The Pascoag to Providence bus is among those that RIPTA is seeking to eliminate, citing low ridership.

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The Providence Journal / Mary Murphy

PROVIDENCE — The state transit authority yesterday spelled out the service cutbacks it is considering, saying it would eliminate a fifth of its service, affecting dozens of bus lines across the state and dropping service to four towns entirely.

The Rhode Island Public Transit Authority said the cutbacks would affect 50 regular routes, eliminating some and chopping off sections of others. They would reduce the number of buses on some lines, increase the time between buses on others and eliminate some evening and weekend service.

Mark Therrien, a RIPTA assistant general manager, said the cutbacks would eliminate about 4.7 million rides, or about 20 percent of its total annual ridership, and eliminate service to Tiverton, Scituate, Burrillville and Glocester.

“We want to improve and expand the system,” not cut it, said RIPTA General Manager Alfred J. Moscola. “We need a first-class transit system if we want economic development in Rhode Island. Unfortunately, after years of cost-cutting, we’ve run out of options.”

Like other transit systems, RIPTA can’t operate without subsidies, primarily from the state government, and those aren’t keeping up with expenses.

If the service reductions are put into effect by the authority’s board of directors, they would significantly undermine the authority’s hope of being a statewide transit system, and would instead move RIPTA toward serving only the state’s urban centers.

Even before all of the details were released yesterday, the prospective service cuts had been vigorously attacked by transit advocates as bad policy, particularly when buses are already crowded and drivers are shifting, or trying to shift, to public transit.

The cuts reflect only the latest and most severe of years of budget crises at the agency. Officials say that pattern is the product of a financing system, largely dependant on the state gasoline tax, that had failed to keep up with costs long before the latest sharp increases in the cost of diesel fuel punctured RIPTA’s budget in the spring.

Moreover, the cuts, the biggest considered in recent memory, would only cover part of a $12-million deficit in this year’s $103-million budget. That would mean both implementing the service cuts this year and rolling perhaps $5 million of the deficit over to the next fiscal year, where RIPTA’s financial outlook is already bad.

The agency will hold public hearings on the service cuts in six communities beginning Sept. 26. Members of the authority board, who must ultimately decide whether to put the cutbacks into effect, have already said that they oppose service reductions and that they went ahead with the hearings because they didn’t have a choice.

The cutbacks include a combination of measures — the elimination of whole routes, shortening of existing routes and cutting back on days or hours of service.

Along with the estimated drop in ridership, Therrien estimated the cutbacks’ effect another way. They would, he said, reduce the number of hours of service RIPTA provides by a similar amount, about 19 percent. That would amount to 800 fewer hours of service per week.

The authority has said it chose routes to cut based on the number of passengers per trip, per hour, and per mile, and the amount of fares collected — an approach intended to minimize the impact on riders by cutting the least-used routes. The authority also said it was trying to eliminate duplicative service first and to preserve trips to work and service to hospitals and medical centers.

One result, however, would be the elimination of service to eight park-and-ride facilities, a direct blow to the goal of reducing the number of vehicles on the road. Therrien said that those buses usually ride empty one way and carry one group of passengers over the whole length of the route the other. That reduces the intensity of use and fare collection compared with routes where riders regularly get on and off, putting the park-and-ride buses at a disadvantage.

The authority’s financial problems stem from its inability to raise its own revenue and its dependence on revenue sources that have become undependable.

In recent years, the bus system has been kept afloat with one-time infusions of state funds by the governor and General Assembly, a solution that is not on the table this year.RIPTA hearings

The Rhode Island Public Transit Authority has scheduled six public hearings on its proposed cuts in service. Except for the Smithfield hearing, the meetings will be from 2 to 4 p.m. and 6 to 8 p.m. on the following days at these locations:

•Narragansett: Sept. 26, Narragansett Town Hall, assembly room, 25 Fifth Ave.

•Warwick: Sept. 29, Warwick City Hall, council chambers, 3275 Post Rd.

•Barrington: Sept. 30, Barrington Public Library, second-floor auditorium, 281 County Rd.

•Newport: Sept. 30, Newport City Hall, council chambers, 43 Broadway.

•Smithfield: Oct. 1, Smithfield Senior Center, cafeteria room, 1 William J. Hawkins Jr. Trail, from 2 to 4 p.m. and from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m.

•Providence: Oct. 2, DaVinci Community Center, central room, 470 Charles St.Proposed cuts in RIPTA service

Regular route and flex service eliminations

Rte. 8 Jefferson Boulevard

Rte. 24 West Bay Shopper

Rte. 49 Camp Street

Rte. 53 Smithfield Avenue

Rte. 62 Thames Street

Rte. 64 Newport/URI

Rte. 73 Fairlawn/CCRI

Rte. 80 Armistice Boulevard

Rte. 203 Narragansett Flex

Rte. 233 Tiverton Flex

Rte. 242 West Warwick Flex

Park and Ride eliminations

Rte. 90 A (W.Warwick/Arctic/Crompton)

Rte. 90 A (Warwick)

Rte. 90 C (Cumberland)

Rte. 90 S (Scituate)

Rte. 90 W (Richmond)

Rte. 90 W (West Greenwich)

Rte. 90 W (Hopkinton)

Rte. 90 W (Westerly)

Route Segment eliminations — eliminated segment

Rte. 1 Eddy Street, all service beyond Providence city line

Rte. 9 Pascoag, all service beyond Apple Valley

Rte. 11 Broad Street, all Prairie/Colony House trip deviations

Rte. 19 Plainfield Street, service from Marconi Square to Wal-Mart

Rte. 20 Elmwood Avenue, service between Wellington at Elmwood & Park Square

Rte. 22 Pontiac Avenue, service between Pastore Center and CCRI

Rte. 27 Manton Avenue, all service beyond Providence city line

Rte. 28 Hartford Avenue, all service beyond Providence city line

Rte. 55 Admiral Street, all service beyond Providence city line

Rte. 57 Smith Street, all service beyond Providence city line

Rte. 61 Memorial Boulevard, all supplemental Summer Beach Bus service

Rte. 66 URI/Galilee, all supplemental Summer Beach Bus service

Elimination of Saturday service

Rte. 14 West Bay

Rte. 29 Kent County

Rte. 79 Columbus Avenue

Rte. 91 Gold Line Trolley

Elimination of Sunday service

Rte. 34 East Providence

Elimination of all Weekend service

Rte. 76 Central Avenue

blandis@projo.com