About Run Equity Framework™
Run Equity Framework™ was founded by Patrick Parents, a former transit operator, scheduler, and transportation entrepreneur with experience across frontline operations, workforce strategy, and operational planning.
Before developing the framework, Patrick spent years working directly inside transit operations — first behind the wheel as a bus operator, and later in service development and scheduling environments helping design assignments, workforce structures, and operational solutions.
Working from both perspectives exposed a recurring reality: assignments that appeared similar on paper often created very different experiences in practice.
As an operator, he experienced firsthand how split runs, extended spans, relief logistics, and overall time burden could shape the true cost of a workday. Later, while working within operational planning and workforce environments, he saw how difficult it was to balance service requirements, workforce sustainability, and operational constraints without a shared way to evaluate time beyond paid hours alone.
Run Equity Framework™ was created from this intersection of operational experience, workforce insight, and modern workforce strategy.
Today, the organization focuses on helping transit agencies better understand workforce sustainability, explore workforce modernization opportunities, and design more workforce-compatible operational structures for the future of transit.
Why Run Equity Framework™ Exists
Across the transit industry, workforce conversations often center around compliance, efficiency, service delivery, and compensation. Yet one critical variable is frequently under-measured within workforce planning discussions: the total time a worker is tied to the job.
Run Equity Framework™ was created to help make that time more visible, measurable, and strategically understandable within modern transit operations.
Rather than judging schedules or prescribing one-size-fits-all solutions, the framework provides a workforce-centered lens for understanding how assignment structure may influence workforce sustainability, operator experience, fatigue exposure, and long-term workforce compatibility.
By helping agencies better evaluate the relationship between operational design and workforce experience, Run Equity Framework™ supports broader conversations around workforce modernization, human-centered rostering, and sustainable transit operations.
A Practical Understanding of Workforce Sustainability
Patrick Parents’ work sits at the intersection of frontline operations, workforce strategy, and real-world transit experience. His approach is grounded in the belief that better workforce conversations happen when organizations, planners, leadership teams, and operators share a common language for understanding operational tradeoffs and workforce sustainability.
Run Equity Framework™ was not created to replace existing systems, labor agreements, or operational planning tools. Instead, it was designed to introduce additional clarity into workforce decision-making by helping organizations better understand the relationship between time, workforce experience, and operational structure.
At its core, the framework helps agencies evaluate time with the same visibility and strategic consideration traditionally given to compensation, efficiency, and service delivery.