portable 2 - Operations Super
• Portable 11 - Dispatcher/Supervisor
• Two New Dispatchers that don't have Portable numbers yet until promoted for whatever reason to Dispatcher/Supervisor, but they remain Dispatchers only as of this time (Aug 2011)

Route/Road Detour Work

• Portable 2 - Main Choice
• Portable 5, 11, or 12 - Second Choice for Route Detour Work
• Portable 6 - Third Choice for Route Detour Work (Most likely if 11 has to Dispatch or is unavailable)
• Portable 7 - Fourth Choice (normally only for parades or special events)
• Portable 8 - Fifth Choice but very rare as it's extremely rare to hear in first place for anything

Who's Who In Command

• Executive Director - Seems to never be on the radio and main job seems to be in charge of all directors from Operations all the way to IT, Marketing & Planning (who don't use radios either).

• Director of Operations/Safety/Security/Risk Management - Seems to be the guy who is always contacted of bus injuries and accidents involving buses. Seems also do training sometimes but radio use is very limited.

• Manager of Operations - Seems to rarely be on the radio but at tad more than the Director. Seems to be the driver's boss and handles road detour work when the Sup of Ops is busy and cannot do it, if one of the Dispatchers aren't assigned to it.

• Supervisor of Operations - Seems to be the main operations guy that Driver/Dispatchers go to when they need a supervisor. Is the main roads detour person. Also handles a lot of training, picking up passed-up passengers, & checking areas for buses running late then taking them to bus/where they need to go. Looks to be in charge of Dispatcher/Road Supervisors. (There used to be Op Sup and Dis Supervisor, but it appears these jobs were merged or were always the same job.)

• Dispatcher/Road Supervisor - This is kind of a weird title because they normally dispatch but at any time can become supervisors using their assigned portable numbers and can do anything from training to simple route detour work. The Road Detour Work being the most popular usage. Normally go to Sup of Ops with any thing of importance but seem to make more decisions when acting as a Portable (maybe temp in charge if Op Super is not there) vs Dispatcher where everything seems to go through Sup of Ops. Dispatchers seem always ask a higher up before making a decision unless no one is available.

Other (non-Portable) Units

• Dispatch - Dispatcher in Moxham Garage
• Bus Stop Stop - Person working in Bus Stop Shop at Transit Center on Main St
• Inclined Plane/Incline - Person working the Inclined Plane on Edgehill Dr
• Front Desk - Customer Desk at Moxham Garage (sells bus passes and gives bus

information on phone)

• Transit Center - Maintenance worker down at Transit Center. (Had a working radio now never answers it)

Vehicles

• 124 & 125 - Renaissance Trolleys used for Downtown Shuttle
• 2xx - Buses (Rarely used except for bus replacements when nothing else is available, some training, and one used at Airport Smoke Drill 2009.)
• 5xx - Buses (35ft Buses)
• 6xx - Buses (See Note 5)
• 7xx - Buses (Newer buses with Security Cameras) (30ft Buses)
• 8xx - Buses (Newest buses with Security Cameras) (30ft Buses)
• 900 - Hybrid Electric/Diesel Bus (May-June 2010)
• Axx - Cambria County Area Agency on Aging Buses
• Cxx - Rural Division buses except C6/C7 (See Note 6)
• C6 - Mechanics/Portable 4 Vehicle
• C7 - Mechanics/Portable 4 Chevy Blazer
• C11 - Rural Division Ford Van that's part of Rural but also used by Urban for driver reliefs, picking up passed up passengers, and more. Never seems to leave the Johnstown area.
• T9 - Mechanics Truck (Rarely Heard) - First heard Feb 2011
• T10 - Mechanics Truck (Rarely Heard)
• T88 - Service Truck (Portable 4)
• T89 - Maintenance Pick-up Truck
• T93 - Dump Truck

• • Note 5: 601 was the only known 6xx series bus. It was mainly used on the Windber 21 bus route, but this bus seems to have disappeared and has not been heard of on the radio for 10 months, so it's safe to assume it's most likely gone. As of June 2010, it has still been unheard of.

• • Note 6: Normally Cxx buses are used on Rural channels but some buses stay in Johnstown (ADA) so use Urban and others (Route 30 normally) use it when in Johnstown to talk to Johnstown Dispatch or Johnstown Drivers.

