RTD has a very busy few weeks ahead of it! First off, Denver Union Station Transit Center opens to the public for a special preview on May 9 with full service on May 11. RTD has lots of information on its website – be sure to take a look if your travels take you through Market Street Station, as your route will change!
Also, May 12 also introduces a brand new service to downtown Denver – the free MetroRide! The buses will travel from Denver Union Station along 18th/19th and Broadway/Lincoln (depending on the direction as those streets are one ways) to Civic Center Station. It’s a FREE service to help supplement the MallRide and its insane (at times) crowds. These buses will run every 5-10 minutes during peak periods (6-9 AM and 3-6 PM).
There are 12 brand new, branded articulated buses to kick off the new MetroRide service. They still have the new bus smell! These buses will run only the MetroRide route and as you can see in the pictures below, they closely resemble the other articulated buses in RTD’s fleet. The MetroRide buses, however, have three doors and are low-floor to help speed up getting on and off the bus.
There are multiple shelters and bus bulbs along the route to mark where the MetroRide will stop. Keep in mind, however, not every stop has one of these white shelters (Property owner objections and utility complications, mainly). They will all have a sign of some sort – no surprise stops are coming as part of this project. RTD constructed a series of bus bulbs along 18th Street to help speed up the loading and unloading of passengers. The bike lanes were even incorporated into the design and construction! This service will go a long ways towards helping ease the crowding on the MallRide while providing additional transportation options in downtown Denver.
Check out the map below for stop locations and RTD’s MetroRide website for more information. See you all on the free MetroRide May 12!
The MetroRide is a waste of time. 18-19th are much too far away to “supplement” the 16th street route and there isn’t much on those streets to attract foot traffic that doesn’t already use other bus routes.
A FAR better alternative would have been to use 15th and 17th streets. 15th already has very heavy foot traffic that would greatly benefit from this service while 17th could benefit from the halo-effect of the 16th street mall to expand more foot traffic into it’s businesses.
Its also worth noting these New Flyer Xcelsiors are NOT hybrids. Being hybrids would have significantly improved their economy on such a short, straight, frequent stop route and steep incline/decline at one end. Especially considering the Xcelsior’s 40,000lb weight and tiny ISL300 powering it.
I understand RTD wanting to use 18th since its the main entrance to the underground station, but they really should have thought out this plan much better. Having the rouse so far from 16th and not using hybrids are big mistakes.
Lance, I think that there is a mistake in your assumptions about the justifications for this service. The MetroRide is not a service for tourists or visitors to downtown, but rather a service for those who work downtown. Since the majority of the large office buildings are along 17th, 18th, and Broadway, this service will help to diversify the options for getting around downtown for those daily commuters, while also easing the burden on the 16th St Mall shuttle. That is one reason why the service only runs during peak periods. To be certain, Denver (the city) needs to evaluate expand the transit options for getting around the city for both visitors and residents, but that is another conversation that needs to start now.
Maybe the lack of foot traffic is because there is no useful transit. Which is about to change. I think this was a very well thought out plan. I just wish it went down broadway all the way to the golden triangle as originally planned.
That was kinda the plan. Look what the mall ride did for 16th st. I know it’s not the same thing, but if we can expand free rides to different parts of downtown you will see new development all along those routes. 14th, 15th, 16th & 17th are doing fine and will get better in time. We need to expanded Denver’s downtown core. The stuff about hybrid buses I could care less about.
Alot more people work in office buildings along 18th St. and 19th St.than on 15th St. Since 17th St. is in between 16th and 18th it will be well served by the 16th St. Mall shuttle and this new circulator. A free circulator bus on 14th St. and maybe with return stops at Civic Center and the Auraria Campus might be a good addition however (down Colfax and Speer).
I don’t know if i would go so far as to say that the MetroRide is a waste of time. It is true there is less foot traffic on 18th and 19th streets, but compared to the 16th Street Mall, many Denver streets have less foot traffic. This should not be cause to eliminate a bus route, particularly a downtown circulation route.
Would a route on 15th and 17th Streets attract a higher ridership? I honestly doubt it. What I think you fail to take into account here is not the foot traffic of the streets the line runs on, but rather the purpose of line for those utilizing it. The 16th Street Mall Ride is intended to shuttle people from restaurant to retail store to bar to entertainment. It is geared for people who intend to spend a day or evening downtown for leisure. What is has actually become, is a commuter line for those that work in Cap Hill or Uptown and live in the Highlands or Riverfront Park, or vice versa, as well as those that utilize the light-rail station at the end of 16th Street. If we wanted to create a new bar/restaurant/shop hopper line, then yes, perhaps 15th street would seem a logical choice (though if we were styling a route along that criteria, a Blake Street/Market Street seems most ideal). The MetroRide however is designed to supplement 16th Street, not duplicate it. It is being implemented for those commuters who are currently using the Mall Ride and want a better solution, as evidenced by its extra run times during peak commuting periods.
