Terre Haute Mayor Brandon Sakbun on Monday announces the city’s transit system will go fare free in 2025. Tribune-Star/ David Kronke
Terre Haute Transit bus rides will become fare-free starting Jan. 1, 2025, Mayor Brandon Sakbun announced Monday morning.
“This decision reflects our belief that access to affordable transportation is a cornerstone of a thriving, connected community,” the mayor said, standing before one of the city’s five new buses in front of Terre Haute Transit’s offices across the streets from Hulman Center and the Terre Haute Convention Center.
“For some folks, this is their car to work,” Sakbun said after the announcement. “Transportation is a huge, huge component of a strong quality of life.”
Revenue from bus fares was only about 5.8% of the revenue that Transit received to begin with, said Terre Haute Board of Works director Jesse Tohill.
Transit’s annual budget is a little over $3 million, so fare revenue amounted to about $174,000, which will be covered next year largely by tax revenue from the Terre Haute Casino Resort.
Sakbun said the city had been considering improving its transit system since he became mayor this year.
“I think it was right around early summer when we knew, one, we had the financial means to offer free transit, and two, we actually concluded some studies of other communities in the Hoosier state that had free public transit, most notably in (the similarly sized) Kokomo.
“Once we saw what others could do, we made the decision to move forward with our program,” he added.
Most transit costs are covered by state and federal money.
“It’s important to note that for the city to adjust a lot of routes, a lot of times, and expand, we have to increase ridership,” Sakbun said. “That’s unfortunately the way that the federal Department of Transportation sets the scales for their funding formula.” When ridership is increased, the city will then adjust bus routes.
Another benefit of fare-free bus rides is that not collecting fares will save time and contribute to smoother operations, the mayor added.
Moreover, nonprofits that frequently travel via bus will be able to redirect that money back into the services they provide.
The new buses cost $134,556 apiece, for a total of $672,780, paid for entirely by the Cases Act Operation and Capital Grant through the Indiana Department of Transportation, Sakbun said.
Next year will serve as a trial period for the program, and the city will be focusing on three key goals: Increased ridership, improved service quality and tracking key metrics, such as ridership numbers, to gauge the success of the program.
Also speaking was Indiana State University President Mike Godard, who announced his satisfaction with the college’s transit partnership with the city. He said the school will boost its contribution to funding the transit department by 10%. Debbie Hensley, director of Terre Haute Transit, also spoke.
Tohill said he expects the program to prove successful.
“Once a month, we already have a free Friday and generally ridership goes up nearly 10 times on that day,” he said. “We don’t expect it to be that every day, but we expect to see two or three times the amount of total ridership.”
QR codes will be implanted at every bus stop to give riders route information.
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