Welcome to the Connect Sun Prairie website and to its Prairie Connections news blog, part of our mission to maintain, promote, improve, and expand public transit in Sun Prairie, Wisconsin, and support other ways to get around our community without a car.
It’s been just over two years since two new Madison Metro Transit bus routes began providing many Sun Prairie neighborhoods with regular bus service on weekdays (Route W) and seven days a week (Route S). And it’s been nine months since those two routes began connecting with the new Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) service to Madison.
Over that time, ridership has grown as more and more Sun Prairie residents have learned how Metro Transit can connect them with the entire greater Madison metropolitan area without the need to drive, or in return for a short drive to the Sun Prairie Park & Ride.
And this is, we hope, just the start. Many opportunities lie ahead to improve on the connections already established, to connect more neighborhoods and riders with this service, and to connect an improving and expanding bus service with the all the other work under way to make it easier to live, work, and get around in our community.
But taking advantage of those opportunities means connecting current bus riders with each other in common cause. It also means reaching out to future riders who haven’t yet discovered the benefits of Metro Transit. And it means convincing many who do not and may never ride the bus that great bus service still benefits them in countless ways.
Finally, sustaining great transit means connecting all its various users, stakeholders, and other support constituencies with the elected and appointed officials whose decisions affect transit service, as well as with other influential community leaders who help shape the local conversation about it.
This all will take more than a little work-maybe even hard work but also, we hope, enjoyable and rewarding work. And lighter work, as the saying goes, the more hands take it on. Which is why we’re here, and why we invite you to connect with us.