SolTrans makes systemwide changes
Change is in the air, and Solano County Transit (SolTrans), the public transit agency serving Vallejo and Benicia, is making significant changes to its routes. Over the past two years, SolTrans has worked with the public to reimagine public transit in the region. The goal was to make the system more accessible and convenient to the riding public so that they could better connect locally and with other transit agencies in the Bay Area. Starting July 1st, 2019 those changes will take effect.
Routes 80 and 85, which serve Fairfield to the North, and Del Norte BART to the South, will combine into the Red Line. In addition to a new name, it will also have new stops. To the North, SolTrans will now connect with the Amtrak Capitol Corridor train service in Suisun City. This system will allow for riders in the region to connect not only to Sacramento but also to other destinations that Amtrak serves. A new stop will be added in North Vallejo, along Highway 37, which will not only help connect local riders to the San Francisco Ferry service, but it will also serve Six Flags Discovery Kingdom. This change means that visitors from San Francisco, Fairfield, and Suisun City will now be able to use the bus to visit one of Vallejo’s largest regional attractions while saving them the cost and hassle of parking. Another new stop will serve Solano Community College in Fairfield at Suisun Valley Rd. and Kaiser Dr. Finally, riders from Suisun City and Fairfield will now be able to connect with the Del Norte Bart Station without changing buses. That change will save SolTrans riders time and offer even more convenience for their daily commute to work.
Their plans for the local service will yield higher frequency and longer operational times each day. They accomplished this by focusing their routes along the high-use corridors of the community to maximize the number of people that are using their services. The increase of the frequency and duration will allow for more access for the public by making it both more convenient and more practical for them to make use of public transit.
On many routes, the frequency will increase to 30 minutes, allowing transit riders to get back and forth more quickly to work, medical appointments, or shopping. Riders will also now be able to ride the bus later. Buses will run until 9 p.m. on local routes, which will allow for those getting off work later to be able to use public transit as opposed to having to wait for a taxi or for friends/family to pick them up.
To be able to offer the use of buses more frequently and at later times, service on routes that were vastly underutilized had to be eliminated. To accommodate those riders, SolTrans has entered into an agreement with Lyft to provide subsidized service in Benicia and some parts of Vallejo to help replace some of that lost service. A nominal rate increase was also put in place to help fund the increased service and to account for inflationary cost rises that SolTrans faced.
Public transit becomes more viable the more people use it. In order to create a larger system, there has to be the ridership to support it. SolTrans hopes to create a public transit system that is more practical and serves the most people so that they can meet the needs of the community while encouraging greater ridership through better convenience. For more information about SolTrans and their upcoming changes please visit http://www.soltransride.com/planning/coa/
