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SMRT Bus Growth

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SMRT Bus ridership has grown significantly since it began.

 

SMRT Bus ridership 

shows continued growth

By Ted Pennekamp

 

The Scenic Mississippi River Transit Bus Service (SMRT Bus), which began operation on Dec. 3, 2012, continues to show good growth over its first few years. SMRT Bus is a commuter bus system for Crawford, Vernon and La Crosse counties. The bus service runs Monday through Friday. 

“The SMRT Bus routes have been changed periodically over the life of the service with the intention of improving ridership and meeting the needs of more people in the service area. Routes were last modified in September of 2015 in which we modified some stop locations in communities and began providing service to Organic Valley facilities (twice daily) in La Farge,” said Peter Fletcher of the Mississippi River Regional Planning Commission (MRRPC). “Partially as a result of those modifications ridership has continued to grow. As 2016 ridership is up 12 percent versus 2015 ridership through the first eight months of the year. As a side note, it is interesting how SMRT ridership has grown even though gas prices are far lower than when the service began in 2012-13 and recent years.”

The addition of the Organic Valley facilities has resulted in approximately 5,000 more rides annually and $5,000 in program support each year from Organic Valley. 

In addition to Organic Valley’s financial contribution, numerous employers and public entities already help to subsidize the bus system. Those entities include Gundersen Lutheran, Crossing Rivers Health, Dairyland Power Cooperative, Southwest Tech and a number of local governments. 

In 2015, the SMRT Bus provided 19,223 rides, a 6.2 percent increase over 2014, according to a 2016 survey conducted by the MRRPC. The MRRPC assists in marketing and promoting SMRT Bus, and routes and schedules are continuously evaluated to provide the best utilization of the service. Grant opportunities are always being explored by the MRRPC to help fund the service.

The survey also shows demographics of who uses the bus service.

“As far as who uses the SMRT Bus, each year we conduct a ridership survey to find out some of those answers,” said Fletcher. “The 2016 survey results indicate that 49 percent of riders are male and 51 percent are female. Twenty-one percent of riders are under the age of 25. Thirty-eight percent are between the ages of 25-44. Thirty-eight percent are between the ages of 45-64 and 4 percent are 65 and older.  Fifty-four percent of riders use the bus to go to and from work, 14 percent use it to go to school, 13 percent use it to go to medical appointments and 18 percent use it for other purposes. Maybe the most impressive statistic is that 79 percent are very satisfied with the SMRT Bus and 21 percent are satisfied. No one surveyed was dissatisfied with the service.”

Prairie du Chien City Planner Garth Frable said the increased ridership obviously increases revenues. 

“We continue to refine the operation to increase ridership and to make the system as efficient as possible,” said Frable. “There are a lot of organizations that contribute financially to the operation – local governments, health care facilities, industries and foundations. There is also a significant annual grant received from the state to support the operation. This is similar to the shared ride taxi the city operates.”

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