By Jake Derry. If you’ve taken a bus along Ponce lately, you may have noticed something different. On Saturday, April 18, MARTA launched its NextGen Bus Network, the largest overhaul of Atlanta’s bus system since the 1970s, and Candler Park sits right in the middle of some of its biggest changes.
The new network streamlines MARTA’s 113 bus routes down to 81, adds 12 on-demand “Reach” zones that work something like Uber, and triples the number of corridors where buses arrive every 15 minutes or better. For our neighborhood, the most meaningful change is to Route 2, which runs along Ponce de Leon Avenue. Buses on that route are now scheduled to come every 10 to 15 minutes, putting it among the most frequent bus lines in the entire system.
Residents near the Edgewood-Candler Park station have always had the Blue and Green lines as their main link downtown. NextGen adds two east-west options worth knowing about. Route 2 along Ponce heads west through Poncey-Highland and Old Fourth Ward, passing North Avenue Station and connecting to the Red and Gold lines. With buses every 10 to 15 minutes, this is finally a reliable way for Candler Park residents to get to Midtown without checking a schedule. Route 51 along Ralph McGill Boulevard runs every 20 minutes and is the more useful option for residents near Moreland Avenue, connecting Inman Park Station to Civic Center Station and running through Downtown Atlanta and Vine City. Riders heading for the Red or Gold lines can now grab Route 2 or 51 from a stop along Moreland instead of walking to Edgewood-Candler Park station.
While MARTA is rolling out the new network, it is still working out some of the kinks. Riders have noticed that bunching has been a problem on Route 2. Some wait 25 minutes at a bus stop, and then three buses arrive in a row, nose-to-tail. MARTA is still tuning the new schedules, and riders are hoping the agency can sort out the bunching as the network settles in.
Although the frequency increase is an improvement, MARTA has its eyes on bigger plans for Route 2. When the More MARTA plan was unveiled in 2018, a North Avenue BRT project was floated as a way to increase frequency and decrease the effects of traffic on the route. While the project has been deprioritized for other projects like the Rapid A line, which went live with the NextGen Bus Network, the increased ridership you can already see may help bring the project back into focus.
So the next time you’re tempted to drive to Tech or Midtown, give the 2 a try. Residents can check out the full network and schedules at itsmarta.com/nextgen.