I take the 150 bus from MIA to South Beach, and it’s easy to do as an infrequent bus rider because I can just tap to pay from my apple pay. I don’t need some special app or anything, and tourists who come to town don’t need one either. I’m sure that maps into the equation on the payment methods accepted.
It’s not hard to imagine the bus being useful for those who come to downtown for festivals, music events, conventions, etc. using the R-Line. Few if any of those visitors are going to be motivated to download a separate payment app to ride it. They are probably more likely to just grab an Uber if they are asked to download yet another app that has their payment details associated with it.
While the umo app has other information on it for frequent users of the system, it’s not going to be terribly compelling for infrequent users of this or any bus system.
Keep the umo app, but add a tap to pay feature for those who don’t use the system frequently, and/or for visitors.
I disagree - because even as a frequent GoTriangle rider, the Umo app has been useless for me except for showing my GoPass. The bus schedules aren’t well-integrated with real-time location updates, their direction-giving features are useless (I seem to have to re-enter my work and home locations every week despite being consistently logged into my account), and their comment/complaint-making feature is nothing but a link to sending an email to GoTriangle.
That app feels like something that a newbie project manager vibe-coded for a homework assignment in their senior year of undergrad - one who’s never taken public transit before, and has never stress-tested their own app in real life. 
Perhaps you didn’t realize that I am not disagreeing with you? I only speak for the infrequent bus rider, and said that I don’t think it’s compelling to use. You only reinforce that it’s bad for frequent users too. That’s not a disagreement; it’s just additional information from a different rider POV.
I agree that the UMO app is not the best for navigating the system.
I use it only to display my senior pass QR code for the reader.
Recommend the Transit app instead if you haven’t tried it.
Accurate, good graphical interface, and adept with route options.
Oh no, I totally get that; sorry for the confusion!
I just wanted to lay that out because I have some seething hatred of Umo and TransLoc. Plus, I think the reasons that you don’t find Umo compelling and my reasons for being frustrated come from the same source: its god-awful UI.
Likewise; whether you frequently use public transit or not, I agree with @TDR and love using the Transit app, instead! It also works for most major cities in the US and the rest of the Anglosphere, too, as well as most of France and several other countries.
Even Apple Maps is better for navigation and live vehicle locations than the Umo app. It’s frankly embarrassing, if I could add my GoPass to Apple Wallet I would never use it.
I’ve used the UMO app exactly once, and I instantly hated it. Rejected my payment options because, apparently, both of my credit cards are “not valid.” I went to GoRaleigh Station and got a physical GoPass. For schedules and navigation, I just use Transit and Google Maps. The UMO app can go burn in hell.
Greensboro’s Hop does the same with the vintage trolleys.
Thanks to all who contributed to this. It gave me a lot to think about and I have my conclusions and a statement being put together. 
I’m closing this form.
I presented my thoughts at yesterday’s Raleigh Transit Authority meeting. Let me know what you think as I try and carry this forward.
I’d add that when Raleigh is offering free parking downtown, but charging for the RLine, it’s no surprise that folks aren’t riding…even DT residents.
2 posts were merged into an existing topic: GoRaleigh Bus System, now and the future
Today, the Raleigh Transit Authority voted to suspend the R-Line for up to 18 months starting in August. (target is Aug 9) This will gives us time to reimagine downtown mobility and make a recommendation to council to either implement a new service or sunset the R-Line completely.
For those that love it, ride it while you can this Summer.
Several years ago, Miami Beach replaced their (for pay) South Beach Local bus service and implemented a “trolley” service that was both free and more robust. The “buses” are smaller and less comfortable, but they reach more destinations in Miami Beach.
I personally won’t miss the R-Line since they both changed the routes and added a charge. I haven’t ridden it since they implemented the fee, and I have noticed that most times it has passed me that it’s been empty or largely empty.
My gut tells me that there won’t be a big outcry over the suspension but I’ll certainly be interested to see if a lot of people are upset about it.
The issue (to me) is execution. Downtown Raleigh sits in an awkward middle ground where destinations are too far apart to always be convenient walks, but not far enough apart that people will tolerate walking 5 minutes to a stop, waiting 8–15 minutes, and then riding a one-way loop that might take them the long way around.
The route isn’t solving a pain point strongly enough, especially when scooters and Ubers exist.
I also think there may just not be enough consistent activity across downtown. It’s not that downtown lacks destinations — it’s that a lot of the activity is concentrated in pockets and event spikes rather than a constant flow of people moving between places all day.
The biggest issue that essentially killed the R-Line, including for me, is making riders pay, and that it requires riders to either get a GoPass tap card, download and pay with Umo, or pay with cash. No casual DT Raleigh visitor is going to have any of this. Either make the route free like it was before 2024, or introduce a “tap with your credit card” option. Otherwise, who is going to ride the R-Line if you can’t even get on it in the first place?
The second biggest reason is the route. I might actually say the U-shaped route is worse than the pre-COVID one-way loop. The U-shaped route is okay, but it’s missing one very critical piece: connecting the two sides directly. We have the west side of DT: Union Station, Hillsborough Street, Glenwood South, and Smoky Hollow. We have the east side: GoRaleigh Station, Fayetteville Street, the Convention Center, and Memorial Auditorium. If you want to get from one side to the other (which is probably the reason one might want to ride the R-Line in the first place), you have to go all the way up to Peace, go across, then back down. If I’m going from RUS to Fayetteville Street, I’m not going to take a service that goes up, then down, especially if I have to pay for it, and it only runs every 15 minutes. As a GoRaleigh/GoTriangle rider, I’ll just hop on either the 9 or the 100, especially now that they both run frequently enough that there is a direct bus between RUS and Fayetteville Street along Martin Street every 7.5 minutes. The casual DT Raleigh visitor, and me when the weather is nice, will just hop on a Lime scooter.
And I’d include branding. Before COVID, the R-Line ran unique blue-green hybrid buses that looked sleek (by 2010 standards) and different from the CAT/GoRaleigh buses. Now? Looks exactly like any other GoRaleigh bus. The casual rider won’t tell the difference. A GoRaleigh rider like me, again, won’t even bother using the R-Line if the 9/100 can get me somewhere faster and run more frequently.
I don’t know what is better, revamp the R-Line or kill it. I don’t want it to go, but I’m also nostalgic for the downtown of the 2010s and I know it’s not the same anymore. I might also add, I think it’s time for GoRaleigh to start running night service, at least Friday and Saturday nights. If we can get bar crawlers who can ride the buses riding the buses when going out drinking, that would give reason for the R-Line to be a downtown circulator.
I agree with all of what you’ve said. I do believe that it should have a reduced but not free fare. I’ve always thought that the decision to get rid of the unique R-Line bus was a mistake. I also believe that the route should hit every major destination and be a true circular route. It would also be great if it were a route that had service end at 1-2am on weekends.
Definitely agree with all this. The old bus stood out visually, had better-marked stops, it was free, and was in a simple counter-clockwise circle around downtown. Each of those factors combined definitely made the R-Line an appealing choice back in those days.