CHARLESTON, W.Va. — The Kanawha Valley Regional Transportation Authority is hearing from the public on more changes they plan to roll out.

The KRT, which serves as the Kanawha Valley’s main form of public transportation, plans to fully or partially replace six bus routes with new micro transits. These micro transits are through the KRTPlus service, which was introduced last fall.

This change will allow riders to schedule a ride on the KRTPlus app or by calling the KRT office. The micro transit will then pick the rider up at the location they request and take them somewhere inside their zone. If the rider needs to go outside their zone, the micro transit can take them to a fixed bus route.

The routes included in this potential change are as follows:

. #10– City Park/ North Gate/ Hillcrest
. #13 — Beech Ave
. #11 — Wertz Ave
. #15 — South Hills
. #16 — South Park
. #18 — Fort Hill/ Montrose

KRT held the first of two public hearings on the matter Tuesday evening in Charleston.

Rider Carlos Gonzales says the smaller buses may help him move away from his very fixed schedule when he has some free time.

“I’d like to go more places. I’d like to go someplace, a route that I’ve never seen before, and have dinner at a restaurant or something,” Gonzales said.

Sean Hill

According to KRT Executive Director Sean Hill, the micro transit vehicles are Ford Transit vans are ADA accessible, more compact, and fully customizable.

Once the public hearing concluded, Hill was asked about the customers that are apprehensive about using an app to schedule micro transit rides. He says they’ve made sure to continue to provide options for those who don’t use smartphones.

“Throughout this whole process, we’ve taken that in consideration. How can we roll this out in a way that’s the least painful as possible? Especially for individuals who maybe don’t want to embrace the smartphones or technology,” Hill said. “It’s been important to us that everything you can do on that smartphone KRTPlus app, you can also call into our office and schedule.

“It was important to us that we weren’t reliant exclusively on electronic payment. Individuals can still use cash, they can still talk to a person in our ticketing window and buy those tickets,” Hill continued.

KRT will hold another public hearing on Friday at noon at the Kanawha County Public Library in Charleston.

These changes would go into effect on July 14.