Let’s Talk About CARTA
The bus service in Charleston is terrible. Stinks. Unspeakable. That’s the bad news. The good news is that it’s still a major upgrade over what it once was. A few years ago the service was so bad that routes made no sense, transfers meant sitting for 45 minutes in a neighborhood no sane person would enter unarmed, and the whole system was losing money hand over fist.
. . . My usual weekly trip is from North Charleston to Folly Beach, and the bus takes me most of the way — I pedal the final two miles. The bus trip itself is about 20 miles. Not the fastest way to go, especially waiting for the transfer.I don’t care what you say, though, you probably can’t drive that distance on a buck and a half — which includes the 25-cent transfer here. No way, not with gas costing what it does right now. And if I took a cab, forget that. A 20-mile trip in a Yellow Cab is $42 in Charleston.
As a rural Berkeley County resident who rarely visits the service area, I have never used CARTA. However, I know several people who use the park and ride option for commuting. With gas prices climbing is the CARTA system a viable alternative for you, if only on an occasional basis?
Heather @ April 22, 2008
College of Charleston students can take the bus for free, so even though I have a car, I take CARTA out to West Ashley to go to the Citadel Mall. It’s not terribly convenient, because the schedule is really unpredictable, especially on the weekends, but I’ll deal with a little waiting time to avoid buying gas.
heather, my car was in the shop a few years ago. i walked from my shoebox apartment on rutledge ave. to meeting street to catch the bus to go to st. Francis hospital for a dr.’s appt. the bus trip took about 45 minutes but was GREAT! catching the bus out there to come back to town was a little more dodgy because i had not researched the schedules. If you don’t take the bus often, you do a lot of standing around unless you rea d the schedule!
I should have visited two days ago, instead of doing homework…
I live one block from a stop for a route that takes me to the parking garage of my employer. They’ve been paying the fare since October of 2006, so I’ve been using it ever since. Yes, the schedules and maps (Ms. McLeod didn’t need to leave Rutledge to catch her bus) should be researched before using. However, keep in mind that the drivers do get tied up in traffic. I also think they don’t have a centralized time-syncing ability either, but that’s another story.
It works out great for me, but I do realize I’m a little “more unique” than others :-).