Express Bus Routes (Minneapolis, St. Paul, Eagan: transfer, moving to, train)

[Family of five]

Hi! I cannot find the answer to my question on the Metro Transit website - that site is just not user friendly.

My question is, which suburbs have direct (no transfer) express bus routes that go directly to downtown St. Paul?

If you know of one, could you please tell me if it from a Park and Ride or a regular bus stop? And the route number, if you know it. Thank you so much!

[northsub]

If you go to metrotransit.org the front page has trip planning front and center. I see 3 tabs: Plan a Trip, Routes & Schedules, Stops & Stations. If you pick Routes & Schedules there is a drop down box that says "Schedules: (Select Route)". If you select that you effectively get a list of routes where you can find the ones that say Express and mention St. Paul. Here's the list I got (with one limited stop route thrown in):

94 - Express - Minneapolis - St Paul
262 - Ltd Stop - 95Av P&R - Rice St - St Paul
265 - Express - White Bear Lake - Maplewood - St Paul
275 - Express - Lino Lakes - Centerville - St Paul
285 - Express - Forest Lake - Running Aces-St. Paul
294 - Express - Oakdale - Stillwater - St Paul
350 - Ltd Stop - Sunray - McKnight - St Paul
351 - Express - Woodbury - St Paul
361 - Express - Cottage Grove - St Paul
364 - Express - Newport - Cottage Grove - St Paul
480 - MVTA - Express - Apple Valley - Eagan - St Paul
484 - MVTA - Express - Eagan - St Paul
860 - Express - Riverdale - Northtown - St Paul

[Family of five]

Thank you, this is helpful. I find that site so hard to navigate! That list of routes is daunting to me, so thank you for pulling out the relevant ones. It used to have a map feature that showed you all the routes at once, but I can't find that. Thanks!

[northsub]

I think metro transit changed their website in the last week or so. I should also warn you that I through that list together rather quickly, so it is possible I missed a route or two.

[gweilo845]

The "limited stop" is usually not much faster than a regular bus. It is just used for routes that use the freeway for a portion of their route. I took the 54 from MOA to downtown St Paul recently and it was a regular route (stopped every block) once it got off the freeway and it took quite a while to get to downtown.

Also, keep in mind that most of the express routes run very infrequently, basically a handful of times to/from downtown during rush hour. I looked into using the 480 from Apple Valley to downtown St Paul for a possible job and it only ran to there 3 times, with the last route leaving the AV transit center at 7:15 AM. Not very convenient IMO. The 94 does run all day but that is between downtown Minneapolis and downtown St Paul only.

Metro Transit's website is awful. Hard to navigate and often gives you inaccurate information -- even the colors/design hurts my eyes. The mobile one is even worse.

[amplified]

Originally Posted by Family of five

Hi! I cannot find the answer to my question on the Metro Transit website - that site is just not user friendly.

My question is, which suburbs have direct (no transfer) express bus routes that go directly to downtown St. Paul?

If you know of one, could you please tell me if it from a Park and Ride or a regular bus stop? And the route number, if you know it. Thank you so much!

I'm glad I'm not the only one. I've not seen a less user friendly site for transit.

[Family of five]

Thank you for the feedback! We are contemplating moving to the 'burbs, but only if my hubby can continue to take the bus, and only if it is relatively easy (no transfer and limited stops). I can see that this is a tall order. I've been continuing to look at the metro transit website and it is so frustrating . Makes me want to move to a city with a good train system.

[Mr. In-Between]

Holy cats, they did change their website. It's awful.

I know a lot of people didn't care much for the old website, but I knew the guy who designed and maintained it, and he told me a number of times about the challenges of trying to get all the essential information in there in a format that was relatively user-friendly for savvy, computer-literate types like us, but at the same time understandable for the other end of their demographic - non-English speakers, people with disabilities that made it difficult for them to navigate even simple websites, and elderly folks who struggled just to get online in the first place. There's a "sweet spot" they need to hit, an overlap zone that works as well as possible for the maximum number of users, and that's a pretty tough "middle ground" to consistently find and operate in.

If anyone finds their site too daunting or obscure, I suggest just calling the transit information center some day while you have the site up on your computer. They'll be glad to walk you through it, and can teach you lots of tricks and shortcuts that will make it a lot easier to navigate.

[Tom Dempsey's Left Foot]

I think the site is okay...it seems to still have all the information on there from before, but with a more tablet-or-mobile-friendly interface. Which is...I mean, on my laptop, it's really weird looking aesthetically, but I love the site redesign when I use Metrotransit.org on my phone, so I'll accept the tradeoff. As long as the Interactive Map is on the front page (which is a complete godsend for someone like me), I'll take it.

That being said, there have always been a few ways to work around the weirdness of the Metro Transit site. FamilyOfFive, I'd recommend that if you want to find an express route that goes direct, the best option might actually be plugging in a starting point in the suburbs and getting directions via Google Maps. They've got a bus directions option, and it's an easier way to get there than Metro Transit's...always has been.

[northsub]

Originally Posted by Tom Dempsey's Left Foot

I think the site is okay...it seems to still have all the information on there from before, but with a more tablet-or-mobile-friendly interface. Which is...I mean, on my laptop, it's really weird looking aesthetically, but I love the site redesign when I use Metrotransit.org on my phone, so I'll accept the tradeoff. As long as the Interactive Map is on the front page (which is a complete godsend for someone like me), I'll take it.

That being said, there have always been a few ways to work around the weirdness of the Metro Transit site. FamilyOfFive, I'd recommend that if you want to find an express route that goes direct, the best option might actually be plugging in a starting point in the suburbs and getting directions via Google Maps. They've got a bus directions option, and it's an easier way to get there than Metro Transit's...always has been.

I think bing is superior to google for bus routes right now. With bing you can input any start day/time you want. Google seems to only focus on the next start time. An example of the problem of this is a route from the Mermaid Lounge in Mounds View to the Xcel Center. Google insists on sending you to downtown Minneapolis and then to downtown St. Paul. Bing allows you to put a start time of 5:30 on Monday morning and thus can find the direct bus route (860) that saves over half an hour on the trip.