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After a long day’s work and waiting at the bus stop in the freezing cold, you just want to go home. But the Transit Windsor bus just passes you by because it’s jam-packed with St. Clair College students.

It’s a frustrating and demoralizing experience that’s happened repeatedly since the start of January for daily Transit Windsor rider Lisa Bassett, caused by a sudden explosion in ridership on the three South Windsor bus routes serving the college’s main campus.

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“My bus pass is $95 a month,” said Bassett. “That’s a lot of money to get passed every day.”

Compared to January of 2017, ridership last month was up 43.7 per cent on the Dominion 5, 49.5 per cent on the Dougall 6 and 39.4 per cent on the South Windsor 7. Most of the extra riders are going to and from the college, according to a recent Transit Windsor report that highlights this “significant increase in student ridership.”

“The buses are packed every single day,” said Bassett, who takes the Dominion 5 daily between her home in the Riverside Drive/McKay Avenue area to her job at a South Windsor daycare near Dominion Boulevard and Grand Marais Road. The problem usually happens on the ride home in the afternoon.