Behind the Times

Ridership’s down

Posted on November 1, 2007 by Michael Ballway
Filed Under Clinton, Downtown, Mike's posts |

Thursday night found me double-dipping, attending the start of the WHEAT 25th Anniversary dinner (excellent food and ambiance by WHEAT and the Perkins School, and great conversation with some civic-minded Nypro employees, who I heard took up three whole tables by themselves) and then hightailing it, with state Rep. Harold Naughton and state Sen. Harriette Chandler fast on my tail, down to Clinton for a date with the WRTA.

Not counting WRTA officials, the three of us driving down from Lancaster just about doubled the “crowd” at the 7 p.m. public hearing

The transit agency’s problems are laid out in the front-page story in Thursday’s Times & Courier, and in the company press release from the week before. We’ll have a more analytical piece in next week’s paper. Essentially, it boils down to declining revenues at the regional transit agency, increasing fixed costs (gas, insurance, etc.) and absolutely horrendous patronage of the Clinton-to-West Boylston bus route.

And the Clinton public hearing, for that matter.

If you care about saving fixed-route bus service in Clinton — and if you’re not one of the two, that’s right, two, riders who bothered to show up Thursday — your last chance to say something is in Worcester Monday. The last two public hearings are at noon in the Martin Luther King Jr. Business Empowerment Center, 237 Chandler Street; and at 7 pm. in the Mount Carmel Recreation Center, 28 Mulberry Street.

Just remember, you’re on your own getting back home, as the Clinton bus doesn’t run in the evening.

Correction (11/2): the Worcester hearings are Monday, not Saturday.