Mountain Express agrees to bus stop at new Center for the Arts

But only during the crowded shows

by Mark Reaman

The Mountain Express bus system will partner with the Crested Butte Center for the Arts and try to take some parking pressure off the Center when there are big events at the new facility.

The Mountain Express board of directors has agreed with a Center request to put in a temporary stop at the new building to be used when events have 75 percent of the tickets sold for any show and during the Alpenglow summer season.

“It will be the regularly scheduled town shuttle that will provide service approximately one hour before and one hour after the event,” explained Mountain Express transit manager Chris Larsen. “Our concern is that by adding a stop to the current town shuttle route it will prevent the bus from maintaining its current schedule and causing the bus to arrive late to the Mountaineer Square bus stop. We will try it and see how it works.”

Parking has been a consistent issue at the Board of Zoning and Architectural Review (BOZAR) meetings with the Center so the thought is to utilize public transportation to help alleviate the issue during events that draw large numbers of people.

“The idea of the bus stop is to give an alternative to driving to town and parking at or near the Center for shows in the theater and Alpenglow,” said Center for the Arts executive director Jenny Birnie. “Basically we want to make it really easy to ride the bus. Since the bus already goes past the Center every 20 minutes in the summertime, an additional stop was not a big ask of the Mountain Express board. They understand the overall parking issue for the Center and town and are very willing to help.”

The threshold to kick in the temporary bus stop is 275 people, which is 75 percent of 350. That’s the number of seats the board considers the maximum capacity of the theater.

“The bus will pick up patrons right in front of the new Center on the new one-way drive that is being proposed,” said Birnie. “For these events, we will have traffic control to guide the buses easily through the drive and traffic will be limited near the front entry.”

Mountain Express board president Roland Mason said the idea of the bus stop at the new Center is a natural fit. “The board members that were there supported this request unanimously,” he said. ”It fits well into our mission statement. We felt a stop in front of the Center for the Arts during busy events would alleviate some congestion on Sixth Street. even though there are two stops within two blocks. We want to try it out.”