City of Claremont Trolley Service Design
Claremont Public Works Department, Claremont, CA (2007)

As a follow-along to a previous comprehensive operational analysis of public transit for the City of Claremont, AMMA Transit Planning prepared a conceptual review of all elements of a downtown trolley service for this city of 37,000 residents on the eastern edge of Los Angeles County. The City Council desired an attractive,  visitor-oriented  non-traditional transportation service for its downtown Village which was greatly expanded during 2007 to embrace an eight-block area on the west side of Indian Hill Blvd., the street that had previously bounded the western edge of the old Village.  The trolley's purpose was to connect the old and new Village areas, to provide connection between new high-density housing and the Metrolink station, and to link the Claremont Colleges' campuses just to the north with the expanded Village.  

AMMA's role was to identify all operational elements of the proposed service, including vehicle issues, operating schedule and preliminary routing, ridership estimates and costs.   AMMA assisted with a Congestion Management Air Quality grant application for which the City successfully obtained funding to purchase its new trolley vehicle.   The study launched a ten-month public participation process that involved numerous city stakeholders in implementation details. 

The new service was implemented during 2008, running a 1.5 mile loop every 15 minutes between 11 a.m. and 11 p.m., Thursdays through Saturdays.  Within its first six months the Claremont Trolley was regularly attaining AMMA's projected first-year weekly ridership and productivity estimates.