Public City Bus Transportation Could Be Good for Traffic Flow + The Environment

Maybe it's because I'm a city boy but I like the idea of mass commuter transit between Lewiston-Auburn and Portland. I like what city officials say and I would like to see commuter bus service between all of the major towns in Maine along major routes, like 202, 100, 196, parts of Rt. 1 and so on. In my opinion public commuter transit will only work if the culture accepts it. It's cheap and it is convenient. When I first moved to Bangor I took the bus a few times until I met people with cars and then I got rides from friends and co-workers. Then I finally got a car and then I was all set. Notice, I bummed rides over taking the bus. I’m not speaking for everyone but I fell into the culture of driving everywhere.

It never dawns on me to take the Lewiston-Auburn city buses. I see them all the time tooling around the Twin Cities but I don’t even know their numbers or routes and in 14 years never looked up the schedules. Is it a class thing? I'm not sure, because I took the bus all the time growing up.

When I go to Boston my first thought is taking the trains through town and I usually don’t drive. In Halifax my home town, sort of, it's the same. When I go back now I drive because I know where I’m going, but I would take Halifax city transit and have while owning a car. It’s easy, cheap and convenient. In Halifax there was, and may still even be, a phone number you can call to find out in real time when your next bus is coming.

I realize we're talking about mostly rural areas here in Maine but it's the same amount of gas whether the bus has three people or 60. Great if they could make it work.