It's been 10 years since the MBTA reached out to its riders to find out what they think of the service. With bus ridership declining — as well as on-time performance — the transit agency launched what's known as the Better Bus Project earlier this year. This week the T wrapped up the first phase of that project — a series of six public meetings around the Boston area.

The agency received plenty of comments at its public meeting this week in Quincy. The most common complaint was a lack of reliability and spotty service, from commuters like Byron Nash, who said he can't afford a car.

"It runs okay during the day, but after a certain time on the weekdays and all day Sunday it runs like every 70 minutes," he said.

Ben Chan, of Weymouth, said of his bus commute to Quincy, "it's somewhat on time 50 percent of the time, but the other 50 percent — it's sometimes late, sometimes it doesn't show up."

Ralph Fisher of Quincy said what drives him crazy is the method used to pay for the T. "Loading up your card when you get onto the bus ... you know, you have to press a button and put some money in, then you get a card. Meanwhile, people are freezing outside who already have their cards loaded up," Fisher said. If people reloaded their cards at T stations instead of when they get on the bus, he figured they wouldn't use up valuable time. T officials do promise a new and more efficient fare system, but it will take about two years to implement.

The T's Heather Hume coordinated these public listening sessions, and she admitted that reliability is a big issue.

"We don't even meet the schedule that we have, and then we've set these standards for ourselves — and we're not even coming close," Hume said. She added that although more funding is important, innovations like the bus-only lane in Roslindale and new technology can help improve service too. "I think we're embracing better technology internally that allows us to be more effective at the way that we allocate our routes, so I wouldn't necessarily say that it's all about money, but it's also about an internal look at how we manage our fleets."

As far as what's next in the Better Bus process, Hume said, "We're going to be going through a second round of outreach in the fall, and at that point we're going to come back with a series of proposals."

And Hume said those proposal will be based on what the Better Bus team hears.

If all goes to plan, Hume said the 400,000 riders who use the T's bus system will begin to see the changes they asked for early next year.