Donnetta Byrd takes the bus to work four or five days a week.
She doesn't have a car, so "It's a godsend for me because it gets me back and forth," said the Huntington resident, who works in food and beverage at the Big Sandy Superstore Arena. "It takes me right there, and I'm never late."
It's been her pattern for a while, but she's noticed a change lately.
"The bus has gotten very much crowded over the past couple months," Byrd said.
Occasionally, it's standing room only. And it's not just folks who have no other means of transportation.
"A lot of the people that I know ride the bus have vehicles, but they choose to ride the bus," she said. "It's convenient, and it's cheaper."
The increasing number of passengers on The Transit Authority's buses around Cabell County and northern Wayne County fits into a national trend: Gas prices have climbed toward the point where more Americans are looking for alternatives for getting around.
The American Public Transportation Association reports that in the first three months of 2008, 2.6 billion trips were taken on public transportation in the United States. That's a 3 percent increase over the first quarter of 2007.
Locally, bus ridership on the TTA has usually reflected the economy. It was more than 1.4 million in 1979, but declined after that, almost steadily, as jobs left the region. It hit a low of about 536,600 -- a loss of well over half its ridership -- in 1997, but got a little boost in the late 1990s, when TTA reinvented itself. But it wasn't until gas prices started to go up after Hurricane Katrina that TTA Chief Executive Officer Vickie Shaffer has noticed a marked increase in ridership that defies past trends. TTA had 793,714 riders in 2007.
"Historically, it's reflected the number of jobs (in the county)," Shaffer said. "This is the first time that we've seen something else -- something specific, the cost of fuel -- become a factor in the demand for transit service."
Ridership on the TTA is up 6 percent so far this year, compared with the same months of 2007. April is the most recent month available, and it was up 9 percent from April of 2007. And that was well before gas surpassed $4 a gallon before Memorial Day weekend.
Sandy Farrar-Patterson has a car, but takes the bus whenever she can, whether it's to see a friend in Huntington or to appointments with the chiropractor. She likes the bus for several reasons -- convenience, affordability compared with buying gas, and because it helps her decrease her carbon footprint when she doesn't take a car and add to the air pollution.
"It stops 500 feet from my house," said Farrar-Patterson, who lives off East Pea Ridge Road. "It runs right by here anyway, so in these times, it makes good economic sense."
Right now, basic fare is 75 cents. That increases or decreases with distance traveled. That fare will go up later this month to offset diesel prices, but it's still less than the cost of gasoline.
Farrar-Patterson even encourages her 17-year-old son to take the bus when he wants to go to the mall or to downtown Huntington to see friends. With gas prices so high, she wants a reprieve from playing taxi driver, and she figured if she's asking him to take the bus, she should, too.
"It's my effort to walk the walk," she said. "I told him to walk or take the bus, so I'm trying to practice what I preach."
Accommodating growth
Ridership is up, but expanding services to cover growth is a costly and complicated process.
Fares cover only about 11 percent of the costs of running the TTA bus system each year, Shaffer said. A county levy covers about 40 percent of the costs, and the federal government covers 30 percent. The rest of its revenue is from smaller, miscellaneous sources, such as the rent for Pullman Square, the fuel it sells to other public agencies in the county and investment income.
Since taking a personal vehicle became more of the norm over the past 30 years, public transportation systems have faced continually decreasing funding and often been forced to either cut services or raise fares to cope with financial strains.
But TTA is about to expand its services. It will raise fares June 29 to cover its own rise in fuel costs, but in July, it begins service in Lawrence County, Ohio, for the first time since 1973.
Right now, the TTA runs from the Veterans Hospital in West Huntington, throughout Huntington, and to Barboursville, Milton and Culloden.
Beginning in July, the TTA is partnering with the Lawrence County Port Authority and the Lawrence County Community Action Organization to provide four bus routes. One runs from Proctorville into Huntington and back. One runs from Huntington through Chesapeake and South Point to Ironton and back. There's also a downtown Ironton route and a route that goes from Ironton into Ashland.
