Express bus improves Orange-Durham commute

Orange County residents who work in Durham now have an easier option for getting to and from work.

Triangle Transit started an Orange-Durham Express bus that stops at the North Hills Shopping Center in Hillsborough, Duke University Hospital, the Durham VA Medical Center and Durham Station.

It was created to relieve parking problems at Duke and UNC hospitals and to encourage the use of public transportation, said Craig Benedict, director of planning and inspections for Orange County.

“We want to do two things: W e want to take the pressure off the parking at those two locations, and we want to try to get people to stop driving those single-occupancy vehicles,” he said.

Benedict said many Orange County residents commute to Durham for work each day.

“There’s thousands of people that are in Mebane, Efland and Hillsborough zip codes that work at the hospital and university,” he said. “And there are more that work downtown.”

About 64.8 percent of Orange County residents work outside the county, according to the Chapel Hill-Carrboro Chamber of Commerce’s 2014 State of the Community Report.

Benedict said there are plans in the works to extend the ODX bus route to Mebane and Efland next year.

While there is no express bus that runs from Chapel Hill to Durham, the two cities are connected through Triangle Transit’s 400 and 405 routes.

To access the express route, Chapel Hill bus riders have to take Triangle Transit’s 420 route to the shopping center.

Bonnie Smith, a supervisor with UNC Hospitals’ food services, lives in Durham and takes the HU bus from the hospital to the N.C. 54 Park and Ride lot. Her commute time is usually 30 minutes.

She said an express route from Chapel Hill to Durham could be beneficial, but she is happy with the current system.

“It might be helpful,” she said. “But I basically just live up the street, right next to the Durham-Chapel Hill border.”

The ODX route leaves from Hillsborough at 6:25 a.m., 7:25 a.m. and 8:25 a.m. each weekday morning and arrives back in Hillsborough at 4:30 p.m., 5:30 p.m. and 6:30 p.m. each evening.

The service is being offered for free through Sept. 19. After that, it will cost $3 each way.

The new service costs about $63,000, Brad Schulz, spokesman for Triangle Transit, said in an email.

The cost was split evenly between Orange and Durham counties, Schulz said.

Assistant City Editor Claire Nielsen contributed reporting.

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