The Eagle Valley Transportation Authority is making their regional transit service more accessible and easier to use by kicking off expansion of free fares and increased bus service frequency for ECO Transit.
Except for passengers boarding and exiting at Gypsum or Leadville, all other ECO Transit riders can now ride completely fare-free. The fare-free service was supported by a 2022 ballot measure that funds both ECO Transit and the Eagle Valley Transportation Authority from two separate taxes of 0.5%, which was passed in unincorporated Eagle County, Beaver Creek, Vail, Avon, Minturn, Red Cliff and Eagle. Only residents in Gypsum voted against the authority’s formation.
Because of the fare-free service ECO Transit expects an increase in ridership, which similarly occurred when the Vail-Beaver Creek Express offered free fares last winter. Planning for this increase, the ECO Transit bus schedule will feature more buses running per day, which gives riders much more flexibility when trip planning using transit.
For most of the day, five buses will depart Vail Transportation Center every hour heading west – adding two more buses to the schedule per hour. The US 6 route, which ends in Edwards, will have three buses running per hour, and the Valley Route, which runs between the Vail Transportation Center and Two Rivers Village in Dotsero, will have two buses running per hour.ECO Transit’s summer service will run from May 19 until Nov. 23, 2024. For the full summer bus schedule and more information on the service, visit Evta.org. Every bus stop also has the newly expanded service summer bus schedules posted, as well as a QR code that links to the online version of the schedules.