Bloomington Transit bus routes free to public for 'First Fridays' of months

Today all nine Bloomington Transit bus routes will be free to the public as part of Bloomington's "First Fridays," a program in which several downtown businesses offer special deals on the first Friday of every month to encourage people to explore the city. BT has been offering this promotion the first Friday of every month since October.\n"We try to have free days, so people can feel comfortable riding the bus," said Kristi Ross, customer service manager for BT. "We used to do free week, and it was the first week of the fall semester. This year we wanted to do something a little different." \nWhen BT employees learned about "First Fridays," they were excited about the idea of encouraging people to go out around town and soon joined the program, which is sponsored by Downtown Bloomington Inc.\n"We just thought it was a nice fit from the beginning," Ross said.\nBT will continue to offer free rides on the first Friday of the month through May and will then decide whether to continue the promotion for the rest of 2006, Ross said.\nBuses will run today starting at 6:10 a.m. until about 12:30 a.m. For complete schedules and route information, visit www.bloomingtontransit.com.