The Cardinal will fly down Welch Avenue no more.

The Ames Transit Agency Board of Trustees voted unanimously Monday to change the route of CyRide’s Cardinal Circulator, deflecting it away from Welch Avenue and sending it instead on a figure-8 pattern between campus and Frederiksen Court.

The change in the Cardinal Circulator won’t be made until August 2004.

The decision was made, said Bob Bourne, CyRide director, due to the diminishing number of occupants living in the remaining two Towers residence halls at the end of Welch Avenue. Roughly 2,200 students lived in the four buildings a few years ago, but due to the closing of Knapp and Storms Halls, the number has dwindled to about 600.

However, CyRide officials have not forgotten those left at Towers.

Additional buses will be added to the Brown Route, Bourne said, and buses will still be stopping at Towers bus stops every 10 minutes. This, he noted, is not a significant reduction from the 8-minute windows which exist with the current routes.

The change in routes will save CyRide $42,000 a year in expenses.

Because the Cardinal Circulator is fully student-funded, the money saved by the termination of the Welch Avenue leg will help to alleviate pressure on student funding of CyRide.

“It makes sense,” Bourne said. “It won’t make a significant difference. It’s still the kind of schedule where you can just wander out and get on a bus without having to check the schedules.”

Shawn Montague, GSB senator and one of two students on the Transit Board, said the decision to change the Cardinal route had been the right one, given the circumstances.

“More or less, with the numbers of students in the Towers being down, we have an excess of service out there,” he said. “And we’re saving students $42,000 next year. With the increases in tuition, the raises in fees and everything else, every little bit helps.”

Dan Becker, treasurer of the Towers Residence Association, said the change in the Cardinal Circulator likely wouldn’t create much of a stir among the remainder of Towers residents.

“Honestly, since I moved to Wallace from Knapp, I haven’t used the Cardinal that much,” he said. “I don’t like the walk, so I usually just take the Brown bus. I can understand their decision, because it probably costs a lot to run out here. I have noticed that the few times I’ve ridden the Cardinal, it’s not very full.”

Becker added the change would likely be quickly accepted.

“It’s going to affect a few people here and there, but give them a few weeks and they’ll forget all about it,” he said.

Montague said the board had also agreed to eliminate the Silver Route, which snakes through campus and back from South 16th Street and the Duff Avenue Kmart on Fridays and Saturdays, moving the buses’ run to Sunday instead.