Ardmore Could Lose Bus Service to Airport

Beginning next year, SEPTA plans to divert Route 115 from Philadelphia International Airport toward DCCC, rather than to Ardmore as it currently runs, the agency announced Friday at a public meeting in Philadelphia.

“Most of the 115 ridership is in Havertown and south,” said SEPTA official Mark Cassel.

Ardmore resident John Barr objected to the plan.

“I tell people that the 115 is a one-seat ride to the airport. They don’t know it exists (because) there’s no marketing,” Barr said. “I thought we were making Ardmore a transportation center. If you do have to cut the 115, at least restore the 106 and 103, all their trips to Suburban Square, so it truly is a transportation center.”

Bus routes in Ardmore and elsewhere within SEPTA changed schedules this week. Cassel told Barr, “We’ve been working with township officials to get buses closer.”

Douglas Diehl of Tri-State Transit Group said he had mixed feelings about the 115 diversion: “It’s going to be very long to go from Delaware County Community College to Philadelphia International Airport. It’s got to go through one of the most congested areas of Delaware County. But I like that we’re looking for a way to get more ridership on the northern side of that route, which has been starving for it.”

Other routes are being eliminated or extended, based on current rate of ridership or requests from the public.

Friday’s meeting was an informal session. An official public hearing on the agency’s many route-change proposals for 2012 will follow sometime in April, and the board would vote in June or July, SEPTA official Charles Webb said.