City approves SunTran route redesign, hopeful to increase ridership

The City of Ocala will implement new routes for its SunTran service. 

The decision to approve the new route redesign was made at the Tuesday, August 3 meeting of the Ocala City Council, in light of feedback from riders collected through a survey. 

That survey, which was conducted earlier this year, provided some of the reasons the service saw a dip in use after a series of route changes were implemented in 2018.

According to Ocala Growth Management Director Tye Chighizola, approximately 40,000 riders stopped using the service in 2019 after the 2018 route changes were implemented. 

According to the Ocala Marion Transportation Planning Organization (TPO), SunTran’s annual ridership for the 2020 fiscal year was approximately 256,510 passengers. 

Chighizola says that the route changes will ultimately shorten trip time, something many riders cited as the reason they stopped using the service. The city plans to conduct additional route changes next year and will use this year’s changes to evaluate and fine tune the service, according to Chighizola.

SunTran, which has been in operation for over two decades, operates as a division of the Growth Management Department since the city of Ocala took over management of the service from the Ocala Marion TPO.

According to Chighizola, the route changes to the Blue, Green, Orange and Purple Routes will create a figure eight (8) loop that will provide more coverage and more direct travel in most of the service area between the different routes.

The organization is seeking to expand its reach further west of I-75 to include service to the new VA, which Chighizola says will open this fall, as well as other locations in that portion of the city. 

Chighizola says that a portion of the funds received from the federal government as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic will be used to address SunTran and other public transportation systems throughout the city. 

The Ocala City Council meets on the first and third Tuesday of the month at 5 p.m. at Ocala City Hall, which is located at 110 SE Watula Avenue. 

To read the complete list of route changes, visit the Ocala City Council “Agenda Packet” for the August 3 meeting.