Officials push for on-demand buses north of Catawba River

Road planners in York County continue steps to close a transit gap in its highest growth areas, though they still have homework to do.

David Hooper, director of the Rock Hill-Fort Mill Area Transportation Study, repeated his case Dec. 21 for a public partnership to provide new demand response bus service. Tega Cay City Council showed interest. Hooper got the same response from York County Council in October, but still needs to bring the plan to Fort Mill.

“I think there’s some homework to do,” said Councilwoman Dottie Hersey in Tega Cay, “but on its face it seems logical.”

High growth areas in Fort Mill, Tega Cay, Lake Wylie and the Lancaster County panhandle are considered part of the Charlotte urbanized area. Rock Hill and the rest of York County fall under a smaller urbanized area. The result is federal funding for public transit in Rock Hill can’t be extended to the growing areas because they’re too close to Charlotte.

“North of the river, out in Tega Cay and Fort Mill, we have no (public) transit options,” Hooper said.

A technical correction to the federal designations has been submitted to officials in Washington, D.C. In the meantime, new transit would have to be funded through state and local sources, along with fares. The South Carolina Department of Transportation has committed to help launch a program.

Due to its size, Charlotte can’t provide demand response, where residents set up appointments for rides. The York County Council on Aging operates a demand response service in the Rock Hill urbanized area called Access, but not the areas that fall within the Charlotte area. Lancaster County has a similar service for medical-only trips and another for multipurpose trips.

“If you’re in a larger urbanized area, you’re not allowed to use federal funding for demand response,” Hooper said. “That’s why people here have been stuck without an option.”

Hooper estimates a new service could be up and running with about a $10,000 annual commitment each from York County, Tega Cay and Fort Mill. The service would operate in target areas along the Gold Hill Road/S.C. 160 corridor, Baxter and Kingsley. Areas that at some point would have a fixed-route transit service, but need something smaller in the short-term, Hooper said.

“These are some of the key points where it would work, or should work,” he said. “That’s a dynamic corridor. There’s a lot of change there. That’s where it would be likeliest for success.”

The new program would be an extension of the existing one through York County Council on Aging. That group has 22 vehicles. Its contract with the county extends 18 months. A new contract or extension could be an opportunity to include the new service.

“We also need to know when this is going to start so we can budget for it,” said Tega Cay Mayor George Sheppard.

Demand response service funding operates based on passenger miles, not total passenger count. Hooper said it would be difficult estimating how many residents would use the service. He estimates the initial start-up for the new service could provide 30,000 passenger miles the first year.

Tega Cay Councilwoman Jennifer Stalford said she would like to see a clearer breakdown of the numbers.

“I don’t know how many people this is based off of to know what the need is,” she said. “We know there is a need.”

Council also wanted to know how trips are prioritized, whether rides to social events rank differently from rides to work or medical appointments. Hooper said existing demand response largely is used for medical trips. The most common use is for rides to dialysis appointments.

“Usually they are trips that are medically based, overwhelmingly so,” Hooper said.

The county, city and town would have to agree on a time to start the service, and a number of miles to fund the first year to determine their costs.

This story was originally published December 30, 2015 at 12:38 PM with the headline "Officials push for on-demand buses north of Catawba River."