It’s been over a year in the making but Madison Metro Transit has now finalized a plan to sweep out the old and usher in the new with a redesign of its bus network. We’ve seen many meetings and online get togethers that were full of arguments but also the occasional agreement. These engagements with the public by the planners showed just how much Madisonians love to bicker, bicker, bicker. There were comments and criticisms, debates and diatribes. It was all talk.
I felt genuine sympathy for people who lamented that short jaunts to a bus stop would become much lengthier under the proposed redesign. And then there were the eye rolls when a guy in one meeting treated us to a classic Madison tirade - one that made no sense. In his best censorious tone, he maintained that some people buy homes based on proximity to bus stops and that they have a right to 50 years of more or less unchanging bus service. Using this logic, we stumble into some crazy Zeno’s arrow paradox territory where service could never change because there’d always be someone coming forward and claiming that right. The people who bought their home in 1972 run out of luck this year but those folks who became homeowners in ’73 can put the kibosh on things.
The Madison Metro staff and the planners from Jarrett Walker + Associates are to be commended for their calm, professional demeanors during the meetings. There were times during the meetings when I, if I was there, would have told a speaker or 2 where to stick their comments.
Again, I am sympathetic towards people that bought a house with a nearby bus stop and who now discover that the stop is going to be moved 2 or 3 blocks away. My Frau and I bought our house, in part, because it was close to a bus stop. The pandemic ended that nice setup and the new bus network doesn’t change the situation. But pandemics happen. Things change. People move to Madison. They sometimes cluster in areas that were fields less than 50 years ago. Businesses open in areas where there weren’t many businesses before. Madison has changed a lot since the mid-90s when it last implemented a new bus network.
But I am not writing to defend the network redesign, but rather to offer thoughts on the future. It sounds like the next step in the process is for a federal so-and-so to give it a look-see and judge whether or not the proposed network has a disparate impact on communities of protected groups. If so, it’s back to the drawing board until a plan that passes muster is found. If all is well, then we’ll have a new bus network next year. I’ve been looking at the map of the proposed system and, because I have a blog, I am going to put some thoughts down here.
One thing that jumped out at me was that service to most of The American Center was jettisoned as was all service to the Prairie Lakes mall leviathan thingy. The lone remaining stop in Sun Prairie is at the park and ride, although our neighbors to the northeast are working on their own bus plan which would create a route that takes riders from the park and ride to downtown Sun Prairie and elsewhere around their fair burg.
Over to the west, Middleton looks to lose area covered by bus service but I think buses will run longer hours.
At one point it occurred to me that, with the elimination of transfer points, there will surely be some land becoming available for development. As an eastsider, I am primarily thinking of what would be a nice fit to replace the east transfer point. It’s not a huge, huge tract of land, but a small apartment building would fit there nicely although I suspect a fast food restaurant would be the most likely candidate.
Access to major sports venues gets a boost with the new plan. By and large, buses will serve these places via the same routes but they will run more frequently. The Alliant Energy Center will continue to be served poorly, unfortunately. (Perhaps it will get better if/when the Center gets overhauled.) My understanding is that MMT is disallowed from running any kind of gameday shuttle for Badger games so as not to take business away from private shuttle providers. Whatever agreement that stipulates this also seems to stipulate that MMT refrain from advertising its services for getting to Badger games because I don’t recall seeing any such ads on the MMT website. But perhaps this is simply my bad memory.
It looks like getting to the zoo may be easier for some folks with a bus that runs very close to the entrance. However, it runs only once per hour and the more frequent service a couple blocks away on Mills will be eliminated.
On a personal note, I will be forced to make a transfer for my work commute. However, the buses that I’d take would both run quite frequently so my time stuck out in the oppressive heat and bone-chilling cold would be minimal. Still, I will miss being able to take a single bus to the office. I suppose this means I need to find a new job.
