New Bus Line Touted at Keep Middlesex Moving Meeting

The lauding of a brand new bus line between Plainsboro and Princeton was the featured discussion at Keep Middlesex Moving's annual shareholder meeting on Wednesday morning.

Headquartered in New Brunswick, Keep Middlesex Moving (KMM) is a nonprofit transportation management group that handles issues such as clean air, mass transit, cyclist and motorist safety, and traffic reduction.

At the meeting at the Forsgate County Club in Monroe, Plainsboro Mayor and KMM Trustee Peter Cantu said that last week, in Plainsboro, he christened a brand new bus route, which he said was the first new bus route opened by NJ Transit in eight years.

The NJ Transit No. 655 bus runs every 40 minutes on weekdays between Plainsboro, and has five stops, including the new United Medical Center of Princeton at Plainsboro hospital, Palmer Square in Princeton, the Princeton Railroad station, Scotts Corner Road in Plainsboro, and the Princeton Shopping Center.

Cantu said the bus route was the result of a great deal of lobbying for funding and discussions with NJ Transit, the new hospital, Princeton University, and the Princeton Forrestal Center, among other key players.

"None of this could have happened without an effective partnership," he said. $400,000 was pledged over three years by the key players to get the line up and running, Cantu said.

Cantu did not have a projection of the number of expected riders, but said that the line is anticipated to service enough riders to sustain it into the future.

KMM also recognized a number of businesses and agencies as NJ Smart Workplace Employers, meaning they offer employer commuter programs that are beneficial to the environment and attempt to reduce traffic.

Local honorees included Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital, the University of Medicine and Dentistry NJ, Rutgers University, the Hyatt Regency, Johnson & Johnson, and the Middlesex County Board of Chosen Freeholders, all of New Brunswick.

For more information on Keep Middlesex Moving, visit www.kmm.org.

Editor's note: KMM's own CarLotta also blogs for Patch about safe driving. Read her blogs here.