Will this route be a success? I can’t imagine it not being one considering the above factors (supplementation for commuters) and the fact that IT’s FREE!
I do agree, though, that not utilizing hybrids or alternatively fueled buses is a mistake in this day in age. Not exactly environmentally friendly. Furthermore, it is sad that this route had to be installed for buses and not something more forward thinking, like light-rail. Clearly the ridership of the Mall Ride would indicate that a light-rail line along this corridor is feasible and warranted. Maybe someday these bus-stops along the MetroRide could be utilized in a light-rail line from Union Station to Civic Center Station (and perhaps even beyond, say, along East Colfax?).
Overall though, I can’t wait to utilize the MetroRide, as well as the new Union Station bus terminal! Thanks for the update Ryan.
I disagree Lance. What I see along this new MetroRide route are a lot of office workers. If anything the 18th and 19th street part of downtown has more office workers than 15th or 17th street. Century Link building, 1901 Broadway, 1800 Larimer, Wells Fargo Center, Denver Place plus many hotels including the Ritz Carlton, the Mariott, etc. That means thousands of office workers and hundreds of hotel guests and unlike those who are on 15th or 17th, they have to walk two to three blocks to take advantage of the Mall Ride.
I’ll have to go with everyone else here, it makes a lot of sense having it go along 18th and 19th. If you work along 17th you can take either bus and be within one block. I don’t think it’s too much to ask people to have to walk two blocks from 16th to 14th either. This will make Northern downtown much more accessible, spurring more development. In a few years we could have a route for even more streets further North.
Holy 1992 Batman! Look at those seats! (I still like ’em though.)
The seats are ultra-flame resistant, if it’s any consolation. Plus, everything retro is coming back in style…
What Jerry G. said. The point of the Metro Ride is to slice through downtown quickly, avoiding the block-by-block stops that you have on the Mall Ride. It is, for lack of a better term, an express Mall Shuttle. It will serve commuters who work downtown and want to get to their bus or rail lines without having to mix in with the tourists, conventioneers and local folks out on the town who ride the mall shuttle.
If you are at Civic Center Station, you can quickly get to Union Station or to either of the light rail lines on Stout and California. If you are somewhere along the mall and want to avoid all of the bustle, you can walk a few block and just hop the Metro Ride, likely saving 10 minutes or more that it could take to get to Union Station.
My only disappointment is that they are unable at this time to extend the Metro Ride route all the way down to the Capitol and the museums, which would have been handy. But it still may happen at some point. I think there likely will be more services like the Metro Ride going forward as central Denver continues to rapidly become more dense and the need for pedestrians to quickly zip from one end of the city’s center to the other becomes even greater. In Portland, it’s free to take the street cars downtown but commuters have to pay fares. Don’t know if this would work in Denver, but it’s worth thinking about.
BTW, I have always thought it would be good to have a free shuttle, maybe with express stops, that runs up 15th to the Highlands and back down 14th. It is a pain trying to get from downtown to a restaurant in LoHi as things stand now.
Now I think we just need a free north/south route to compliment these two essentially parallel east/west routes (and yes I realize they aren’t really aligned to the cardinal directions, but its just easier to think of them that way). I’d suggest a free bus service on Larimer St. (halfway between Union Station and the downtown light rail lines on California and Stout). This service could start from the Auraria West Station, run through the campus and Larimer square, connect with the 16th st. Mall Ride and new Metro Ride and ultimately run up into the Ballpark neighborhood, maybe ending at Broadway. This would encourage some more north/south movement in the downtown and offer better connections to and from the Auraria Campus and ballpark neighborhoods from the downtown core.
Also (and here’s my own selfish plug) it would offer us W-line users an easier and quicker way to access central downtown and the theater/convention center district (rather than going three more stops to Union station and then walking and/or shuttling 3/4 of a mile to get to central downtown destinations). I hear a lot of potential transit users on the West line say “I’d take the train if it took me to the Performing Arts Center/Convention Center/Downtown offices, etc.; they all seem to agree that going to Union Station is a waste of time for them. I think that having a fast free connection from Auraria West Station into central downtown would help boost ridership out here on the West line.
This is a great idea…id say have it terminate at the 38th and blake station.
Some good ideas here. I believe there is a plan for a streetcar line on a route similar to what Chad describes. This would be an excellent first step. Also wondering if any one else has thought about the utility of using the MetroRide for connecting the very large number of patrons that need to get from Union Station to Coors Field. It would get them within a block or two and work much better than the mall shuttle. Of course ideally the MetroRide will run all the time (and add the originally envisioned civic center extension) but in the meantime….