I enjoy going to the cinema and the new network would, on the whole, be an improvement over the existing one. While a new route and its successor, the east-west BRT line, would get you only a block closer to Point Cinemas than the existing one, it will run more frequently and runs from the far northeast side instead of from West Towne Mall. With the 2 bus going away, so does being dropped off right outside of AMC 6 at Hilldale. But you will be able to catch that same soon-to-be-BRT line and walk a couple blocks. This may be a moot point as the theatre’s future is uncertain with the announcement that that section of the mall is to undergo redevelopment and the theatre might not make it to 2023. Flix Brewhouse at East Towne Mall loses 1 lengthy hike to get to it but retains the other under the new system. The downtown movie venues – MMoCa, Arts + Literature Laboratory, Vilas Hall, Union South – all seem to have more or less the same bus service, um, serving them.
I was mildly disappointed to see that Fair Oaks Avenue was being deprived of bus service in the new configuration. But I suspect this may change in the future – depending on the budget, of course, - when Madison absorbs that section of the Town of Blooming Grove around Fair Oaks just south of Highway 30 by the time of which there may very well be an apartment building at 219 N joining all the new ones on S. Fair Oaks. It must be something of a whack-a-mole game for Metro planners to try and provide service to all the new apartments and mini-clusters of density springing up.
As an eastsider, I am happy that we look to be getting decent, regular service down Milwaukee Street and Cottage Grove Road instead of a loop that runs only during peak hours on weekdays. There are an awful lot of apartments over on the east side of the interstate and these new routes will get riders a lot farther than West Corporate Drive. On the other hand, north-south service takes a hit. Buses will no longer go traverse Acewood and Thompson, for example.
Lastly, I will note that it looks like the new C/C1 route will be the brewery run. The C1 will run a block or so away from the eastside Great Dane Pub. As you go west, it'll get you about 2 blocks (not as the crow flies) from North of the Bayou which has started brewing its own beer. Your bus will transmogrify into a C and you’ll head down Atwood Avenue and right outside the doors of Starkweather Brewing as well as One Barrel. Tacking a more southerly course, it will get thirsty folks within walking distance of O’so Madhouse, Parched Eagle, and Vintage Brewing(Capitol East) on East Washington as well as Working Draft Beer Co. and Giant Jones Brewing which are a little closer to the stretch of Jenifer Street that the C will traverse. Also in close proximity to the route will be Old Sugar Distillery. I was going to add Bos Meadery but they no longer have a mead hall. Hopefully there will bee one soon and on a bus line.
A few more (tangential, perhaps) thoughts:
First, I hope that Metro Transit can engage with the business community to get more businesses to have webpages that give directions to their establishments via bus.
On a related note, the Metro Transit website seems devoid of directions for using the bus to get to destinations. With the caveats that you can use the Plan Your Trip feature and I am not a UX designer, it seems like it would be handy if the site had a list of destinations that you could choose from for bus directions. Easy directions for sporting events like Badger, Forward Madison, and Mallards games. How can I get to the airport or intercity bus stops via Metro?
Thirdly, with fewer routes, the signs at bus stops should become more useful instead of simply having route numbers on them.
Next: ensure that there’s fare card unity. The same pass should work on the BRT routes, the non-BRT buses, and, should it come to fruition, Sun Prairie’s bus line.
Penultimately, I hope Monona jumps on the team and comes on in for the big win.
Lastly, what Metro Transit really needs is more money. Someday Democrats will regain control of the state legislature and they need to be given motivation to repeal the law that bans regional transit authorities and take measures to allow cities more flexibility when it comes to raising money for transit.
P.S. - credit must go to Mayor Satya Rhodes-Conway for helping get this done. For all of the Richard Florida kool aid Mayor Dave Cieslewicz drank, I don't recall him really giving one shit about Madison Metro and doing nothing but raising fares. His successor, Paul Soglin, as well as my former alderman, David Ahrens, both said that we are stuck with mediocre bus service until the feds pony up and blamed state Republicans for anti-transit policies. In other words, they passed the buck. Glad they're gone.
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