Laguna Beach residents may soon enjoy riding the city’s trolleys on federal holidays like Martin Luther King Jr Day and have greater access to the transportation system during the Spring and Winter seasons.
Officials in the coastal city unanimously voted last month to accept millions in county grant funds to expand the city’s trolley services and expand the city’s free hybrid electric on-demand ride sharing program for residents – Laguna Beach Local.
Funding for the expansion of both services will come with help from $7.2 million Orange County’s Transportation Authority grant money over the next seven years with $5.2 million going towards the trolleys and $2 million going to the ride sharing service.
Mayor Sue Kempf commended Laguna Beach Director of Transit and Community Services Michael Litschi for the work on getting the grant and said the ride sharing service had over 63,000 boardings last year.
“This is a lot of money we got for a city our size,” she said at the Oct. 22 city council meeting. “It’s pretty darn good.”
Councilman Alex Rounaghi asked how many people used the ride service and said the city needs to increase awareness about the transit program.
“The more people are using this, I think it is going to be better for all of us, it’s an opportunity where you don’t need to have a car (living) in Laguna beach”.
Councilman George Weiss asked whether the trolley system transition to electric vehicles was part of the transit expansion project.
Litschi said officials will continue to look into replacing old trolleys with electric ones in the coming months.
However, none will be immediately replaced.
“We don’t want to purchase a lot of new electric trolleys before we have a reliable way to charge them, so the infrastructure piece of that is going to be important,” said Litschi.
Laguna Beach launched the ride sharing service in November 2021, and it is free for residents to use. It has over 150 pick up and drop-off locations throughout Laguna Beach.
Some of the grant funding will go to buying three new hybrid electric vehicles to service current pick-up and drop-off locations.
Litschi said the Laguna Beach trolley service has guaranteed funding through June of 2031 and the trolley service will also increase its weekday frequency and service additional locations.
He also said the expansion of the ride-sharing service was a necessity.
“We have received a lot of input from residents who live in the north end of town off Laguna Canyon road and El toro road about the lack of city transit services,” he said. “We got a lot of good feedback from residents that informs this.”
The trolley service will not get any new vehicles. Instead, the funding will be used to boost service on holidays and weekends.
Judie Mancuso, 2024 city council election candidate and member of the environmental sustainability committee, said that high school kids were using the ride sharing service excessively.
“The fear is that this is being taken away from seniors or other folks who might need to use this, now that we have this influx of money, maybe there is some other form of transportation we could incorporate for the highschool students,” Mancuso said to the city council at the Oct. 22 meeting.
Mancuso said, at Laguna Beach High School, students use the ride sharing service more than any other public transit service.
Laguna Beach City Clerk Anne Marie McKay said the project would also benefit residents living on the outskirts of town.
“I live in an unserviced area and I hear the complaints from residents there. I know the community appreciates the city recognizing that we have members out there who would like to be able to come into town easily without having to drive and find parking.”