South Metro Area Regional Transit

History

After complaints from local business owners who felt they were having to pay too much in payroll tax to support the regional transit agency, TriMet, with little or no bus service being provided in exchange, the city decided to file a formal petition to withdraw from the TriMet district. Such withdrawals were allowed, if meeting certain conditions, under a new law enacted by the Oregon Legislature in 1987. Wilsonville's petition to withdraw from the TriMet district was approved by the transit agency's board on November 30, 1988, and the withdrawal took effect on January 1, 1989. A condition of the TriMet ordinance permitting the withdrawal was that Wilsonville had to provide replacement transit service for at least one year. The change enabled the city to reduce the rate of the payroll tax levied on area businesses, for transit, from 0.6 percent to 0.3 percent. Initially, the city provided the required replacement service by contracting with TriMet, which in turn contracted with Buck Ambulance to give service with vans. However, Wilsonville later prepared to begin managing the service directly and to increase marketing of it, in hopes of improving ridership.

In 1990, the city council approved naming the Wilsonville bus system WART, for Wilsonville Area Rapid Transit. Aware that the name was likely to inspire a few jokes, city officials proposed using a leaping frog in a new logo to be created, in order to show they had a sense of humor. The service was free at all times.

In 1993, following a city-sponsored contest to rename the transit system, the city council approved changing WART to SMART, or South Metro Area Rapid Transit. The first full-size buses were put into service later the same year. Most service until then was dial-a-ride, door-to-door service. Following the acquisition of five used full-size buses, SMART introduced a new fixed route, 201, connecting Wilsonville with TriMet service at the regional agency's Tualatin Park-and-Ride lot and its Barbur Boulevard Transit Center, on November 1, 1993, and this was followed by the launching of a route to Oregon City (route 202), connecting with other TriMet routes there. From 1999 to 2000, a lunchtime bus service was operated between businesses and the commercial center.

Until fall 2005, no fares were charged for any SMART routes. As of 2006, only rides within Wilsonville are free. In 2009, TriMet's Westside Express Service (WES) commuter rail line began connecting with SMART buses at Wilsonville Station. SMART opened a new bus transit center next to the rail station, named SMART Central, that January. A minor change to SMART's name was made around the beginning of 2009, when "Rapid" was changed to "Regional", making the full name South Metro Area Regional Transit but leaving the acronym unaffected.

Current services

SMART has four routes that serve only Wilsonville, going east-west and north-south. However, it is noteworthy that the three other routes go well beyond the city limits (and the entities who pay for the service). Route 1X goes South on I-5 all the way to Salem, where riders can transfer to Salem-Keizer Transit (Cherriots) and operations is shared with Cherriots, the 2X heads North to Tualatin and southern Portland to the Barbur Transit Center, where riders can connect to TriMet, and Route 3 goes southeast to the city of Canby, connecting with Canby Area Transit. Routes 4, 5, 6, and 7 only serve Wilsonville, but Route 5 connects with TriMet Route 96 at Commerce Circle, at the northern end of the city.

On August 5, 2013, SMART began operating route 8X, an express route connecting the Wilsonville Transit Center with TriMet's Beaverton Transit Center via Interstate 5 and Highway 217. Because the WES commuter rail service connects the same two points, route 8X only has one trip per day in each direction (from Wilsonville at 5:20 a.m. and from Beaverton at 10:05 p.m.), and is intended to provide service at times when WES does not operate. The route was discontinued in 2016.

All of SMART's routes serve the transit center SMART Central, with timed connections between routes. The system has a total of 28 vehicles in its fleet as of February 2017, including buses, vans, and a trolley-replica bus.

With transfers, it is possible to use public transit to travel between Portland and Salem. Using SMART is cheaper than taking direct (and faster) Greyhound or Amtrak service.