Most buses exist to serve an actual purpose. They run in a certain area not seen by other routes or connect important areas that other routes don't. And then there's the 49 from RIPTA.
Why does this thing even need to exist? There are not just one but TWO high-frequency routes right near it (both east and west of it), those being the 1 and the R. This thing also runs three trips a day southbound and two trips a day northbound on weekdays only.
The bus leaves Miriam Hospital at 9:10 am, 3:10 pm, and 3:56 pm every day. The bus departs from Kennedy Plaza at 8:45 am and 3:31 pm for its return trip. The route takes approximately 20 minutes between the two endpoints.
This thing is useless. This route gets 24 riders per day and is the second-least used non-Flex route in the entire system.
Edit - March 6, 2022: The 49 is on RIPTA's chopping block to be eliminated in 2022! Even RIPTA found it useless.
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Heli on October 26, 2021 at 4:44 pm: cool post! Funnily enough, I actually wrote a post on this very route as my 2nd ever post! It really is that bad, huh?