Return of Pullman-Moscow bus route?

It’s been a decade since Wheatland Express carried riders between Pullman and Moscow, but local city, university and transit officials say — at the very least — conversations about reestablishing an intercity transit service should be started.

The Moscow Transportation Commission formed a subcommittee on the subject and met Tuesday for the first time. It plans to reach out to officials from Moscow, Pullman, the University of Idaho, Washington State University, Pullman Regional Hospital, Gritman Medical Center, the Pullman-Moscow Regional Airport and major employers, like Schweitzer Engineering Laboratories and Emsi, to gauge their interest in a bus route between the two cities and whether they would be interested in funding the service.

Rebecca Couch, director at UI Parking and Transportation Services, said at Tuesday’s meeting that UI students frequently ask how to get to Pullman and she and other university officials suggest carpooling to the students. She said some longtime UI faculty members say the Pullman-Moscow shuttle should return.

Mary DuPree, Moscow Transportation Commission member, said that transportation “at some level” is needed between the two cities.

Gina Taruscio, Moscow city councilor and council liaison to the Transportation Commission, said determining who would use the service — students, work commuters and/or others — would dictate the bus route and frequency.

“There’s a lot of questions I still think need to be answered to make decisions, but on the surface, I love the idea,” Taruscio told the Daily News.

Identifying funding appeared to be the major challenge for officials.

“If the money was there, boy I’d like to see it personally,” Moscow’s SMART Transit Executive Director Ben Aiman said.

John Shaheen, director at WSU Transportation Services, said the route is needed and will eventually happen.

“The spirit is willing but the pocketbook is weak when it comes right down to funding a self-supported program,” Shaheen said, noting many people would be interested in using a publicly-funded system.

WSU and UI split funding during the Wheatland Express days.

In 2011, the cost to extend the Wheatland Express contract would have exceeded $150,000, according to information from the UI. At that time, the estimated average ridership was around 150 people per day and the average per trip cost was $6. Agreement to extend the contract would have far exceeded that per trip rate, driving WSU and UI to discontinue the service.

Pullman Transit Manager Wayne Thompson said the “elephant in the room” is whether the Pullman City Council would want to support a service that takes people out of town to shop in Moscow.

“I think that’s going to be an interesting city council discussion if we get to that point,” Thompson said.

Thompson and Aiman said providing transportation service to the Pullman-Moscow Regional Airport is a larger priority.

“I would say the Moscow-Pullman connection is probably number two or three on our list of projects to seriously look at, but the airport has to come first,” Thompson said.

Pullman Transit and SMART Transit both operate inside its city limits, so they would need to figure out if and how it could cross into different jurisdictions if they provided the intercity service. Thompson said it would be most convenient if a private company provided the service.

If a bus took passengers to the airport from each city, Aiman, an ex-officio member of the Moscow Transportation Commission, said people bound for Pullman could then take the bus returning to Pullman from the airport and people destined for Moscow could take the bus returning to Moscow.

Aiman said providing bus service to the airport would also alleviate parking congestion at the airport.

Pullman City Councilor Nathan Weller said he has been working to restore the Pullman-Moscow bus route almost since it was canceled in 2011.

“Our cities are so reliant on one another already,” Weller said. “Connecting them further, it seems so logical.”

Weller said he started working on it primarily because he knew students who needed to travel the eight miles to WSU and UI for classes. When the Wheatland Express service disappeared, students had to bear the cost of gasoline for their cars and university parking fees, he said.

“For me poverty and homelessness has always been a huge passion of mine and seeing students suffer just because the universities feel it’s not penciling out — it seems unfair,” Weller said.

Weller said people commuting for work and people who need to see physicians across the border would also benefit from the route.

From a commuter standpoint, Aiman said he thinks there is interest in the intercity service.

“Both economies share workers,” Aiman said. “I think there’s enough people there that would use the service if it were available. The interest is always there but it’s something that would need a lot of buy in.”

After Wheatland Express stopped the service, Weller said College Cabs tried to run a bus between the two cities with funding from rider fees and the two cities, but it never came to fruition. A WSU senior tried to restore the bus service a few years ago but that never gained traction either.

“Really a bus is right in line with what I feel both Pullman and Moscow see as very important, which is being environmentally friendly and sustainable,” Weller said. “I just don’t know why we wouldn’t try it again.”

He said he thinks the absent bus service between the two cities is a “lack of will” rather than a “lack of resources.”

He said perhaps the two cities, two universities and two hospitals could contribute funding — the same stakeholders the Moscow Transportation Commission subcommittee plans to engage.

“I really feel that it’s disappointing that we cannot move forward with something like this,” Weller said. “I am very, very glad, very heartened, that the Moscow Transportation Commission subcommittee is looking at this because I think it’s very beneficial.”

Cabeza can be reached at (208) 883-4631, or by email to gcabeza@dnews.com.

“The spirit is willing but the pocketbook is weak when it comes right down to funding a self-supported program.”— John Shaheen, director at WSU Transportation Services