Photo by Pat Christman
The Stomper Express' inaugural 2007 rounds weren't as busy as usual. The bus averages 10.61 riders per hour, though only about half that many were here on a recent Thursday evening. The route is funded by Minnesota State University and the city of Mankato.
MANKATO — Explaining the rising popularity of the Stomper Express — a bus partnership between the city of Mankato and Minnesota State University that brings students to the retail district — isn’t very difficult.
“It’s free,” MSU students Ana Gonzalez and Ben Dowswell chime in simultaneously. It’s convenient, too, for the foreign students from Mexico and Canada who have the same shopping needs as others but not the transportation.
“Pretty much everyone here has a car,” Dowswell said.
While the school pays for the service, the Stomper’s ridership among MSU students is rising, likely thanks to a convenient route that stops at each place on the same minute.
Shoppers know the bus stops at Wal-Mart at 23 minutes after the hour and will wind by River Hills Mall exactly 10 minutes later.
The partnership was started about a year ago as a way to help MSU students meet their transportation needs. The city pays about $22,500 a year and MSU chips in about $8,000.
Ridership has risen from 2,142 passengers during the spring semester to 2,387 riders in the fall semester. This is despite a 22 percent drop in total miles driven, so the total increase in riders per hour is 19 percent — an unusually large increase during the first year of a bus service, transit foreman Mark Anderson said.
And it came despite a route change that diverted the Stomper away from the downtown area, Anderson said. That leg of the route just wasn’t popular, so it was axed in favor of more stops in the hilltop shopping district.
But the good news stops here. The hope last year was the state would step in to fund 80 percent of the route. A grant application to the effect was rejected by the state last year.
Tom Gottfried is planning director for the Minnesota Department of Transportation’s office of transit. He says priority for the funding goes to services that break new ground.
Mankato’s effort offered college students a free, convenient choice, but it’s essentially an alternative to city routes.
“That’s fundamentally why Mankato’s Stomper service, along with others, didn’t make it,” Gottfried said.
And he says that there’s a “pretty low” chance the Stomper will be funded next year because the same programs that were funded in 2007 will probably reapply.
“Which is too bad, because this is a really good start,” Anderson said of the state’s decision.
It’s an abnormally healthy start, in fact, because most routes tend to cycle up and down over the first few years, but this one is going straight up.
Average ridership is still only about half of the regular city routes, but Anderson predicts that the Stomper’s numbers will continue to rise over the next few years.
And even without the state’s help, the city and MSU don’t look to be backing out anytime soon.
“I think the university is satisfied with that experiment,” said Dave Cowan, with the school’s facilities department. “I know this may surprise some, but most of our riders,” he said, “wanted to go to River Hills Mall, Wal- Mart, that area,” not to downtown bars.
The school pays for the route using tuition and state appropriations. The bus runs between 6 p.m. and 11 p.m. on Thursday, Friday and Saturday. It’s free for MSU students, but anyone who wants to can pay the standard $1.25 fare and ride.
Anderson cautions that the words “free ride” are deceptive, but that’s clearly a big draw for the students who make up almost all of the route’s ridership.
“It’s a good resource,” says Dowswell, the Canadian international student. “I wouldn’t want to have it taken away.”
For more information about the Stomper Express, visit http://www.mnsu.edu/parking/stomperexpress.html.
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