Second Line Transit’s official launch is now underway in Mobile, with a focus on smaller microtransit vehicles and a fleet of trolleys.

Mayor Spiro Cheriogotis has some ideas for the buses that remain.

“I’m thinking stickers on the back saying, ‘I wish I was a trolley,’ or ‘trolleys are coming,’” Cheriogotis said Wednesday during a ride-along with local media aboard the city’s first and so far only trolley. The vehicle was purchased for $100,000 using leftover revenue set aside in the city’s capital budget.

In Cheriogotis’ Mobile, it’s not going to be easy being a bus.

“It’s my stated goal to get rid of the buses,” he said. “We want to give them good homes to transit systems that love them.”

Cheriogotis, elected mayor a little more than a year ago, has made trolleys one of his signature initiatives during his first year in office. No previous mayor or City Council has ever introduced the concept, let alone elevated it to such a high priority.

The city’s first trolley, decorated with Second Line Transit branding, was purchased from Wisconsin-based Hometown Trolley. The vehicle has a 24-passenger capacity and is designed to resemble a historic rail trolley, similar to those found in cities such as New Orleans and San Francisco. It was built in 2018 and had been operating in Roanoke, Va.

The trolley will be stationed downtown.

Mayor’s trolley goals

The mayor said the first trolley is only the beginning. He wants more, a lot more.

In fact, he has said he is “obsessed” with trolleys and still holds out hope that someday a billionaire donor could help fund a light-rail line to move trolleys around the city.

For now, his goal is to have between 10 and 12 trolleys operating throughout Mobile within the next four years. To achieve that, he will need federal funding and City Council support.

So far, council members appear open to the idea, though not without reservations. At a meeting last month, Councilman Ben Reynolds said the city should proceed cautiously, noting that officials need more analysis of the success of the Second Line Transit system and of any new trolleys before moving toward a large-scale replacement of buses.

Still, the Mobile City Council approved a resolution allowing city staff to apply for a $1.36 million Federal Transit Administration grant to purchase five trolley-style buses for Second Line Transit’s fixed-route network. If awarded, the grant would require a $320,000 local match.

Cheriogotis said that the price tag is manageable and significantly less expensive than purchasing new buses, which he said can cost as much as $1 million each.

He said he was hopeful the grant would be awarded within the next year. If that happens, a trolley route would be added along Old Shell Road, connecting downtown Mobile with Spring Hill College and the University of South Alabama.

Ultimately, however, Cheriogotis wants to replace the city’s fleet of roughly 50 buses with rubber-tire trolleys.

Call it nostalgia, or just a hunch, but the mayor is committed to his vision and believes the shift will succeed.

“I realize these are not rail-based trolleys, but it’s a historical look,” Cheriogotis said. “It’s the history we had here up until 1950. It brings a piece of nostalgia with them. I think people, in many ways, yearn for simpler times — whether it was actually simple or not — I think they like the trolleys.”

Public transportation changes

The emphasis on trolleys is part of a sweeping transformation of Mobile’s public transit system that began more than a year ago, when the city hired New York-based Via Transit to oversee operations and modernize service by introducing a new app-based platform, reducing the number of fixed-route buses, and expanding microtransit options.

At the time the city was examining a new approach to busing, Cheriogotis was campaigning on bringing trolleys to Mobile during last year’s mayoral race. He was the only candidate to highlight trolleys as a key part of the transit plan, advocating for replacing the city’s buses with what he has described as more nimble trolley-style vehicles.

The new transit system is now known as “Second Line,” a name selected through an online vote and inspired by Mardi Gras traditions. The new system is expected to be fully implemented in the coming months. Existing vehicles and buses are being rewrapped with Second Line Transit branding, replacing the former Wave identity.

Cheriogotis said that because the city eventually hopes to replace many of its buses, some vehicles will not receive the new branding.

Questions remain about whether the changes could reduce service in neighboring Prichard or in Africatown, north of downtown Mobile.

“Our concern is the territory,” said Robert Clopton, president of the Mobile chapter of the NAACP. “It could be a good addition. It serves the same purpose (as a bus). But our concern is with microtransit and how it will be conducive for the people on the outskirts of the city.”

Clopton said there are concerns that some residents who have long been accustomed to the old transit system could be left out of the new system.

The challenge appears to be educating people about the service changes and demonstrating how the new approach will meet their transportation needs.

Cheriogotis recounted a recent conversation with a longtime transit rider who lives along U.S. 45. He said the woman was worried that the bus service she had used for decades would disappear.

The mayor said he explained how the microtransit system would work and even showed the resident how to use the new app.

“Instead of walking six blocks daily (to a bus stop), she is now looking to walk a block-and-a-half,” the mayor said. “The microtransit network will come on your schedule, not the buses schedule.”

In his nightly newsletter on Wednesday, Cheriogotis praised the new system and predicted it would be more accessible to 60,000 additional Mobilians than the previous Wave Transit, which relied on fixed bus routes.

“It will allow even more of your neighbors to get to work, go out on the town, or get to where they need to go more effectively and efficiently,” Cheriogotis said about Second Line Transit. “This is a new era in Mobile’s public transit, and the future is bright.”

Cheriogotis, during his session with the media, said he believes a shift from the large buses to microtransit vehicles and trolleys will generate revenue and help offset the cost of expanding the trolley fleet.

“I think we’ve already created a more reliable system and one primarily more convenient due to the microtransit at this stage,” he said. “I think people are more willing to ride (trolleys) than buses.”

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