After giving initial approval for an Atlanta-based charter bus company to move across the river from Columbia, the city of West Columbia could send the company back to the drawing board.
Southeastern Stages took riders from its stop in north Columbia to nearby cities like Charlotte and Myrtle Beach before a recent expansion of the Stanley Steemer that shared the building with the company caused the company to look for a new home, representatives for Southeastern Stages told the city’s board of zoning appeals in February. The bus company must be out of its Columbia location by the end of this month, a representative told The State.
The charter bus group thought it had settled on a new home in the old Steve’s deli at 1471 Platt Springs Road after it got approval in February to be used for selling tickets and picking up bus riders. But after the city’s police chief, Marion Boyce, sent a letter to the planning director with concerns about crime rates at the company’s former Columbia location, the board unanimously voted Tuesday night to reconsider its initial approval at its next meeting in May. The move came after the board voted earlier in the meeting to amend its bylaws, giving it the ability to reconsider previous approvals if new information is presented…