Oakland Broadway Shuttle To Run Until 1 AM Starting In July

Broadway 'B' Free Shuttle, a photo by Pushcart Design on Flickr.

Oakland Broadway Shuttle extends operating hours!

That's the Twitter tweet from @BroadwayShuttle I just saw, and was posted about 15 minutes ago. Here it is:

@BroadwayShuttle Broadway Shuttle
It's official! Broadway Shuttle will run Fri & Sat nights until 1am beginnning in early July. Stay tuned for more details.
19 minutes ago via web

This is GREAT news for Oaklanders, like this blogger, who have asked for a service like this for some time, if only to have a real inexpensive alternative to the car after a night out bar-hopping (I use the cabs).

Back in September 9th of 2009, I called for a late night shuttle service that would ideally ring around Lake Merritt. While the Broadway Shuttle doesn't do that - it stops at Webster and Grand Avenue, just two blocks from the Lake - at least the 1 AM time stop is a massive move in the right direction.

What would it take to extend it? Money.

I know the owners of The Lake Chalet would welcome such a move to extend the Broadway Shuttle around the Lake, and help pay for it in some way.

In fact, if we count merchant heads, of those businesses that may be interested in helping pay a percentage of their sales toward such a shuttle extension, we have The Lake Chalet, The Ruby Room (not far from the Chalet), Disco Violante, Baggy's Bar on East 18th, Room 389 on Grand, Round Table Pizza on Grand, Heart and Dagger and Kwik Way on Lake Park, Gold's Gym (which is open until midnight) The Grand Lake Theater (it's owner, Alan Michaan's got to want this), Lanesplitters Pizza, Easy Bar on Lakeshore, Colonial Donuts on Lakeshore (open all night), and The Alley on Grand Avenue, as well as Smitty's Bar, Kingman's Lounge, The Boot and Shoe Restaurant.

That's 17 establishments in total, and just paying for what realistically should be a weekend route extension, for Friday and Saturday. I don't know what that cost would be as of this writing, but what if each business contributed four percent of their monthly gross income to that shuttle service?

If that came to $600 per month per establishment, a low guess, that would be $10,200 per month, or $222,400 per year. That should be enough, perhaps more than needed, just to run a two-night route extension.

Indeed, looking at the original operating grant that called for $997,000 for a two-year shuttle program, it's more than doable.

Now What About The Lake Merritt Library?

Some Oaklanders reading this will be livid that part of the money could not go to save the local library, and they would be correct. So, why not have a program where any money raised over a ceiling of need would go directly to the operation of the library on El Embarcadero, next to the Lake.

Just throwing out some ideas, just showing what's possible to do.

Got off track, but the good news is the Broadway Shuttle hours are extended. That's a great first start!