The city of Madison launched their new bus rapid transit (BRT) system on Sep. 24, offering riders a new and improved rapid route and 62 new, fully electric bendy buses deployed across all routes to reduce wait times and delays.
While some riders are pleased with the new bus system, others say the new buses are flashy and don’t offer meaningful improvements over last year’s revised routes.
Madison Metro Transit released a statement on Friday warning BRT users of potential service outages until the end of the month, with routes B, 28 and 38 being the primarily impacted lines. This outage comes after District 8 Ald. MGR Govindarajan characterized the rollout of BRT as having “a lot of kinks.”
However, Govindarajan is certain that given time, Metro will be able to work out delays in the BRT system.
“It’s not a one night change,” Govindarajan told The Daily Cardinal.
Even though the $351 million price tag seems costly, Govindarajan said the city has only paid for 6% of the figure out of pocket, with the other 94% being covered by funding from the state and federal government.
“This really hasn’t impacted the city a whole lot financially,” Govindarajan said. “When you look at what Metro used to cost in 2014, we have actually continued to fund Metro at pretty much the same levels accounting for inflation.”
Govindarajan also said the BRT initiative significantly improved bus routes since last year, removing an excess of numbered lines and creating the new letter line routes.
“Before BRT, if you wanted to get from downtown campus to West Towne Mall, you would have to get on bus 2 or bus 7 and then go to the West Transfer Point,” Govindarajan said. “The whole thing would take 45 to 50 minutes. Now with BRT, you can get there in 25 minutes.”
In addition to more direct routes, the BRT system implemented red bus only lanes and dedicated bus stop lights, which Govindarajan said allows buses to get through stop lights and areas of high congestion faster than traditional cars.
Still, students remain cautious about the new bus lines. Since coming to campus, University of Wisconsin-Madison freshman Reesa Karamanski told the Cardinal the buses are “always late,” and she is “never been able to accurately tell when they’ll arrive.”
Brooke Manteufel, a sophomore at UW-Madison, said the new system has been “overall pretty positive,” but the buses don’t seem much more reliable than last year.
New bus pass system causes confusion, frustration among students
Govindarajan and the students all agreed the new system for picking up a bus pass this year was difficult.
Before this fall, student bus passes were given out by the Associated Students of Madison (ASM), but with the advent of the new BRT bus lines, Metro Madison gave responsibility to UW Transportation Services instead.
Govindarajan said this change made him “a little upset” to see the “loss of power” normally afforded to ASM.
Students too were upset at the change from past years. Elias Cassis, a senior at UW-Madison, bluntly said the new system for picking up bus passes was “confusing and sucked ass.”
His biggest complaints were the lack of warning and clarity from the university about the new system and the confusing nature of signing up online for a bus pass. In the past, he said all he had to do “was come down to Union South and swipe my student ID.”
Manteufel agreed the process for applying for a bus pass was “annoying.” She said she struggled to find what website bus passes could be found on and when she did it was “unclear” which bus pass she was supposed to get.
Govindarajan acknowledged his and other students' frustrations with the new system, but reassured students that come next semester, just like the BRT lines, the process would be much more streamlined.
