$5 Monthly Discount Youth Pass Program Extended Through 2010

December 8, 2009

On Monday, December 7, 2009, the Feather River Air Quality Management District (FRAQMD) Board of Directors unanimously extended Yuba-Sutter Transit's enormously popular Discount Monthly Youth Pass Program for another year through December 2010. Without this $70,000 grant, the program was set to end December 31st. The regular $15 monthly unlimited use local fixed route youth (ages 5 - 18) passes have been offered since September 2005 at the greatly reduced price of just $5 using a series of FRAQMD grants to off-set the loss of fare revenue.

The objective of the program is to encourage and increase youth ridership throughout the year just as the summer bus pass program had done during the summer months. The results have been very impressive as the discount youth pass program proved to be an even more effective and efficient means of increasing youth ridership than the summer youth bus pass program which it has now replaced.

Compared to pre-program levels, the sale of monthly youth passes increased from 87 to 612 and monthly youth pass ridership increased from 2,894 to 14,534 passenger boardings (October 2004 versus October 2009). The 7,000 youth passes to be funded by the new one year grant are expected to provide up to 140,000 youth pass trips in 2010.

The $5 discount monthly youth bus pass offers unlimited use of the local fixed route system for one calendar month for those ages 5 through 18. Discount youth passes are available at any of Yuba-Sutter Transit's pass sales outlets from the 24th of each month through the 7th of the following month. Passes are also available by mail or at the Yuba-Sutter Transit office all month long.

For route and schedule information or a list of local pass sales outlets, call (530) 634-6880 or check on-line at www.yubasuttertransit.com.