Board grants reprieve to Alta-Stewart bus route
Elderly and disabled residents along Stewart Avenue and Alta Drive received a break Thursday when the Regional Transportation Commission voted not to eliminate Route 207, the only line that serves those corridors.
Commissioner Lois Tarkanian, whose Las Vegas City Council ward includes Route 207, fought for public transit riders who feared losing the route would cut them off from activities at community centers or entertainment downtown.
Tarkanian credited commission administrators for listening to residents, though the route is the agency's worst- performing, carrying 600 passengers a day compared with busier lines that serve 10,000 riders a day.
"It's important to see that a large agency does listen," she said.
The agency faces a $8.3 million budget gap in large part because of lower sales tax revenue because of the poor economy. Eliminating Route 207 would have saved the agency $1 million a year. But when the commission sought public opinion on all the proposed eliminations or cutbacks, they received 347 comments, and 250 were about Route 207.
"We bought our mobile homes because of the (proximity of the) bus route," Sharon Donnellan, a resident of the Rulon Earl Mobile Home Park said.
Donnellan went on to say that residents would lose their only mode of transportation to shopping centers, community centers and downtown.
The route will be spared for at least a year as the commission sees whether sales tax revenues increase.
Contact reporter Adrienne Packer at apacker@review
journal.com or 702-387-2904.
