GREYHOUND BUSES ROLLING AGAIN IN AND OUT OF JACKSON

Cape Girardeau is without Greyhound bus service again, not an unusual situation in the city over the past five years.

Greyhound buses rolled into Union Bus Depot at 16 N. Frederick for more than 40 years, from 1947 to March 1990, when the depot closed because of a decline in service following a 21-day Greyhound strike.

Service here has been sporadic since 1990 as the bus line moved from place to place, with periodic service suspensions in between. Bus service was suspended here more than a month ago.

The bus company has had six locations in the county in five years. Two have been at Jackson, where the operation is now centered on Main Street. The ticket office is at 117 W. Main, office of First Class Printing, owned by Ken Forester. The ticket office is open from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday through Friday.

"We're not open on the weekend," said Forester, "but tickets are available from the bus drivers."

Four buses stop daily at Jackson, at the intersection of Barton and Main about a block from the ticket office.

"We've had passengers every day since we became bus station ticket agents," said Forester. In addition to passengers, the bus company also provides a means of shipping packages between St. Louis and Memphis.

Forester became ticketmaster more than a month ago, at 502-C West Street, when Greyhound moved from Cape Girardeau. He recently moved to the Main Street address.

Nearest Greyhound Bus pickup points to Jackson are at Sikeston and Perryville. Buses no longer stop in Cape Girardeau.

"We'd like to see bus service resumed here," said John Mehner, president of the Cape Girardeau Chamber of Commerce. "We receive a number of calls concerning bus service."

Greyhound attempted to remain in Cape Girardeau for more than four years after the Union Station closed.

Joseph Kaylor, Greyhound area customer service representative from Evansville, Ind., cited two problems. "One was zoning in the city," he said. "Some of the locations we looked at were not zoned for bus stations."

He was speaking specifically of a service station/convenience store on South Kingshighway, where Greyhound was located one week before it was discovered that zoning would not permit the bus station there. The second problem in Cape Girardeau was that a bus station has problems operating on its own and needs a supplemental income business.

Greyhound operated at one location nine months on Sprigg Street, but the operator gave it up because of insufficient income to cover expenses of keeping the facility manned and open 24 hours a day.

Greyhound had its longest run since the close of the depot at Don's Store 24 at Morgan Oak and Sprigg. The final Cape Girardeau location was at 305 N. Frederick.

"Cape Girardeau officials have been helpful," said Kaylor, who has visited Cape Girardeau a number of times. "But our zoning requirements don't give us a lot of places to choose from."

Kaylor said the company would consider looking at Cape Girardeau in the future.

At one time, Greyhound buses stopped at Jackson and Cape Girardeau.