Free City Transit Starts August 26th in Cold Lake

The City of Cold Lake announced that August 26th, public transit will officially hit the streets. In late January, The City purchased six transit buses  from Calgary. After months of planning the buses are now ready to hit the streets.

Mayor of Cold Lake, Craig Copeland says the best part about the transit system is it will be introduced at no-cost. “We’re going to operate it for free, for probably about six months. Get it up and running and see what types of passengers load and commitment we have.” The idea is to see who’s using the bus before determining a cost for riders, says Copeland, “introduce a fee policy, later in 2016.”

The City of Cold Lake released the following announcement regarding the transit service:

The City of Cold Lake Transit service will start running on Wednesday, August 26 from 6:00 am to 10:00 pm. Once it is launched, the service will be open Mondays through Saturdays.

“We are ver excited that public transit will roll out here, and we were happy to announce that it will start off as a free service,” Mayor Craig Copeland said. “The City of Cold Lake is spread out from north to south and from the south to 4 Wing, so we expect that having a public transit option will be a great benefit.”

Council made the decision to offer the service for free earlier this year. Fees for the service will be reviewed in the upcoming budget deliberations.

Cold Lake Transit will start off running two buses – one running a north circle and the other a south circle. The two circles will join in the Tri City Mall area for passengers who are travelling from the north to the south and vice versa.

City of Cold Lake Chief Administrative Officer, Kevin Nagoya, said that a simple, predictable service is what the City is aiming to start off with.

“From staffing to maintenance and the timing of routes, there are a lot of moving parts to a public transportation system,” Nagoya said. “We want to start off with a system that is easy to use, easy to maintain, and – most importantly – reliable. We have extra buses to ensure that we have a reliable pool of vehicles, and to give council the option of expanding the service if the demand is there.”

Beginning August 26, Cold Lake Transit will run from 6:00 am to 10:00 pm, Monday through Saturday. There will not be bus service on Sundays. Schedules for the service will be available for pick up at City Hall, on the buses, and are available online at www.coldlake.com. Please note that the schedules are subject to change. For more information about the transit service, call 780-639-4455.