Ken Pollock, Director of Bay Transit, the public transportation division of Bay Aging, has announced his retirement scheduled for mid-February 2025, after more than twenty years of distinguished service in public transportation.
Mr. Pollock was first hired as Transit Director for Bay Transit in 2000 and continued in this capacity until 2008. During this period, Pollock grew the transit system from a three-county service area to its current size of twelve counties, serving a 3,000 square mile area larger than the state of Delaware. To support this expansion, Pollock partnered with all twelve county governments and the towns of West Point and Colonial Beach to bring public transportation services to transportation disadvantaged and elderly residents throughout the region. Under Pollock’s leadership, Bay Transit added seasonal trolleys in Colonial Beach, Kilmarnock/Irvington/White Stone, and Urbanna, as well as deviated fixed-route services in Gloucester, West Point, and Tappahannock.
In 2008, Pollock was hired as a Rural Transit Program Administrator for the Department of Rail and Public Transportation where he worked closely with many of the rural transit systems in the Commonwealth. In addition to managing DRPT’s Rural Transit Assistance Program, Pollock also oversaw the National Transit Database data collection and reporting to the Federal Transit Administration.
Pollock returned to Bay Transit as Director in 2011. In 2013, Pollock was appointed as the Community Transportation Association of Virginia’s (CTAV) representative on the Transportation Service Delivery Advisory Committee (TSDAC) to advise the Commonwealth Transportation Board on the distribution of new state transit funding and served on the committee until 2018. He is a past CTAV board member and served as the association’s President from 2004-2008. He also served on the board of the Virginia Transit Association (VTA).
At the VTA’s 2024 Annual Conference & Bus Expo in May, Pollock was awarded the Helen Poore Transit Professional Distinguished Service Award, in recognition of his dedicated service to the public transportation industry. The award marked the fifth consecutive year that Bay Transit has been recognized with an award from the VTA.
In 2015, Pollock managed the construction of a new administrative office and bus maintenance facility in Gloucester that was built to the U.S. Green Building Council’s Gold Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) standards. The LEED program provides a framework for healthy, highly efficient, and cost-saving green buildings, which offer environmental, social and governance benefits.
Beginning in 2019, Pollock coordinated strategic partnerships with several organizations across the Bay Transit service area. A total of sixteen Bay Transit bus shelters were installed across the region including at the Rappahannock Community College (RCC) campuses in Glenns and Warsaw, VCU Health Tappahannock Hospital, and income restricted apartment complexes in Gloucester, Essex, and Middlesex Counties. In 2020, Bay Transit and the RCC Educational Foundation began offering free rides to RCC students to and from any of the four RCC campuses in the region.
In June of 2021, Bay Transit launched the highly successful Bay Transit Express ride hailing service in the Gloucester Courthouse area. By April of 2022, ridership on Bay Transit Express was regularly eclipsing ridership on the remaining deviated fixed-route service in Gloucester. With the support of Gloucester County, the service was expanded to Gloucester Point in October of 2022. Today, more than 1,720 trips on the award-winning Bay Transit Express system are taken in Gloucester County each month. Earlier this month, Pollock eliminated the under-performing deviated fixed-route line in West Point and replaced it with Bay Transit Express – Paper Trail, which serves the Town of West Point, portions of King & Queen County, and Eltham.
In 2021, Pollock partnered with the Rappahannock Art League (RAL) in Kilmarnock to launch the “Art in Transit” judged competition to raise awareness about, and financial support for, the two non-profit organizations. Bay Transit’s share of the proceeds from entry fees, artwork sales, commissions and sponsorships go toward a Rappahannock Community College scholarship fund for Bay Transit’s frontline employees, children, or even grandchildren; as well as its New Freedom Program, a low-cost transportation service for the disabled and/or individuals age 60+ who need to travel outside of Bay Transit’s normal service area or operating hours. In 2024, nearly $11,000 in sponsorships were raised, increasing the scholarship to $2,100, increasing underwriting of New Freedom trips, and placing a copy of the first-place finisher’s artwork on the side of a bus for the third year. Now in its fourth year, Art in Transit has expanded into a truly regional competition and is supported by the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts.
When cutbacks in local matching funds forced Bay Transit to cut the service hours of the popular “Rivah Ride” deviated fixed-route service in Tappahannock in 2023, Pollock explored alternative funding opportunities and, later that year, executed the first ever sponsorship agreement for the Rivah Ride with VCU Health Tappahannock Hospital. In March, with VCU Health branding on the Rivah Ride bus and six of the Bay Transit bus shelters in the area, the Rivah Ride’s service hours were restored. Pollock is now focusing on securing additional private funding from VCU Health for New Freedom trips for area residents who need to travel to and from the Massey Cancer Center in Richmond.
As Pollock prepares to retire in February of 2025, he remains forward looking, focusing on completing Bay Transit’s updated five-year Transportation Development Plan (TDP). “We have been working on a comprehensive, updated TDP this year to ensure my successor has a blueprint in place to continue Bay Transit’s success,” Pollock stated. “It has been such an honor to serve this region for the last two decades and I am committed to ensuring a smooth transition for my successor and colleagues to equip them to continue Bay Transit’s dedication to service and commitment to providing exceptional public transportation services across our service area.”
As she reflected on Pollock’s legacy, Bay Aging President and CEO Kathy Vesley stated, “It has been a pleasure to work with Ken for the many years where he led the development of public transportation for people of all ages in this region. Bay Transit is tasked with moving people living in their individual homes to various destinations at times that may overlap, conflict, and otherwise make it a very complex process. Ken has brought in software, new infrastructure, and a dynamic team to maximize the safety and efficiency of transit services for our region. His leadership, part science, part art, has been fundamental to assisting thousands of individuals depending on Bay Transit to take them to work, health care, shopping, and many other business and social activities,” Vesley added. “His legacy will impact the quality of life for future generations who rely on public transportation to meet their daily needs. I will miss Ken’s great compassion to serve people, and his analytical abilities tinged with ever-present humor.”
For more information about Bay Transit, please visit the Bay Transit website at www.BayTransit.org. To learn more about Bay Aging, please visit the website at www.BayAging.org.
