By Satya Rhodes-Conway
Mayor, City of Madison

In roughly 30 years, the population of Dane county will increase by nearly 100,000 residents. In that same period of time we are expecting to create 85,000 new jobs. Those are some staggering figures that could really affect the quality of life in our city and surrounding areas.

In just the past few years 180,000 daily trips have been added locally. We expect to add even more if our region continues to grow as projected. Consider this; if all those new trips are made by automobile, it would require adding one or two lanes — in each direction — to East Washington Avenue, University Avenue, Park Street and other major streets. It would also require doubling the public and private parking spaces downtown. That’s not sustainable or feasible — we literally do not have the land to accommodate widening those streets. 

What we do have is a plan to move forward in to the future and make everyone’s commute better by scaling up our transit system. 

The City of Madison is working hard to plan for a new east-west Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) line. BRT uses dedicated lanes where feasible, modern stations, larger specialized buses, and other enhancements to provide fast and cost-effective service to jobs, entertainment and schools. Think Madison’s version of light rail with stops every 10-15 minutes from 6 am‒12 am. Madison’s BRT will complement existing Madison Metro routes and be our city’s next big step toward a more sustainable local transit system. It will ease congestion and traffic on our major arterials and provide a convenient way for current and future Metro riders to get to work, school, shopping, entertainment and more. In addition, investments in our infrastructure, expansions of the regular Metro system and partnerships to get bus passes into the hands of more people will mean everyone benefits. 

The city is conducting a Madison East-West BRT Planning Study to develop a plan and initial design for the city’s first BRT route. The city will use this plan to apply for federal funding to complete design and construction. The planning study will conclude in fall 2019, with construction of the east-west BRT route possible in 2024. 

Visit MadisonBRT.com to:

• Learn more about BRT and access a map of the Madison East-West BRT study area.
• View BRT photos and information about projects in other cities.
• Sign up for project email updates, including public meetings and events.