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Mountain View suspended its free shuttle services Thursday morning after learning that the operator failed to renew a state license that is required to legally run the shuttles, according to a city news release.
“We are exploring every possibility to reinstate services as soon as possible,” said Roni Hattrup, executive director of the Mountain View Transportation Management Association, a nonprofit that provides transportation services in Mountain View.
MTMA contracts with WeDriveU as the driver and operator for MVgo and the Mountain View Community Shuttle, which provide riders with free shuttle services throughout the city. About 350 passengers board MVgo and another 1,000 passengers board the community shuttle every weekday, Hattrup said.
MVgo is primarily geared toward commuters to help with “last-mile” connections to and from local bus, light rail and train stations. The Mountain View Community Shuttle has routes that go to shopping centers, parks, the senior center, El Camino Hospital and downtown Mountain View.
As of Thursday morning, all the shuttles came to standstill because of “the expiration of the shuttle operator’s California Public Utilities Commission license,” according to the city news release.
WeDriveU did not respond to questions for comment about the expired license at the time of publication.
Hattrup told the Voice that the CPUC license apparently expired on June 9. However, MTMA only learned about it on June 17, she said. The license expiration is likely impacting all services in California operated by WeDriveU, according to Hattrup.
In the absence of free shuttle services, MTMA is providing transit users with Uber vouchers. A voucher for two fully covered rides can be accessed online. The vouchers have a capacity limit, but the operator will refresh the link to provide more vouchers as they expire, Hattrup said.
MTMA is also looking at ways to resolve the situation with WeDriveU quickly, including exploring the option of using other operators, according to Hattrup.
“All of the plans are in motion to restore service as soon as possible, but there’s a lot of details to work out,” she said.
Editor’s note: This article has been updated to include weekday ridership figures for MVgo and the Mountain View Community Shuttle.
According to the CPUC website, a new license was issued to WeDriveU today. Hopefully that gets the service back up and running tomorrow.