Pomona : RTD Plans to Drop 2 Routes

Two major Southern California Rapid Transit District bus lines that serve Pomona and Claremont will be discontinued because of cuts in federal transportation funds, the RTD announced this week. The lines, Routes 192 and 194, cover Mission and Indian Hill boulevards, White, Towne, Garey and San Bernardino avenues, Arrow Highway and the Corona Expressway. Their elimination will remove a large portion of current bus service in Pomona and parts of southern Claremont.

The cuts are scheduled to go into effect Jan. 26, but they may be postponed until March, an RTD spokesman said.

The cuts will leave the small, independent Pomona Valley Transportation Authority in a quandary. Members of the authority’s board of directors said a recently installed local bus system called the Valley Connection was designed to link with the RTD routes that are scheduled to be cut.

Pomona Councilman Jay Gaulding, a member of the transportation authority’s board, said the Valley Connection, a system of fixed-route and dial-a-ride services begun Nov. 18, could be redesigned to permit it to cover the canceled RTD routes. But he said that would severely curtail dial-a-ride service and probably would require extra funds that Pomona does not have.

A more likely alternative, he said, is the creation of a “transportation zone” in the east San Gabriel Valley that would allow cities access to federal transportation funds that now go to RTD.

Terry Fitzgerald, a Claremont councilwoman who sits on the board, said she believes public bus service can be handled more efficiently locally. “The RTD routes are not very efficient,” Fitzgerald said. “If we take them on we could use the funds to create a better system.”

The board will meet in mid-January, Gaulding said, to discuss the matter further.