University of Wisconsin students could have Wi-Fi on their bus rides as soon as next year, as Mayor Paul Soglin’s capital budget includes plans for installing internet access in all Madison Metro buses.
Mick Rusch, Marketing Communications manager for Metro Transit in Madison, said the possible installation of wireless internet is the part of the Metro budget he is most excited about.
“We are very heavily dependent on people using apps to track their bus and plan their trips. Some people can actually start working on the bus by working on their tablets and phones so that’s another thing that will help people by being able to use Wi-Fi,” Rusch said. “There’s nothing other than good things about having Wi-Fi in buses.”
Rusch said if the funding for the Wi-Fi is passed, he thinks it would be installed in the second half of 2015. It would take some time to find a vendor for all of the buses, he said, and installation would take a while as well.
The most current edition of Soglin’s budget includes $100,000 for the internet upgrades, as well as funding for other software upgrades for both the buses and new Metro facilities.
Ald. Mike Verveer, District 4, serves on the Board of Estimates, which reviewed the mayor’s budget last week. Verveer said he thinks the Wi-Fi additions are a part of the budget that will pass with no problem.
Verveer said the Wi-Fi is one of the most meaningful initiatives in the budget as it relates to students, who make up a large part of Metro’s ridership in Madison.
“It makes a ton of sense. I think it will be very welcome by the entire city council, whether they’re bus riders or not,” Verveer said.
In addition to the Wi-Fi, the mayor’s budget includes funding for 15 new buses. Rusch said the average financial life cycle of a Metro bus is about 12 years, and old buses are retired yearly in order to keep the fleet up to date.
The replacements are traditionally 80 percent federally funded, but that money is not always available, Rusch said, so this time it is included in the capital budget. The cost of each bus is estimated to be $410,000, and federal funding will only cover 50 percent of the total.
Another possible part of the budget is the creation of a new storage facility in the city’s new Nakoosa Trail property near Stoughton Road in 2018. Rusch said Metro currently has 209 buses housed in its East Washington facility, but it was only built to hold 170 buses.
Rusch said an increasing ridership makes expanding services difficult, but it at least means Metro Transit is doing something right.
“It’s a great problem that we have. Our ridership is so high that we need to expand, but the only problem is we don’t have anywhere. If we would purchase extra buses and get the funding for that, we won’t have anywhere to put them,” Rusch said.
City Council will finalize the capital budget in November.
