“Transportation for this area has always been a challenge,” said Kathy Krysiak, who has been general manager at Golden West Comfort Suites at 29300 U.S. 40 in Evergreen since 1999. She said that when prospective guests ask her about getting around in the area, she strongly recommends renting a car.
However, the challenge has eased up, Krysiak said, as transportation options in mountain communities have expanded.
In the five years since Don Bosch took over Mountains Taxi, the company has grown from one taxi van to a fleet of 20 vehicles.
He credits his success to a fine balance of meeting the area’s demand with good customer service.
“Because we are a small company, many of our passengers know our drivers by name,” he said. “Our best compliments come from out-of-towners who have experienced the big-city cab companies and then they experience us.”
The success has allowed Bosch to expand Mountains Taxi’s service area — which initially covered the Evergreen area and parts of Park, Clear Creek and Gilpin counties — to include Golden, where he said he was hearing of high demand. The service comes as a relief, especially to the mountain communities, which have seen sporadic taxi services in the past, or got by with none at all.
Bosch said the success of a taxi company anywhere is a delicate balance of supply and demand, which is even more challenging in less-dense areas like Evergreen.
“It’s a real fine line that you have to walk, because if you build the demand and not the availability, you’ve just wasted your time,” he said. “And if you build availability and not the demand, you’re also wasting your time.”
It is not much different for RTD’s Call-n-Ride service, which has served Evergreen since 2001. RTD’s specialty services manager, Brian Matthews, said about 40 percent of Call-n-Ride passengers are subscription-based, meaning riders get rides at the same time on the same days of the week. Seniors and kids make up most of the Call-n-Ride ridership.
“The middle-school kids are a big market for us,” Matthews said. “We just gave them wheels. It’s not easy to get around (in Evergreen) without Mom or Dad.”
However, he stresses that Call-n-Ride is not a taxi service. It requires more flexible pickup and dropoff times and it relies on a minimum ridership demand, which Matthews said has been low lately. He said RTD is in the very early outreach stages of getting an advisory committee together to look at possible adjustments to the service.
Other challenges include weather and longer travel and pickup times, but Bosch said customers generally grow to be understanding. Recently, he has had to face some competition in the form of Uber drivers coming into the area.
“All along the Front Range — including the foothills — we’ve been able to increase our service,” said Uber’s Colorado manager Will McCollum. Uber is a ride-share service in which aspiring drivers and passengers connect over a mobile application.
He said his company is all about supply and demand, too, but more on the part of the driver who chooses to serve the Evergreen area.
“Drivers are going to be where there’s demand for rides — the more they request, the more drivers are going to come.”
For Mountains Taxi, the current demand is also about more drivers; in July the company hopes to increase to 30 vehicles.
“The more we have vehicles on the road, the more responsive we can be,” he said. “We’re still building, and if I can find 20 drivers, that’s really a key point.”
Josie Klemaier: 303-954-2465, jklemaier@denverpost.com
