As bright red mini-buses pass us by, it’s easy to look beyond a public service we don’t all need. Or didn’t think we need or want, until it was free.
We’re talking about Durango’s free city bus ride program this summer and its whopping ridership increase of 34% this July over July 2022, with 40,527 people hopping on board. An outstanding success, it’s the first time this number beat 40,000 rides since October 2017.
Simple and modest, free bus rides are revolutionary, taking more of us off the road. As the saying goes, traffic isn’t other people. Traffic is us.
Free bus rides wouldn’t normally rise to the top of a municipality’s list, but as Durango determines priorities for its 2024 budget and lodgers tax uses, it makes good sense to keep this program rolling. (Couldn’t resist.) It’s a quiet kind of effort for residents – we like it.
Transportation isn’t sexy in the way that extended trails or new bike parks are, but free rides make good sense. The program has been well-received to the point that we’d like to see even more buses and routes, and increased transit times. In particular, later evening hours to accommodate service workers. The last ride out from the transit center is 8:40 p.m. Not so helpful for nighttime workers, serving tourists downtown. That’s where the seasonal money is and so should be the public transportation.
A 34% increase in ridership is telling. Preteens en route to river floats are squeezing in with inner tubes; neighbors are chatting across aisles or tuning out, catching a few minutes of podcasts. Workers are giving it a try. The program has even created some FOMO (fear of missing out). We want to ride, too.
As reported in The Durango Herald on July 21, city Transportation Director Sarah Hill said about 60% of riders take the bus because they don’t have access to a vehicle or bicycle. The other 40% are choice riders – those who take the bus because it’s convenient. Choice riders prefer to avoid traffic or have personal goals and values related to reducing carbon emissions, and environmental footprints.
Not everyone can purchase an electric vehicle. And some workers are just done with parking.
Durango is doing right by its citizenry – the purest concept of government is serving its people. Contrast this with what’s going on in national politics, far removed from constituents. As Hill recently told City Council, this enterprise of free rides is simply a public service.
In that moment in the back of the room, Tom Sluis, Durango public information officer, thought, oh, right, that’s our job. “We are not a for-profit enterprise, but we do have fiscal responsibilities,” Sluis said. “Our job as a government is to simply help people. Does that radical idea still resonate with people these days? What is our level of responsibility to each other?”
We like this question so much, it’s worth repeating. What is our level of responsibility to each other?
The ride share plan was put in motion (excuse us, again) before our recording-smashing high temperatures in July in the Southwest and the boosted potency of heat held, then emanated from paved areas.
As our nation considers whether air-conditioning should be a public right, let’s add to this free bus rides – at least in the summer. As it is, saguaro cactuses in the Sonoran Desert are literally wilting; people suffering heat stroke in the South are zipped into body bags filled with ice; and recent studies prove that as the mercury rises, our cognitive abilities and performance dip. Free bus rides benefit our health and the climate.
Considering harmful ozone impacts, about 85% of greenhouse gas emissions from transportation originate with daily commutes. This number matters, just like that 34% increase in ridership.
Thank you, Durango, for getting us on the road (oops) to more prosperity and sustainability, making this place even more livable. When on the bus, we’re contributing to this. And we didn’t even realize it.
