Paul Bass Photo
Ludean Spears aboard the 243: Connecticut has the money.
Ludean Spears shelled out $68 for a monthly pass and another $48 for her daughter so they could return riding CT Transit buses Monday.
She wasn’t pleased.
“I can barely afford to live in this state,” Spears said while riding the 243 from her Amity home down Whalley to downtown, where she would then switch buses to get to her job in the logistics department at the West Haven Veterans Administration (VA) hospital. “Let the people ride ride for free.”
Spears had plenty of company among riders interviewed on the first weekday morning that it cost $1.75 again (or $2 if you don’t have exact change or a prepaid card or phone app) to ride the bus. The state Department of Transportation (DOT) reinstated the fares Saturday after a year-long pandemic holiday. Click here and here to read two stories offering arguments about whether it was the right policy move; it would have cost Connecticut an estimated $45 million a year to keep rides free.
Kassia Ford (left, with LaTanya Sledge): "We broke!"
LaTanya Sledge was still waiting on receiving a 10-ride pass her insurance company is mailing her when she boarded on Sunday.
“I was so embarrassed because the bus driver stopped the bus. Everybody’s like, ‘I gotta go to work! [He said:] ‘Get off or pay your fare. Get off and wait for the next bus. Go to the ATM.”
On Monday morning Sledge and her friend Kassia Ford were waiting on Elm Street to catch the bus to Sargent Drive for an APT Foundation group session. They said they ride the bus “all day long, every day,” to Long Wharf, to Hamden Plaza to a volunteer gig at the VA.
“It’s going to make a big difference” Ford said of the reinstated fares. “We don’t have the money right now.
“We broke!”
One regular rider, retired Yale dishwasher Keith Walker (pictured above), agreed with the state’s decision.
“How can you complain? You rode for free!” Walker said about the now-ended fare holiday while riding the 243 downtown to visit Wells Fargo bank.
“We ought to put back into the system. It’s like social security. If you don’t put nothing into the system, you can’t get nothing out of the system. It’s like life. You’ve got to take life like it gives it to you.”
The state for weeks advertised the pending return of fares in the front-window route ticker. It added a new phone app for paying for rides as well.
On Monday morning it had supervisors like David Nieves (pictured above) checking with drivers to make sure the fare boxes were working right. So far, Nieves reported, the drivers reported no problems.
The state has no plans to reinstate fare-free service. But it is working to expand and improve service based on feedback from riders, according to DOT spokesperson Josh Morgan: It is adding direct service from New Haven to Wallingford’s Amazon facility as well as an express route between New Haven’s and Orange’s business districts; and studying making fares uniform statewide and expanding discount programs.
CT Transit General Manager Thomas Stringer Jr. said he was pleased with the “full-team effort by his staff over the two past weeks to prepare for the fare return by “supporting the riders by answering their questions and providing general assistance.” In the lead-up to Saturday, CT Transit put the notices and bilingual signs on buses about the fares returning along with e‑alerts, social media posts, and telephone “hold” messages.
Drivers, meanwhile, were rolling with the change.
Their union president, Amalgamated Transit Union Local 281 President Ralph Buccitti, reported hearing no complaints about Monday morning’s resumed-fare rollout.
He said his members are split on the decision. Some applaud it: They were “overwhelmed” by so many people hopping on buses for short distances.
Others report that collecting fares slows down the rides, makes it harder to stay on schedule.
For Buccitti, free fares are an “equity” issue: Many regular riders have little money, he said. Another twenty dollars or more a week for bus rides hits hard people living in or near poverty, even if they’re making $17 an hour.
“To be consistent with transit equity, not having bus fares is the way to go,” Buccitti argued.
Ludean Spears makes close to $38,000 a year at the VA, she said. So the $68 monthly bus pass takes a real bite out of a budget that covers her family, which includes two children. Because of a school bus driver shortage, she needs to shell out the extra $48 a month for her daughter to get from their Amity home to Achievement First High School, she said.
As the bus rolled from Whalley to Elm, she reflected on how wealthy people pay a far smaller percentage of their income on taxes in Connecticut than do working people with incomes like hers. She pointed to the Yale buildings outside the window: “Look at the millions they pull in and don’t pay taxes,” she said.
“We have the money in Connecticut,” Spears argued. “We give it to the rich people and let them write off everything.” Then she disembarked to catch her connection, put in a day’s work, then catch three buses home.
Click on the video to watch two regular riders discuss the return of bus fares, on the “Word on the Street” segment of WNHH FM’s “LoveBabz LoveTalk” program. Click here to subscribe to WNHH FM’s“LoveBabz LoveTalk” and here to subscribe to other WNHH programs.
The buses weren’t free for 2 years. There was a pandemic pause from approximately 3/20-9/20. People who activated multi day passes prior to the pause did not get their bus passes reactivated upon resumption of fares. In the summer of 2021, buses were free on weekends. Then we had the one year of no bus fare from 4/22-3/23.