Ceremony participants gather in front of one of the newly wrapped CUE buses.
For more than four decades, Fairfax City’s CUE bus has reliably served the City’s residents, plus George Mason University students and faculty. These buses were painted white and accented by green, blue and yellow stripes.
Now, though, they sport a whole new look – dark blue with wraps featuring the shapes of people in bright yellow, blue and green. And instead of standing for “City. University. Energysaver,” the CUE initials now represent “City. University. Everyone.”
“We opted to keep the name and rebrand,” explained Transportation Director Wendy Sanford. “We felt that this really reflected what CUE stands for – that it’s a partnership between the City, the university and, really, everyone.”
She was speaking at a recent ceremony celebrating the changes and recognizing how significant a role the bus system plays in the lives of its users. Participants included City officials, members of its economic-development staff and chamber of commerce representatives.
Economic Development Director Chris Bruno acknowledged CUE’s importance to the business community. “The CUE bus system touches every single activity center within Fairfax City,” he said. “It provides connectivity and access between the university and every commercially zoned property here, and it also connects to the Vienna Metro Station for shoppers beyond Fairfax.”
“It’s important for the workforce, as well, and it’s something I want to underline,” he continued. “It’s a really great tool for businesses that have located or exist here in Fairfax City to move their workers and get them to their jobs.
“For hospitality, retail and office workers, CUE offers the equivalent of a $1,000 bonus through its fare-free program. We want business owners to know that this is a significant benefit to operating a business in Fairfax City, and it’s a really great asset for us.”
As for the new wraps on the buses, Bruno said the City’s excited about them for two reasons. “We believe the brand update is more representative of the City,” he said. “In addition, when you see these CUE wrapped buses out there, they serve as a moving message to current and future businesses that Fairfax City Economic Development is here to support businesses in this City.”
Furthermore, he said CUE’s new wraps are also “a recognition of the importance of a transportation system in any city’s economic-development strategy. And CUE is one of our tools we want to celebrate.”
Sanford said CUE was delighted to partner with the City’s economic-development office. She then shared some key facts about the buses. “CUE runs seven days a week throughout the City, to GMU and to the Metro,” she said. Sanford also stressed that the majority of City residents are within a quarter mile of a CUE bus stop.
“It means that anyone living in the City can reach a stop very easily, in less than a 5-minute walk,” she said. “The bus can take you to your favorite restaurants or stores, to the university, to work or to the library. And CUE is free for everyone to ride, not just students. You just get onto the bus, and it takes you where you want to go. You don’t have to choose whether you’re going to be able to go to work and to the grocery store – you can do both. You can take the bus anywhere, and you can hop on and hop off.”
Sanford also noted CUE’s real-time, bus-arrival system called TransLoc, so riders don’t have to worry about having a schedule with them. Instead, they just download the app on their phones. “This app uses GPS data to pinpoint your location and will tell you how many minutes until the next bus will be arriving,” she said.
In addition, all the buses have bike racks and are all wheelchair accessible. “We want everyone to feel comfortable riding the bus and to be able to ride it,” said Sanford. Then, as people applauded, she said, “We have the best bus drivers in the DMV; they’re friendly, talented and helpful. And chances are, your bus driver is going to know your name. We don’t have that many drivers so, if you’re a regular, you’re going to know them, they’re going to know you. It’s a feeling of safety, security and community.”
Last fall, Fairfax installed 10 Capital Bikeshare stations in the City, and GMU installed three on campus. So, said Sanford, “You can always take the bus uphill and grab a bike to go downhill. You could also grab a scooter or walk. The point is, you have options, and CUE is a great one for all or part of your trip.”
She said the updated tagline, “City. University. Everyone,” reflects the system’s commitment to serving everyone while connecting the City and nearby areas. And although the 12 buses now feature a new look, said Sanford, “They’re the same CUE, just CUE-ter.”
Speaking next was Jennifer Rose, executive director of the Central Fairfax Chamber of Commerce. “You do have the most amazing bus service here in the City of Fairfax, and your bus drivers are the most outstanding, most professional folks,” she said. “They’re the ambassadors for the City, in many ways. They know all the best places to eat, where to go and where to stay. And our business owners and employers love that their employees can travel around town at no cost and that their customers can come and go for free – and conveniently and safely.”
As for Fairfax Mayor Catherine Read, she’s been a fan of the CUE buses for more than 43 years. “I moved into the first dormitory ever opened on George Mason University’s Fairfax campus, on Oct. 25, 1981,” she said. “And 1981 is when the CUE bus came into being. I arrived at college without a car so, at age 19, the CUE bus was my lifeline. When I graduated in 1984, there were 500 students living on campus here. Today there are 6,200 – and this bus is still operating and moving those students around, into and out of our City.”
Thanks to the Fairfax City Council, CUE became free to ride in 2020 – becoming the first, fare-free bus system in Virginia. Even now, only seven other systems have followed suit. And, said Read, “It’s an asset to everybody who needs, wants and relies on transit to get them to school, their jobs and healthcare.”
But that’s not all, she added. “There’s also an equity lens through which we need to look at why this CUE bus has existed for so many years, and why it was so important to make it fare free. There are jobs, restaurants, retail and cultural-arts events here, and this bus makes it easy for people to get into and around our City.”
Read also stressed that many visitors to Fairfax City don’t speak English as their first language. So, she asked, “What could be easier than to get on a bus where you don’t have to figure out if you’ve got the right fare card or the right change? If visitors coming here understand that this bus is free and will take them where they want to go, it makes it easy for people whose primary language isn’t English.”
However, while calling the spruced-up CUE buses “vibrant, colorful and cheerful,” she also said some people in the City still don’t know they exist or are free. So she said Fairfax needs to do a better job of publicizing them. And she noted the CUE’s importance to young people, too.
“High-school and middle-school students take this bus to and from school,” said Read. “And it enables them to participate in before- and after school activities when they don’t have parents who can drop everything and pick them up or drop them off. Again, there’s an equity lens to having this kind of investment in good, public transit.”