Kokomo bus service will begin in the mid-summer

Kokomo’s fixed-route bus system will be resurrected this summer, marking the first time since the 1960s that Kokomo residents will be able to hop on a bus – or a bus that looks like a trolley, to be specific.

City officials are due to open bids today on three trolleys, to be purchased with federal grant money.

The former Bureau of Motor Vehicles location on South Union Street also will be purchased out of a $1 million stimulus grant, awarded Friday by U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood.

“If it wouldn’t have been for stimulus funds, we probably wouldn’t be doing this,” city controller Jim Brannon told Kokomo Common Council members Monday.

The arrival of the stimulus money ends more than a decade of considering and reconsidering whether to renew bus service in the City of Firsts.

The debate pitted the relatively low ridership of the current public transportation system vs. the potential cost of a bus service.

Currently, seniors and the disabled can use the Senior Bus Service for free, and everyone else can receive subsidized cab rides through the First City Rider program.

But Kokomo’s use of public transportation lags behind every other similarly sized Indiana city.

In 2008, the First City program provided just more than 87,000 rides, and the Senior Bus handled just fewer than 57,000.

Those numbers compare poorly with Columbus — a smaller city — which offers a fixed-route bus service.

Columbus spent $700,000 less on public transportation than Kokomo, yet handled 106,000 more rides.

Two separate studies — in 2002 and 2008 — have recommended at least adding some fixed bus routes to Kokomo’s transportation mix. The 2002 study estimated adding a fixed-route bus service would double the number of rides per year.

Last year, Kokomo Mayor Greg Goodnight made it clear he’s very much in favor of bringing bus routes back to Kokomo.

In one exchange with Larry Ives, the metropolitan area planning officer, Goodnight was blunt.

When Ives asserted that Kokomo’s present system is “moving people much cheaper than anyone else,” Goodnight replied, “But we’re not moving very many of them.”

Monday, Brannon reiterated plans to begin with two routes and to expand bus service from there if finances allow.

A plan hasn’t yet been formulated to fund the service moving forward, and Monday, Brannon indicated the city might consider shifting subsidies away from First City Rider and the Senior Bus toward the fixed-route system.

The Howard County Governmental Coordinating Council, led by Ives, will run the fixed-route system, using the former BMV location as a transfer point.

Tuesday, Ives said consultants are working with his office and the city to formulate an organization structure for the new system, along with bus routes.

“We’re trying to find destinations,” Ives said. “The universities, the hospitals and Wal-Mart ... those are three definites. Beyond that, we’re looking.”