The Main Avenue trolley will return to 20-minute interval bus stops this fall in response to complaints about safety and timeliness of the service, city officials said.
City transit officials changed trolley service earlier this year from stops every 20 minutes to every 30 minutes to reflect a decrease in grant funding, a change that took one of the two trolleys off the road, said Sarah Dodson, assistant director of transportation for the city of Durango.
But the cuts affected the service in a way that Dodson said undercut the safety and timeliness of the trolley.
Since the cuts in May, the department has received an average of 10 calls per week about trolleys running behind schedule.
And drivers said the demand to make a trip from Animas View Drive to the Transit Center in 15 minutes made operators drive faster, causing a safety concern.
Funding for the renewed service comes from a fund the Transit Department set aside when budget cuts were made in anticipation of tweaks that may be needed to keep the service safe and on time.
The downtown trolley is Durango Transit’s busiest route, seeing an average of 390 passengers each day, Dodson said. The trolley has served downtown Durango since 1982, when it had been known as the Durango Lift.
