The Greeley City Council next month will vote on a plan to improve regional bus wait times following a presentation earlier this week.
According to community outreach efforts by city staff, 43% of all car trips in Greeley take under 15 minutes. However, waiting for a bus alone can take 25 minutes at best and more than three hours at worst.
Ridership has been on the rise since the pandemic. In 2018 and 2019, annual ridership exceeded 800,000. In 2020, that number fell to below 400,000. In 2023, ridership surpassed 600,000.
A year in the making, the Mobility Development Plan has been finalized. It is the first step in the city’s Greeley on the Go transportation plan, which the council adopted in 2023.
City staff forecast no financial impact on the city as most of its funding will be sourced from various grants over the next 10 years, with any additional costs coming from the city’s Capital Improvement Plan.
“These results highlight the challenges of mobility and connectivity within Greeley,” City Transportation Planner Hanna Feldmann said. “It emphasizes the need for improvements to make public transit a more viable option.”
The Mobility Development Plan was created to combat these transit issues and has been molded by public input from pop-up events, Speak Up Greeley and Greeley-Evans bus drivers. Once adopted, city staff plan to start a micro-transit pilot program and a new bus route along U.S. 34 to Loveland. They’ll also begin construction on the MERGE Mobility Hub at Centerplace within two years.
If approved, the micro-transit program would provide on-demand shuttles for residents, and the MERGE Mobility Hub would provide residents with greater connections across Colorado. Feldmann alluded to the possibility of the mobility hub having connections to Denver International Airport further down the line.
Additionally, the project’s long-term goal is to implement premium transit corridors on 10th Street and 10th and 11th avenues with wait times of less than 15 minutes. The city would also work on increasing the fleet size of the Greeley-Evans bus system to reduce wait times at non-premium routes to less than 30 minutes.
Councilwoman Deb Deboutez asked if residents have been contacted about these additional transit hubs, specifically in east Greeley. Feldmann said they have yet to contact anyone from those areas directly, but once the plan is approved by the council, staff will contact residents before any designs are drawn up.
With the extended wait times, Councilman Tommy Butler asked about the lack of bus stop covers he has observed in his ward and whether this plan would deal with that or if there was anything they could do.
Public Works Deputy Director Will Jones said bus stop covers are a part of the plan in an aesthetic sense, but the contract for those covers will be up for renewal in 2026. They could negotiate additional covers as part of the new contract.
“I think the other thing that’s important to note is that this plan is really leaning into what the shelters look like and making sure that it’s identifiable and contextual to the neighborhood,” Jones said.
Without any further notes from the city council, city staff will return to the council in April at a time that has yet to be determined for a vote to adopt the plan.
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