Just curious but has MV or Google released any numbers for daily ridership of those shuttles? When I see them on Grant Road going to El Camino Hosp, they don't seem to have very many riders.

The ridership numbers are actually posted monthly on their website. www.mvcommunityshuttle.com/statistics

Thank you Google. More frequent busses would be better, but the real time maps are useful (to people who can afford smartphones).

Seriously? I was unable to drive for over a year due to an injury and this service was not listed anywhere. What does it do? Does it have set routes? Does it take you wherever you want to go? How can someone use this service?

I'm asking because it seems the service is offered, but like everything else Google does, falls short of actually doing anything for anyone, other than the possibility of Google looking good or getting an expense writeoff.

@Nobody Knows

Don't hassle Google on this one. They're picking up the slack for our City Council, which never met a building project it didn't like, but does nothing to improve infrastructure.

And no, Google alone is not the source of all the traffic around town.

@Nobody knows

What does it do? Does it have set routes? Does it take you wherever you want to go? How can someone use this service?

Are these rhetorical questions or do you expect someone to answer them for you?

@Nobody Knows - The Community Shuttle has been operational for some time now, and has been widely promoted in the Voice and at community events. There is a website and published schedules Web Link If you live in the Whisman area it's puzzling how you never heard about it as the map includes Whisman/Middlefield. Web Link

Although I will say, it's a nice service but I am not a fan, the schedule does not help commuters as it starts at 10am, it does not help people who want to spend an evening downtown as it ends at 6pm, so I think that is why the shuttles are usually empty (at least the ones I see).. I think if it served those two groups it would get a lot more use. I would like to see them run maybe 7am-11am, then 4pm- 10pm.

The ridership numbers indicate it might get more weekend use if it ran later on weekends. Parking downtown is getting more and more challenging, not to mention nice to have a free lift home after a few cocktails. How about a Saturday pilot running late? (until 10pm?) Or run until 7:30 and then start again 9:30pm until maybe 10:30 or 11?

The route is a giant loop. Red shuttles go in clockwise and gray counter-clockwise direction stopping every half hour. If you ride the shuttle for the entire loop, you will discover that the riders choose the shuttle in the correct direction to ride the shorter distance. There are some areas closer to DT where they are more riders and fewer away from DT. This might be why they appear empty in some areas.

Agree that time of routes could be later, but these shuttles are used and appreciated. I was most impressed how everyone I saw thanked the driver for the ride and the driver politely responded.

Their website for Mountain View Community Shuttle Schedule is great.
Web Link

I''m a fan of the service because I lived next to a stop and my kids private school is next to a stop. I've used it when my car was serviced as well. I do wish it starts earlier than 10am and ends late enough so that I can park outside of downtown when I want to avoid driving in circles looking for parking downtown.

@Nobody knows

Given the number of different transit systems around here, my wife and I have found that the easiest way to plan a route using transit is to use the Directions feature of Google Maps. If you enter your starting and ending location, click the transit icon, and set a departure or arrival time, then the system is pretty good at picking the best option, whether that's VTA or Caltrain or BART or one of the community shuttles or some combination of these.

@member

thanx for the link. The 37% year-to-year increase in ridership is quite impressive. Guess more people are getting to know about it, maybe word of mouth. The monthly numbers for 2017 are pretty impressive too.

The small increase for July of only 12% is an outlier. Wonder how much of it has to due to the 9 AM - 4 PM traffic nightmare on North-bound Grant Rd due to the huge ongoing trenching project?

Lots of kids take this shuttle home from area schools. Many other folks in our area who don't have transportation also take it during the day. I think it's a great service. And Google (and others) merely pay for it. They don't run it. The City does the ops and it seems like they're doing a fine job. It could certainly do more but there's a cost for that....maybe some of you folks wanting more should get your respective companies to donate some cash to make it happen.

Due to repeated violations of our Terms of Use, comments from this poster are automatically removed. Why?

@Nobody Knows:
Let Me Google That For You:
Web Link