'An average person is going to say 'a minute - that doesn't matter a bit.' But it can matter a whole lot because it might mean the difference of a bus making a transfer point,' says Drew Beck, Metro Transit planning manager. Officials say the streamlining of the stops on Johnson and Gorham has improved bus times, with a gain of 30 seconds to two minutes.

Residents protested the proposed elimination of the stop in front of Yahara House, a clubhouse for people with mental illness at 802 Gorham St. Last year, Metro thinned stops along Gorham and Johnson streets. But on the dense isthmus, there may be too many stops.

On the peripheries of the city, which tend to be more sparsely populated, bus stops are already spaced out that much or more, Metro says. This project is needed to bring these corridors into compliance with the Transit Planning Guidelines of spacing bus stops, in general, between 3/16 and 1/4 mile apart.' In its 2013-2017 Transit Development Plan, Metro recommends 'a bus stop consolidation program to remove or relocate excessive bus stops in central Madison, particularly on the Jenifer Street, Johnson Street, Gorham Street and Monroe Street corridors. Metro's solution is to cut down on the number of bus stops on heavily used routes. Says Kamp: 'If I miss a bus at a transfer point, I'm going to have a half-hour wait, maybe an hour on weekends.' Kamp says that these routes routinely arrive late at transfer points, meaning passengers are regularly missing connections. Buses on these routes don't have to stop at every intersection, only if they see someone standing at a stop or if someone signals they want to get off.īut this system, Metro officials say, makes it extremely difficult to run buses on time. Right now, there are stops at all seven intersections on Jenifer between Williamson and Baldwin Street. Madison Metro will move the routes back to Jenifer when the street reopens in the fall, but plans to have fewer stops. During the reconstruction, Metro will most likely reroute buses that run on Jenifer Street one block over to Spaight Street (the detour routes are not yet final). This year, the city is going to rebuild Jenifer Street from Spaight Street to Few Street, along with portions of some cross streets. 'That often happens when you're making changes with a transit system.' 'I think it benefits the whole, even if there is a smaller group negatively impacted,' Kamp says.

But he insists the changes will improve the overall system, which hit 15 million riders for the first time last year. It is planning to cut stops along a few routes, including Jenifer Street, a neighborhood where many people ride the bus and have grown accustomed to their stops.Ĭhuck Kamp, Madison Metro's general manager, recognizes that some people won't like the changes. 'It gets harder and harder for her to compete against the car system.'īut Madison Metro says the elimination of some bus stops along heavily used bus routes is a necessary evil, to help make the buses run faster and more efficiently. 'Just watching my mom and her aging, I see it's a struggle to stay engaged in the community as more and more barriers keep being put in front of her,' Barrett says. And so Barrett, who is a member of Madison Area Bus Advocates, fears how changes proposed by Madison Metro - to thin out bus stops along routes through the isthmus - might limit some people's independence. Michael Barrett doesn't ride the bus all that much, as he mostly gets around by bicycle.īut his mom and an elderly neighbor both depend on Madison Metro to get out.

Madison metro detours