The present state, corrected: Route 30, the 2025 redesign, and the for-hire test

2025–2026 · PRESENT STATE — AND A FLAGGED DIVERGENCE FROM THE BANKED ARTICLE

The correction, stated first because it changes a banked article: Transportation's present-state article prints Yellow Line Bittersweet service with a transfer to Transpo Route 9. That state no longer exists. Under the CONNECT Transit Plan — the joint Transpo/MACOG redesign of both networks — the new system launched Monday, 2 June 2025, and Route 9 was replaced by Route 30: a jointly operated, one-seat ride between downtown South Bend and downtown Elkhart, scheduled under one hour end to end, running through Osceola as Route 30 / 30-YELLOW. The divergence is flagged here rather than smoothed: the banked article was true of the pre-June-2025 network, and the official plan and the current schedules supersede it. Osceola's stops on the present line run the length of Lincolnway and its cross streets — Lincolnway at Ash, Chestnut, Erie, Beech, Oregon, Peony, Guernsey and Bittersweet among them — with Osceola Town Hall a named timing point; the June 2026 schedules (GTFS/Moovit) give a first bus at about 5:08 AM and a last at about 7:20 PM at Osceola. The redesign has already had a second act: Indiana Senate Enrolled Act 1 (signed 15 April 2025) cut the property-tax base Transpo runs on, and Transpo's answering 2026 route modifications — aired at open houses on 27 May and 10 June 2026, public comment to 22 June — were implemented in September 2026, saving a reported $400,000–$600,000 in the first year: Routes 14 and 15 discontinued, Route 1 truncated at 12th Street and Merrifield, free fares 8–12 September for the changeover. Route 30's one-seat line through Osceola stands as the present state of transit on this ground: the best service the town has ever had, and younger than the banked article it corrects. The for-hire test, at survey size: no taxi company is seated in Osceola in the directories searched (November 2026); the nearest seated taxi trade is Mishawaka's (Mishawaka Taxi Service). App service reaches the town — Uber's own Osceola page quotes an average of about $18 for a sixteen-minute ride — and one Osceola-address carrier, Michiana Medical Transportation, works the non-emergency medical trade, which is a medical service and not a taxi trade. The town that waited seventy-five years for a bus has a one-seat regional line and no cab of its own; both halves are the present state.

Sources:

1. Transpo / MACOG, CONNECT Transit Plan — the joint redesign; new Transpo and Interurban Trolley networks launched Monday 2 June 2025; Route 9 replaced by Route 30, one-seat downtown South Bend ↔ downtown Elkhart in under an hour. CONFLICT with Transportation's present-state article flagged in the text, per this run's discipline.
2. Route 30 / 30-YELLOW schedules (GTFS/Moovit, June 2026) — Osceola stops on Lincolnway (Ash, Chestnut, Erie, Beech, Oregon, Peony, Guernsey, Bittersweet), Osceola Town Hall a timing point; first bus ~5:08 AM, last ~7:20 PM at Osceola.
3. Transpo 2026 service-change record and South Bend Tribune reporting, Sept. 2026 — Indiana Senate Enrolled Act 1 (signed 15 Apr. 2025); open houses 27 May and 10 June 2026, comment deadline 22 June 2026; changes implemented September 2026, $400,000–$600,000 first-year savings, Routes 14 and 15 discontinued, Route 1 truncated, free fares 8–12 Sept.
4. For-hire directories searched Nov. 2026 (no Osceola-seated taxi company); Mishawaka Taxi Service (Mishawaka); Uber, Osceola page (~$18 average, 16-minute ride); Michiana Medical Transportation, Osceola address (non-emergency medical transport).