A few things to report regarding the fight to keep a bus running in the Valley Park Neighborhood and not leave us stranded down here.
I met with County Executive Scott Walker a few weeks ago and presented our petition to him. He listened to our concerns stated in the petition letter. He appreciated that neighbors had offered alternatives to cutting the 13.
In the past week I was informed by his office that there cannot be any re-routing of the #31 or #10 into the Valley as an alternate to the #13. The County transit people say it's too costly, and they would lose close to 200 riders a day on the #31 alone.
So what they are trying to do is looking at rerouting the 13 so it will end up running down Wisconsin Avenue to Downtown, accomodating neighbors who would than be able to transfer to other main routes more easily, and still get downtown.
The only downside, because of budget issues, they would only be running the #13 for 2 hours in the morning and 2 hours in the late afternooon/evening However, they promise to run it as often as possible during those time periods.
Meanwhile, transit will be applying for a Federal Transit Grant in spring which would pay for running the 13 (if it is saved from the chopping block this year) for two years with no cost to the County. There is no guarantee they will be able to get that grant. But if they get it the route would not be at risk as part of cuts to the County budget.
One more thing is they may re-route the bus slightly differently through the neighborhood to save a little time and make it more efficient.
I think we should try and be satisfied with any kind of bus service we can get right now. All this has to still make it through approval by the County Executive and by the County Board, who also have other constituents with bus routes they want to save.
If anyone has questions please feel free to get in touch with me. When I hear what the final word is I will post it here.
I met with County Executive Scott Walker a few weeks ago and presented our petition to him. He listened to our concerns stated in the petition letter. He appreciated that neighbors had offered alternatives to cutting the 13.
In the past week I was informed by his office that there cannot be any re-routing of the #31 or #10 into the Valley as an alternate to the #13. The County transit people say it's too costly, and they would lose close to 200 riders a day on the #31 alone.
So what they are trying to do is looking at rerouting the 13 so it will end up running down Wisconsin Avenue to Downtown, accomodating neighbors who would than be able to transfer to other main routes more easily, and still get downtown.
The only downside, because of budget issues, they would only be running the #13 for 2 hours in the morning and 2 hours in the late afternooon/evening However, they promise to run it as often as possible during those time periods.
Meanwhile, transit will be applying for a Federal Transit Grant in spring which would pay for running the 13 (if it is saved from the chopping block this year) for two years with no cost to the County. There is no guarantee they will be able to get that grant. But if they get it the route would not be at risk as part of cuts to the County budget.
One more thing is they may re-route the bus slightly differently through the neighborhood to save a little time and make it more efficient.
I think we should try and be satisfied with any kind of bus service we can get right now. All this has to still make it through approval by the County Executive and by the County Board, who also have other constituents with bus routes they want to save.
If anyone has questions please feel free to get in touch with me. When I hear what the final word is I will post it here.
