Humboldt County Transit Authority offers free bus rides all weekend until January

Humboldt County, Ca., (KIEM) In an effort to attract new riders, the Humboldt-County Transit Authority is offering free rides every weekend until the first week of January.

The generosity of HTA stemmed from a $75,000 grant that was offered to the transit authority by Caltrans in effort to increase ridership on the city transit. In addition, to a way for the state to reduce greenhouse gases.

The free weekend bus ride allows commuters to get on any route HTA takes for free throughout Saturdays and Sundays.

General Manager of Humboldt Transit Authority, Greg Pratt said it’s a way to ease rider-anxiety.

“For a lot of people the first time they use public transit they’re scared, they don’t know anything about the farebox, how much money they’re supposed to have so this kind of gives them the opportunity to try it and not have to worry about paying a certain fare, or what kind of fare you need to have,” said Pratt. “Our ridership. We ran it for two weeks and for the weekends we’re up 20%.”

The service will be offered for all services that Humbolt-County Transit Authority operates.