WI: City of Eau Claire to waive bus fare for secondary students, riders under 18 starting Jan. 1

Starting at the beginning of 2026, the Eau Claire Transit bus ticket costs will be waived for high school students and anyone under the age of 18.

“It has been our goal for a while now to try to increase everyone’s access to transit,” City Administrator Stephanie Hirsch said.

Although there are continuing costs and subsidies associated with the operation of transit systems, Hirsch said there are still financial barriers that people may face when looking to take transit.

“Also for people who might want to just elect to take transit rather than getting a second car or a third car, they might do the math and decide they don’t want to spend that money on the fare,” she said. “So we have been wishing that there was a way to help more people get onto transit.

“The amount of money that is paid for in our budget through fare revenue is very small compared to the whole budget. Ideally, we wish we could have transit be free for everybody, because then for every dollar we invest in the system, or the federal government or the state invests, then there would be more of a return in terms of benefits for our residents.”

Effective Jan. 1, waiving the fare for community members under 18 years of age acts as a starting point in increasing accessibility to transit.

Student transit is a good area to focus on because of the predictability of routes associated with school, Hirsch said. Student passes in that age range also already generate only a small amount of revenue comparative to the city budget as a whole, roughly $15,000 to $20,000.

“Other reasons why it seemed like a good idea was because sometimes people can be kind of intimidated with riding a bus,” she said. “If we could get kids using it as part of their daily routine, then it may be something that they can rely on as they get older as well.”

Hirsch said keeping this in place is something they hope to continue. In the long run and if there is an opportunity to move a lot of students to buses, there might be opportunities to fund it, but there is no expectation for that at this time.

In addition to high school and middle school students transporting around the city using public transportation for school needs, students may also be able to use it as an opportunity to travel for other reasons. Families looking to take public transportation with their children may also benefit from the changes.

“Our next steps are to work with the school system and students taking the bus system to try to make sure that we have worked out the details of connectivity,” she said. “We need to figure out exactly when the bell times are and then how much before the school day starts the bus would need to get there.

“It’s a continuous improvement process to try to make sure that transit gets people where they need to go. That’s something that we will be working with the school system on to try to adjust over time.”

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