Common Abbreviations

• Barn - Moxham Garage/Office
• Bus Stop (Shop) - Store located in the Transit Center that sells food and passes, plus contains one of the lost and founds.
• Down - Late, i.e. 5 minutes down
• Helper - Can either be a shuttle bus when a detour is in effect or just a bus that's covering part of a run for another driver
• Reporter - Driver (normally new person though when doing "reverse seniority" can be an older (not age-wise) driver) that waits at the Moxham Office and responds when need for covering a run, doing a helper, and more
• Run - Single trip, i.e. 8:30AM Route #15
• TC - Short for Transit Center, located on Main St in Downtown Johnstown
• WC - Wheelchair

Rural Division

The Low-Down on Rural

• • Note: Radio usage is extremely low on Rural channels and most traffic is Area Agency on Aging. No Portable or special units have ever been heard on Rural channels. It's basically a bus to bus or bus to dispatch type of radio usage, nothing special like Urban. Though some fire departments are said to have Rural programmed in to their radios, no evacuations or anything like what is on Urban has ever been heard on Rural. Rural also has no where near the employees of Urban. Also the radio coverage is horrible at times, so landlines need to be used instead further lowering the activity.

Vehicles

• Axx - Cambria County Area Agency on Aging Buses
• CXX - Rural Division buses except C7 (See Note 7)
• T87 - Service Truck (Mechanics)

• • Note 7 - Rural buses usually stay on Rural for when they are not in Johnstown which most are not. Though some buses like the Route 30 Ebensburg/Johnstown use Ch. 3 when in Rural area but Ch. 1 in Urban area so that Urban buses can tell the 30 when they have passengers or vice-versa, and besides Rural channels work lousy in Johnstown due to how far away the repeaters are, Nanty-Glo and Carrolltown. Also, Johnstown ADA routes use Urban.

Vehicles

• Axx - Buses/Cars
• A29 - Car
• A54 - Car
• A57 - Ford Focus

Units

• Ebensburg Base - Aging Agency "Dispatchers" - Seem to check on people who are to be picked up by the buses
• Portable 10 - "Supervisors" at Ebensburg Center who check on people who get Meals on Wheels and don't answer door. (see Note 8 & 9). This appears to be an actual Senior Center Work not an actual Aging Agency Worker.

• • Note 8: Portable 10 appears to be at least 3 different people working out of the Ebensburg Senior Activities Center and worry mainly about Meals on Wheels issues such as someone not answering the door (emergency contact) and it is publicly known that the Cambria County Senior Activities Centers are in charge of Meals on Wheels with the help of Area Agency on Aging to do the actual delivery. Portable 10 once in a while talks with CamTran+ personnel on the radio but this is mainly due to seniors who use both Senior Centers/Aging AND CamTran+.

• • Note 9: Now it may seem confusing why an agency would start with the number 10 instead of starting with 1. It is believed, since Aging knew CamTran was using Portable 1-9 at the time they needed a number (unknown when this actually was), they knew 10 was unused. It seems though this logic has disappeared since CamTran now seems to have gotten their own Portable 10. Yet it seems Aging didn't care to move up to Portable 11, which actually could come in use soon, for another Dispatcher Use. Also, it is unclear why the term Portable was even applied to Aging, as unlike CamTran's various units, they do not go on road supervisor work or go investigate bus accident scenes. In fact, they appear to never leave the office during work. Only logical explanation is that since both their main contacts were in Ebensburg, they could not easily call both Ebensburg base, so making one a Portable unit.

Why Aging Was Added To This Page

Even though it's obvious that the Cambria County Area Agency on Aging is a completely different agency than CamTran/CamTran+, it's included on this page for the following reasons:

• 1: Aging shares the same channels with CamTran+ (Rural) (so if you listen to Rural you hear Aging no matter if you don't want to)

• 2: CamTran mechanics do Aging's mechanical work

• 3: Aging and CamTran+ share a building in Ebensburg

• 4: Because of their use of the "Portable" type for supervisors, it can confuse who's unit(s) you are listening to, especially if you don't hear them call an A or C bus. A being Aging and C for CamTran+.

• 5: Finally, they just are not big enough of an agency to create a completely seperate page just for them.

Inclined Plane

Units

• Incline 1 - Believed to be Operator
• Incline 2 - Believed to be 2nd Operator