Federal grant to help Durango replace broken buses, pay for transit stop improvements (2024)

City awarded $659,089 to be administered by Colorado Department of Transportation

The city of Durango was awarded a Federal Transit Administration grant for $659,089 earlier this month that will help pay for bus stop safety improvements and the replacement of a city bus.

Transportation Director Sarah Hill said she learned the city was awarded the grant through a nationally competitive program the week of July 7.

“We are very grateful and proud that our project was awarded,” she said in an email to The Durango Herald.

The Colorado Department of Transportation will administer the grant funding, a monthslong process after which the city can purchase three new buses and bus stop facilities, she said.

Among the city buses to be replaced is a fixed-route transit bus that was wrecked after a Durango man stole the bus and took it on a joy ride in May. The incident ended after the man drove over spike strips laid out by law enforcement on Colorado Highway 172 and crashed.

The driver crashed at least three times before the bus came to a total stop. He crashed once on Camino del Rio in Durango and twice on Highway 172, according to Durango police.

CDOT applied for the grant on behalf of the city of Durango, which will pay a matching contribution of $164,784 for new buses and bus stop improvements.

U.S. Sens. Michael Bennet and John Hickenlooper, who sent letters in support of three of the projects, celebrated Durango’s grant awards and similar awards to eight other Colorado communities totaling $52 million in federal transportation funding.

The funding was made available by the Biden administration’s bipartisan infrastructure law, according to Bennet’s office.

According to the transportation department’s application, Durango Transit provides about 425,000 rides annually, and 77% of its ridership depends on public transportation to get around. Durango Transit has operated within city limits for four decades.

In making its case on behalf of Durango, CDOT said in its application that Durango’s population of over 19,000 nearly doubles daily with people traveling to the city for work, shopping and medical services unavailable elsewhere in the area.

“With Durango as the regional employment, medical, and shopping hub, Durango Transit services are critical to the region’s transportation system,” CDOT said in the application.

CDOT highlighted Durango’s five fixed bus routes and evening/nighttime on-demand microtransit service as being “at the core of a high-level quality of life for the increasing transit dependent population.”

The city will put the awarded grant funding toward safety improvements such as lighting and shelters to 25 bus stops and replace three buses “that have operated well beyond their useful lives,” CDOT said.

CDOT cites Durango’s 2023 ridership survey conducted in coordination with Fort Lewis College professor Kaitlin Mattos’ Sustainability By Design class.

The survey showed the majority of respondents earn less than $50,000 a year, the largest age group of riders is 25 to 40 years old and most riders work in the service industry at restaurants, hotels and bars.

This grant request will make critical safety improvements to 25 rural transit stop facilities and replace three aging fleets that have operated well beyond their useful lives. The project will increase the safety, accessibility and equity of the Durango Transit system, and remove transportation-related disparities and barriers.

At the Durango City Council meeting last week, Hill asked City Council to approve a budget amendment to account for another grant award worth $35,000 and a $7,000 contribution by the city to replace a city transit van used in Durango’s Opportunity Bus program.

The Opportunity Bus is a paratransit service that provides transportation to elderly residents ages 60 and older and residents with disabilities covered in the Americans with Disabilities Act, according to the city.

“The Opportunity Bus is available for any transportation needs you have, not just for medical appointments,” an Opportunity Bus program description on the city’s website says. “Grocery shopping, trips to the recreation and senior centers, or meeting a friend for lunch, all qualify.”

cburney@durangoherald.com