Tillamook County Transportation District (TCTD) is implementing route and schedule changes to The Wave services throughout Tillamook County. All changes will be effective January 2, 2018. TCTD General Manager Doug Pilant said, “These changes are a result of multi-year transit development planning effort that focused on strategies to increase local resident’s access to transit services while improving the overall reliability of The Wave’s bus schedules. These service changes are the result of rider service improvement recommendations from the District’s onboard passenger survey that was conducted.”
Route 1: Tillamook Town Loop
Tillamook Town Loop trips will begin departing the Tillamook Downtown Transit Center on-the-hour throughout the day to facilitate transfers to and from the other routes. The last trip will continue departing the Transit Center at 6:15 PM to accommodate riders on other buses who are arriving from Portland, Lincoln City and Cannon Beach.
The Town Loop service will also be re-routed to serve the Fairview District Neighborhood via Hughey and Hummingbird Lanes to eliminate the requirement for riders to call and request route deviations. Pilant said, “Local residents are required to call the dispatch center to schedule route deviations and by re-routing the service closer to where the riders live will eliminate the deviation requests and improving residents access to transit while improving the Route’s schedule reliability.”
Route 2: Netarts/Oceanside
Daily trips departing the Tillamook Downtown Transit Center will be spaced about 2hours apart throughout the day to improve rider’s ability to transfer to and from routes between Tillamook, Portland, Lincoln City and Cannon Beach.
Route 3: Manzanita/Cannon Beach
The North County service in City of Nehalem will be re-routed to provide direct service to the North Coast Recreation District. Pilant said, “There are frequent route deviation requests from passengers wanting to attend programs at the recreation District. This will eliminate deviation requests and improve schedule reliability.
The number of round trips between Tillamook and Cannon Beach will increase from 2 to 4 trips per day where the schedules are being coordinated with the Sunset Empire Transportation District’s “The Bus” service. Pilant said, “Early in the District’s local transit planning process the need for Tillamook County residents to travel to the North Coast Housing Authority, the Social Security Office and other medical facilities in Clatsop County was identified.” Pilant said a trip is being scheduled later in the evening to allow riders adequate travel time to conduct their business and return to Tillamook County on the same day.
Route 4: Neskowin/Lincoln City
The South County services Pacific City bus stop timepoint is being eliminated and moved to the Kiawanda Community Center. Additional time was added to the Route 4 schedule to improve rider’s ability to transfer to and from Lincoln County Transit buses going to Newport or the Coastal Connector buses going to Salem.
Route 5: Portland
TCTD is adding an additional 5-minutes to the schedule between the 3rd Street Park and Ride and the Tillamook Downtown Transit Center to provide additional passenger loading time to improve the Portland Route 5’s schedule. The District is also expanding driver layover times in Portland to improve the interline connections with both Amtrak and Greyhound.
The WAVE bus schedule effective 1/2/18
Riders can access route and schedule information online at nwconnector.org or by calling the The Wave Customer Service at 503-815-8283. Riders can also find real time route and schedule information on smartphones by downloading a Swiftly app.