MCTS Finalizes New Route Changes

MCTS Connect 1 at Wisconsin Avenue Stop. Photo by Graham Kilmer.

The Milwaukee County Transit System (MCTS) is wrapping up the its biggest redesign of bus service in years.

MCTS has finished the final public input phase of a new planning project called MOVE 2025. The result is 20 potential service changes, which the transit system will submit to the Milwaukee County Board for final approval in June.

The transit system implemented a major route overhaul in 2021 with MCTS NEXT, which rebalanced the system to favor high-frequency routes over geographic coverage. The MOVE 2025 plan is more in line with the quarterly changes MCTS implements to the system. However, it has involved a uniquely robust public input process and resulted in more route changes than the system typically implements in a single quarter.

MCTS doesn’t have the funding to expand the system, so all changes are designed within existing means. Anywhere service can be seen to increase, it corresponds with a decrease somewhere else. Planners were careful to reduce service where there was very low ridership, with the number of riders per hour in the single digits, said Jesus Ochoa, MCTS planning manager.

MOVE 2025 was initially announced in January this year. It began with the public release of 32 potential changes to routes and bus frequency across the system. The changes, developed by planners using transit data and years of public input, were submitted to public meetings and rider surveys over the course of two public-involvement phases. Riders have been very engaged in the process since it was announced, Ochoa said. More than 1,200 people took a survey during the first phase alone. More public meetings and surveys were involved in the second phase.

“The feedback from Phase Two really kind of buttoned up what we’re recommending,” Ochoa said.

The final recommendation will include a handful of newly created routes, including one called Route 59 that will run east and west along Drexel Avenue on the southern end of the county; and another called Route 73 that will run along Mill Road on the Northwest Side. Three routes will see bus frequency increased: Route 57, Route 63 and the BlueLine.

Other routes are being extended, creating more connections to other high frequency routes, or to employment centers or retail, Ochoa said.

“We would be expanding service and streets we don’t serve today, which is, from a connection and access standpoint, huge for our riders,” Ochoa said.

The plan was put together with an amalgam of transit data, formal input from riders and bus operators, and anecdotal information from the same.

“We take a look at how development is growing in the area: What’s the demand? We take a look at, if there’s any historical ridership trends. Are those trends growing? Are those trends maybe dipping?,” Ochoa said. “It’s kind of like a balance between what our riders want, how the area is growing, what the demand is, and then what we’re able to provide.”

Check out the proposed changes on the MOVE 2025 website.