CARTA, Twitter and Volunteers Team to Promote Black Friday Bus-Riding

During Thanksgiving weekend, the Town of Mount Pleasant and East Cooper CARTA Riders will cooperate to bring prosperity to businesses along the new CARTA 401 East Cooper Connector Bus route.

At 8 a.m. Firday, volunteers will convene to , 794 Coleman Boulevard, for an informal breakfast. Following the breakfast, volunteers will maintain a rider assistance presence on the #401 bus route from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m., tweeting out location and arrival time information to potential riders as @eastccrider with hashtag #CARTA401. A Facebook page and web page on the event will also be updated from the bus.

Businesses along the route can participate Saturday and Sunday by tweeting out specials and announcements with the #CARTA401 hashtag or by posting updates on the Facebook event page linked the www.eastccrider.com website.

Businesses can start helping out today by tweeting out location reports when they see the #CARTA401 bus in their area and are always welcome to promote their business using the hashtag.

The East Cooper Connector began running on April 17 with the goal of reaching a ridership standard of 10 passengers per hour by Sept. 30. Schools, churches, businesses, government have supported the awareness effort with nine passengers per hour. Volunteers are expected to bring that final rider per hour on board over the Thanksgiving weekend.

The #40 and Express Routes in Mount Pleasant have had ridership increases this year. Over 2,000 more riders a month are on CARTA and Tri County Links Buses East of the Cooper than were a year ago.

Full information on all of these routes can be found at www.eastccrider.com and official CARTA information can be found at www.ridercarta.com.