Joe Tarr
Intercity buses are now picking up and dropping off passengers on Langdon Street near the Memorial Union.
The downtown stop for interurban buses has moved yet again as the city continues to search for a location for a sheltered bus terminal, a goal that has eluded it for six years. There now may be light at the end of the tunnel — but it is a very, very long tunnel.
“We are certainly aware of the need for an intercity bus terminal,” says Heather Stouder, director of the city Planning Division, “but at this point, the soonest we foresee the ability to study it in depth is 2019-2020, due to other competing priorities.”
On Jan. 3, the isthmus stop for Badger Coaches, Lamers Bus Lines, Megabus, Van Galder Bus Company and Jefferson Lines moved from University Avenue, in front of the Chazen Museum of Art, to Langdon Street.
“The city required the change because of the problems the University Avenue stop created for [local] Metro buses, blocking the bus lanes, and also concerns regarding bicyclist safety due to the fact that buses needed to cross into the bike lane to get around the intercity buses,” says William Schaefer, city transportation planning manager.
The new stop is the sidewalk on the odd-numbered side of Langdon Street, opposite the UW Pyle Center building. Previous to the Chazen location, buses stopped across the street in front of the Memorial Union and Red Gym.
That location was problematic. On any given day, as many as 31 intercity buses, from five bus lines, stopped there; only two of the lines were specifically authorized to do so.
The heavy use of Langdon had campus and city officials worried about safety, particularly when multiple buses queued near a heavily used pedestrian crossing. Also, Union staff were concerned that their building was essentially being made into a bus terminal.
The spot had been the city’s de facto bus hub since the October 2009 closure of the Badger Bus depot, at the corner of Bedford Street and West Washington Avenue. The closing followed the industry trend to shed brick-and-mortar stops, ticket over the internet and pick up on street curbs.
In 2011 a Madison inter-agency team was created to work with the university on finding a solution. In 2013 a consulting firm for the city, Kimley-Horn and Associates, recommended a new bus terminal be built near the Badger Bus Depot’s former location. By that time the depot had been demolished and a mixed-use development built on its site.
That same year, to accommodate construction at Memorial Union, intercity buses moved to the Chazen, where they parked in the University Avenue lane meant for city buses. There was no shelter, but travelers congregated on the expansive East Campus mall. Family and friends expecting arrivals could wait in their vehicles in a broad drop-off lane.
But the hazards of this location quickly became evident. On an average weekday, according to a city study, the University Avenue stop is passed by an estimated 25,359 motorists — including Metro buses that pass it about 425 times. Thus the return to Langdon.
“Langdon Street is a congested area, but is better,” says Schaefer, “especially since it is further away from the Memorial Union than it was before. The bus companies want to be as close as possible to their customers, many of whom are students.”
And the UW wants to do right by those students.
“While the university is not responsible for providing intercity transit, we have recognized over the years that many of the users are our students, and they need a safe and convenient location near campus,” says Gary Brown, director of UW Campus Planning and Landscape Architecture. “We continue to have regular discussions with the city of Madison as part of the campus planning process in order to identify an appropriate long-term solution.”
The current draft of the UW’s Long Range Transportation Plan, part of the 2015 Campus Master Plan update, includes a recommendation for establishing a permanent intercity bus terminal.
Brown says one potential location would be on the first floor of a redeveloped Lake Street parking garage. But that redevelopment won’t happen soon.
Says Stouder: “The city parking utility is addressing at least two other major parking structures — Government East and in the new Capitol East District — prior to having capacity to take on the Lake Street Ramp project.”
