DES MOINES, Iowa — DART has released its Reimagine Draft Bus Network, the first major redesign of services in more than a decade. DART is proposing to cut more than half of its routes, taking it from 27 routes to 10.
DART provides 3.75 million rides a year, almost 60 percent of those are for people going to or from work, which was a focus when coming up with a new system. They wanted to serve those who are using DART, which they say aren’t necessarily the 9-to-5 workers, but more so the retail and service workers.
In the new system, buses would pass more frequently, adding more 15-minute wait times. A goal for DART was to speed up a ride length. So instead of stops every 1-2 blocks, they’d be 3-4 blocks.
A huge part of this was also budget, and to help with that, service hours would be reduced by 10 percent…