Capital Area Rural Transportation System

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Changes to CARTS District Boundaries are coming

May 17, 2012

The proverbial “other shoe” dropped on Monday, March 26th --the one that we had been waiting for, the final U.S. Census report on urbanized area determinations. Why this matters to us is because it changes the size of our District as parts of it urbanize and become ineligible areas for CARTS to use its RURAL transit funds (Capital Area RURAL…).

Georgetown, San Marcos (including part of Martindale) and Kyle became urbanized areas, so they will no longer be in our RURAL district. These communities will receive funding directly (or through Capital Metro) to provide transit services, not through CARTS.

How will this change CARTS? What will happen to our customers in these areas needing rides?

Short answer, we expect that not much will change in the coming CARTS fiscal year (Sept 1 2012-Aug 31 2013) as we have been dealing with the issue beforehand with both Georgetown and San Marcos, and to some degree, Kyle. The Texas Department of Transportation, the Federal Transit Administration, Capital Metro and CARTS are all actively engaged in looking for solutions that will prevent any disruption of service to our customers.

The "new" map of the CARTS District, and the ever-growing urbanized core tells the story. In coming weeks we will provide updates and discuss the changes and the effect, if any, on our customers.

Some press reports on this subject have caused uncertainty to our customers, but be assured that we and others are working everyday on this, and we will keep you informed as we work through processes to arrive at workable solutions.