Busway: Free Rides to UCONN Games Fails to Boost Bristol's Ridership

A new strategy unrolled Saturday among the numerous tactics that the State of Connecticut is using to promote ridership on it's newest Bus Rapid Transit system.  The first promotion that the CTFastrak has associated with UCONN football however appears to have been a bust at the West End of the Bristol line.  Most Americans will agree (as does the author of this blog) that the government does not do enough for those whom have served.   So why not offer free rides to veterans to boost public support and ridership numbers?  It seems this is the thought in mind as the press release from CT Transit has echoed the back-patting rallies of success from Governor Dan Malloy and DOT Commissioner James Redeker as of late.  The press release begins as follows.

"One day after surpassing the million-rider mark, the Connecticut Department of Transportation announced the start of a new CTfastrak Bus Rapid Transit service to all Saturday University of Connecticut football games at Pratt & Whitney Stadium at Rentschler Field in East Hartford. The new transit service will start this Saturday, September 12, 2015, when UConn plays Army at noon. "

So how did it work?  I met up with Bristol residents Justin Moutinho and Newington town planner Craig Minor at 8 am that morning for a twenty minute conversation prior to Mr. Minor's departure.  Justin is the editor at The Goodman Chronicle where he has analyzed public policies pertaining to the CTFastrak.  The twenty minute conversation was quite interesting but I have only included a portion of it in this blog below.

Click here to watch the entire video.
Although the concept of using public transportation for high-attendance events is a logical one, it seems that it did not spur the ridership activity expected.   I drove downtown at the edge of the West End an hour after the game began and the bus stood alone and empty without a passenger's car parked in the adjacent lot known as Depot Square.

A ride back down to the Todd Street commuter lot at 1:15 showed even less promise.  There are roughly two hundred available spaces available at the lot.   Fourteen motor vehicles were on the lot, but most were not commuter vehicles.  In fact, there three times as many cars on the back of this rig than there were parked there for the bus.
One other rig sat parked in the other back corner of the lot.  The area is clearly marked to prohibit such use but when there is no demand for the parking spots there is no point in pushing tired tractor-trailer drivers onto the roadways.  At least someone is getting use out of the expanse of asphalt on the weekend.  Without them the count would only be three.  Another victory?

Reports from Newington residents indicate that new busway stops in their town were just as empty. CT Transit will again offer free rides to veterans when UCONN plays the Navy on September 26th.