Lawrence County had been giving up federal funds that could have gone toward transit services, said Paul Davis, general manager of the TTA. The U.S. Department of Transportation's Federal Transit Administration is providing about $365,300 for the new service, which is matched by local funds. In years past, those federal funds have just bypassed Lawrence County and gone to other Ohio counties that would use them.
So for the first time since 1973, a passenger will be able to travel from downtown Ashland to Culloden, if they planned it out right, Davis said. It's the first major step toward a seamless transit system in the Tri-State.
Again, the new service is a sign of higher gas prices, Shaffer said.
In Lawrence County, "We have elderly people and Marshall students," she said. "We have people who need to go to Huntington and Ashland for services, and they can't afford to drive."
The next thing TTA looks toward is putting bike racks on the front of the buses, Davis said. Riders can then have another affordable means of transportation to and from their bus stop.
The TTA is working with the KYOVA Interstate Planning Commission on a grant for that.
Slow to change
When it comes to the future of mass public transportation, in the region and nationally, a lot of things have to fall in line, said West Virginia Sen. Bob Plymale, D-Wayne, who is also director of the Rahall Transportation Institute at Marshall.
Looking back, it's been a slow process to get where we are, at a point when most people drive cars to their destinations. As far as man-made transportation systems, it's gone from trains to buses to motor vehicles in the past hundred years, he said.
It's not difficult to see why people would have taken their cars rather than a bus when gas was $1.35 a gallon, Shaffer of the TTA said. And although they're still not flocking to bus stations in overwhelming numbers, the trend is beginning.
"Because of fuel prices, the ridership on the Milton and Barboursville buses increased first -- because people said, 'Whoa!'" Shaffer said. The $2 it has cost to get to Milton and back is far better than the gas mileage expense of most cars. That fare goes up 25 cents each way on June 29, but it's still a far better deal.
Plymale said one thing that might encourage more folks to take advantage of the bus system would be more vast publication of the bus routes.
The TTA has routes published on its Web site (www.tta-wv.com), but it's working on some improvements to the site, including a comprehensive map that shows all its routes in the same image. Those, along with the new routes for Lawrence County, are expected to be up on the Web site by July, Davis of the TTA said.
The more that people are made aware of transition points and schedules, the more they'll be willing to use the TTA, Plymale said.
Getting that kind of information into everyone's hands is one of the most challenging things to do with efficiency, Shaffer said. You could put it in the hands of 100 percent of area residents, and maybe 5 percent or 7 percent would use it, she said.
What also may help increase bus ridership, Plymale suggested, are more transportation kiosks stationed in the region, which not only could provide shelter for waiting riders, but also provide information about routes and schedules.
The kiosk could be funded by writing a grant, Plymale said. "There are grants out there that make it possible to do that."
He has concerns about the lack of public transportation from Huntington to places such as Hamlin and Wayne. There's also no steady, public transportation to and from the Tri-State Airport in Wayne County.
"If you fly into Tri-State Airport, how do you get downtown?" he said.
There's no question that in the not-so-distant future, the demand for rural transportation to commercial and medical centers will grow enough to get through to the political system so that money is appropriated, Shaffer said.
"Congress has to keep this pattern," Shaffer said. "If they get enough letters from seniors and letters from the disabled, and the industry is lobbying for rural transportation while potential customers are demanding transportation -- because they can't go anywhere anymore -- that's politics, and that's what happens. With the increasing price of fuel, the isolation of rural residents grows proportionally."
For the city and state, Plymale envisions even some light rail, adding that it would be good to have a route from Huntington to Charleston.
"From a state perspective, we need to look at a state transit system and fund it," Plymale said.
The problem is the expense, which is where public-private partnerships would help.
Nationally, the country needs to come up with a federal transportation policy, he said. European countries, which have long been paying more than double what Americans pay for gasoline, are well ahead in dealing with this situation. Those countries have come up with nationwide transportation policies, some of which are tied to their energy policies, Plymale said.
"My personal opinion is that it's incumbent upon (the country) to find solutions for people -- to find ways to make it less costly for them to get to work," Plymale said.
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