Buses take trial run, gear up for June 23|[6/14/06]

Published 12:00 am Wednesday, June 14, 2006

Vicksburg’s public transit system has a launch date set for this month, city officials said Tuesday as a few of the system’s potential customers were taken on a test ride.

The city will host a kickoff party for the system it calls NRoute on June 23, said City Planner Wayne Mansfield. Minibuses will actually start traveling scheduled routes on June 26.

&#8220It’ll be a big public event,” said Mansfield, who described the kickoff as a kind of ribbon-cutting, though the specifics have not been worked out.

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In the meantime, he said, the buses are still being outfitted with logos and sound systems that will play mostly blues and jazz music, along with some country and rock. Eight drivers have been hired , four full-time and four part-time, and are continuing training to learn the ins and outs of the buses and the routes, Mansfield said.

One of those drivers, Shirley Love, escorted 18 passengers, almost all from the city’s Senior Citizens Center on Walnut Street, around the city on one of the planned routes Tuesday, a month to the day after the buses arrived in town.

Six of the 20-seat, wheelchair-accessible Ford E-450 buses were bought from Starcraft Bus of Birmingham, Ala., with a $488,000 federal grant. The Board of Mayor and Aldermen voted to amend its budget in April, adding $181,550 into the bus fund and authorizing spending $237,790 to get the system running. The remaining $250,000 went into the general fund to be apportioned for other projects.

The decision to seek the grants and commit local funds followed a Chamber of Commerce study assuring the buses were needed. Skyrocketing fuel costs in the past year have added even more impetus, Mayor Laurence Leyens said.

Fare per trip will be $1.50 each way for regular routes, 75 cents for riders 60 years and older and $3 for those who want to arrange to be picked up at their homes or elsewhere off a scheduled route. That revenue will cover about 10 percent of the operating cost, with the rest coming from city, county, state and federal tax funds plus donations from area businesses and revenue from advertising signs inside the buses.

The city’s last effort to institute a transit system, a system of downtown trolleys 11 years ago, failed to catch on. The last full-size bus system shut down in the 1960s, but for decades before, the city had been served by public transportation going back to electric and horse-drawn carts.

The new plan is to operate the buses in 40-minute intervals from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday to more than a dozen stops, with adjustments made to meet demand.

The buses are being stored in the parking garage at South and Walnut streets downtown, a hub that will serve as a starting point for each of the system’s seven daily routes, said program planner Audrey Jackson. Tuesday’s excursion followed one of those routes, beginning at the parking garage and traveling east on South Street, through downtown and eventually covering stretches of Mission 66, Indiana Avenue, both North and South Frontage roads and Pemberton Square Boulevard. Stops along the way included the Big Lots/El Sombrero parking lot off Plaza Drive, Kroger on Pemberton Square Boulevard, Wal-Mart SuperCenter on Iowa Boulevard and SuperValu Fresh Foods off Indiana Avenue – a sidewalk just south of the Vicksburg Police Department on Monroe Street, Pemberton Square Mall and River Region West on North Frontage Road.

In all, the circuit covered many of the city’s main routes and returned to the South Street parking garage in just less than an hour.

Tuesday, even the air conditioner blasting full speed from the back of the bus was drowned out by the chatty passengers, who shouted in vain to acquaintances on the street, traded stories on certain buildings and businesses – both existing and only remembered. They asked questions about the details of the planned system and offered advice of their own for Jackson.

&#8220I would like to see the hours extended to maybe 10 (p.m.),” said passenger Carl Yelverton when asked some of his suggestions, adding that the buses should also run on weekends. &#8220I’d like to see seven days, but at least Saturday. A lot of seniors go out shopping on Saturday.”

The trial run itself was not without some minor glitches. A rider who asked to test the cord strung above the windows to signal to the driver to stop at an unscheduled location wound up pulling one end of the cord completely out of its attachment at the front of the bus, causing the red &#8220Stop Request” light above the driver to remain on for the remainder of the trip. Others, including Jackson, said they would report &#8220grinding” around the back left wheel during sharp right turns.

Still, the inaugural passengers applauded when the tour came to an end.

A quartet of members from the Red Carpet Belles, decked in their trademark purple and red outfits, rode along and said afterward they thought the system could help a lot of people in the city. All four still drive, they said, but might use the buses to go on group shopping outings, for instance.

&#8220I think it was absolutely wonderful,” said Arveta Avant, one of the Belles. &#8220I hope everybody takes the opportunity to try it at least once.”