With the west side of South Hill expanding outward over the years, the City of Moose Jaw also plans to expand the No. 4 Westmount bus route for better coverage.
Starting Monday, Jan. 18, the Westmount bus will travel west to Coteau Street past 16th Avenue Southwest, turn south and stop on Arlington Avenue near the south intersection of Belmont Crescent. Then, the bus will turn east onto Wellington Drive and make a stop near the 16th Avenue Southwest intersection before connecting with that road and continuing onward.
City hall expects to erect several new bus stop signs at the new locations before the expansion date.
“It’s a really small change,” said Darrin Stephanson, manager of public works and utilities. “We were contacted by a resident in the area further down Wellington noting, just noting there wasn’t any nearby stops that service that area.
“It kind of has developed out over the years to the west, so 16th was the furthest we were servicing and this was just a fairly easy change for us to make without impacting the route at all or our times … .”
There is no cost to expand the bus route further west into Westheath since no extra buses will be required, Stephanson continued. The transportation department might have to spend a couple hundred dollars to install a few bus stop signs, but that will likely be it.
“At this point, it’s permanent,” he said. “We’re looking to do a review of all our transit system here this year and that will include looking at our four main routes and the areas we service and what makes sense and what doesn’t make sense.”
The department will look at areas in the city that are underserviced and whether service times can be changed to increase ridership. This could include changing routes to 30 minutes from the current 40 minutes.
For more details about bus routes, schedules and fares, visit the transit page at moosejaw.ca.
