La Crosse Municipal Transit Utility

The La Crosse Municipal Transit Utility or MTU is the primary provider of mass transportation in La Crosse, Wisconsin. Using 21 buses, eleven regular routes are provided from Monday through Friday. On Saturdays, the MTU runs six routes, and five routes on Sundays.^[2]

La Crosse Municipal Transit Utility

Bus #1202 in 2020
Parent	City of La Crosse
Founded	January 2, 1975
Headquarters	2000 Marco Dr.
Locale	La Crosse, Wisconsin
Service area	La Crosse County, Wisconsin
Service type	Bus service, Paratransit
Routes	11
Hubs	Clinton & Caledonia Transfer Point
Stations	Grand River Station
Fleet	21
Annual ridership	713,823 (2024)[1]
Website	La Crosse MTU

History

Public transit in La Crosse began with the opening of a horse-drawn streetcar line in 1879. Over time, more streetcar lines were added and in 1893, all streetcars had been electrified. Beginning in the early 20th century however, increasing car ownership led to a decline of the privately run streetcar system. As a result, buses began to replace streetcars throughout the city and by November 1945, the last streetcar line closed. The City of La Crosse took over operations of the buses in 1975 from the Mississippi Valley Public Service Company, as the buses could no longer be operated profitably.^[3]

In 1945, in the first timetable after streetcar service had ended, there were four bus routes. The earliest bus left at 5:40am and the last bus returned at 1:00am. Buses ran at a 10 to 15 minute headway throughout the day. In total, the buses provided 1519.95 hours of service per week. In 2022, the MTU provides only 1141.6 hours of service per week, a decline of 24.89%.

In 2019, a real time bus tracking mobile app was launched.^[4] The first two electric buses were introduced to the system on June 13, 2022, which was followed in October with the launch of a mobile app for fare payment.^[5][6][7]

Routes

Services Mon-Fri (5:12am–10:40pm) Sat (7:42am–7:40pm) Sun (7:42am–6:40pm):

• Route 1: South Avenue
• Route 2: Green Bay
• Route 4: Losey Boulevard
• Route 5: Valley View Mall
• Route 6: Northside

Services Mon-Fri only

• Route 7: French Island
• Route 8: Crossing Meadows
• Route 9: Onalaska
• Ciculator Route 1
• Circulator Route 2

Services Mon-Sat only:

• Route 10: La Crescent Apple Express

Grand River Station

Grand River Station panorama

Grand River Station can be seen on the right of this aerial in downtown La Crosse

Grand River Station is the downtown transfer point for the majority of MTU routes and provides an MTU ticket counter along with retail and housing. The center opened on August 25, 2010, allowing transfers between MTU buses, intercity buses and commuter buses.^[8] Prior to the construction of Grand River Station, transfers between buses occurred by the Post Office at the intersection of 5th Avenue and State Street.

Ridership and service

	Total Ridership	Change	Total Revenue Hours	Change	Total Revenue Miles	Change	Fixed Route Ridership	Change	Fixed Route Revenue Hours	Change	Fixed Route Revenue Miles	Change
2007[9]	1,043,403	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a
2008[10]	1,202,018	015.2%	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a
2009[11]	1,189,841	01.01%	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a
2010[12]	1,230,030	03.38%	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a
2011[13]	1,255,407	02.06%	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a
2012[14]	1,152,781	08.17%	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a
2013[15]	1,229,410	06.65%	89,707	n/a	1,171,787	n/a	1,175,528	n/a	54,206	n/a	763,957	n/a
2014[16]	1,223,182	00.51%	81,247	09.43%	1,113,534	04.97%	1,192,752	01.47%	54,215	00.0%	766,569	00.34%
2015[17]	1,128,992	07.7%	80,624	00.77%	1,136,698	02.08%	1,102,173	07.59%	56,160	03.59%	794,864	03.69%
2016[18]	1,059,472	06.16%	81,240	00.76%	1,112,519	02.13%	1,032,964	06.28%	58,547	04.25%	830,979	04.54%
2017[19]	1,025,797	03.18%	70,506	013.21%	1,043,529	06.2%	999,955	03.2%	58,801	00.43%	844,107	01.58%
2018[20]	980,865	04.38%	67,404	04.4%	1,002,603	03.92%	959,453	04.05%	58,459	00.58%	845,271	00.14%
2019[21]	923,030	05.9%	67,734	00.49%	988,717	01.38%	905,412	05.63%	60,626	03.71%	866,971	02.57%
2020[22]	562,145	039.1%	62,788	07.3%	887,922	010.19%	552,719	038.95%	59,275	02.23%	826,151	04.71%
2021[23]	524,717	06.66%	67,767	07.93%	983,201	010.73%	510,235	07.69%	62,356	05.20%	884,284	07.04%
2022[24]	606,371	015.56%	-	-	1,012,367	02.97%	587,835	015.21%	-	-	887,773	00.39%
2023[25]	685,372	013.03%	-	-	1,016,566	00.41%	667,034	013.47%	-	-	896,617	01.0%

Financial Information

	Operating Expenses	Fare Revenue	Farebox Recovery Ratio	Operating Expense per Vehicle Revenue Mile	Operating Expense per Vehicle Revenue Hour	Operating Expense per Passenger Mile	Operating Expense per Unlinked Passenger Trip
2013[26]	$4,426,715	$646,955	23%	$5.79	$81.66	$1.18	$3.77
2014[27]	$4,661,352	$633,582	19%	$6.08	$85.98	$1.30	$3.91
2015[28]	$4,993,931	$632,438	17.3%	$6.28	$88.92	$1.46	$4.53
2016[29]	$5,123,647	$645,204	17%	$6.17	$87.51	$1.60	$4.96
2017[30]	$5,153,871	$610,973	15.7%	$6.11	$87.65	$1.72	$5.15
2018[31]	$5,150,579	$612,670	18%	$6.09	$88.11	$1.79	$5.37
2019[32]	$5,317,615	$537,194	14.9%	$6.13	$87.71	$1.96	$5.87
2020[33]	$5,301,401	$170,186	8.2%	$6.42	$89.44	$3.20	$9.59
2021[34]	$5,408,836	$251,832	9.4%	$6.12	$86.74	$3.54	$10.60

Although the MTU does not recover all of its operating expenses through fares, neither does the local motor vehicle infrastructure recover any of its expenses through user fees. In fact, not one cent of local road costs are paid for by the user, not to mention the abundant subsidized parking in the city.^{[editorializing]}

Bus fleet

The MTU bus fleet is composed primarily of Gillig Low Floor models. As of 2021, the 22 buses in the fleet had an average age 7.7 years, down from a high of 12.6 years in 2018.^[35][36] As of 2023, the bus fleet comprised the following vehicles:^[37]

Count	Year	Manufacturer	Model
1	2001	Gillig	Low Floor 35'
2	2002	Gillig	Low Floor 35'
5	2007	Gillig	Low Floor 35'
3	2012	Gillig	Low Floor HEV 35'
4	2019	Gillig	Low Floor 35'
6	2021	Gillig	Low Floor 35'
2	2021	Proterra	ZX5 35'
2	2023	Gillig	Low Floor HEV 35'

See also

• Scenic Mississippi Regional Transit
• La Crosse station
• Jefferson Lines
• Megabus
• Badger Bus
• List of intercity bus stops in Wisconsin
• List of bus transit systems in the United States