Fixed-Route Bus
12 routes and more than 400 stops from downtown Wilmington to Carolina Beach, connecting at Forden and Padgett Stations.
Maps & schedules →Where are you headed?
Routes, real-time buses, fares and alerts for Wilmington and New Hanover County. Service runs 6 a.m. to 8 p.m. weekdays and 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. on weekends.
Plan a trip
Door-to-door directions on Wave routes with Google Maps transit.
Uses the existing trip planner. No new engine is built or maintained.Track my bus
Live locations and arrival estimates, updated every 10 seconds.
Connexionz real-time tracking, embedded on this site.Fares and passes
$2 a ride, $5 all day, $80 for 31 days. Half price for seniors, students, veterans and riders with disabilities.
Services
Five ways to ride
Each service is its own structured record in the CMS, so hours, fares and links are edited once and appear everywhere they are used.
Port City Trolley
Fare-free rides every 30 minutes along Front St between Padgett Station and Castle St, April through September.
Trolley details →Dial-A-Ride (DART)
ADA van service for riders whose disability prevents using the fixed-route bus. Curb to curb within ¾ mile of any route, next-day booking.
Eligibility & application →RideMICRO
On-demand rides within five zones in New Hanover and Brunswick counties, connecting to the bus at Padgett, Forden, Monkey Junction and UNCW.
Zones & hours →Seahawk Shuttle
UNCW campus and off-campus routes when classes are in session. Students and employees ride every Wave bus free with a OneCard.
Shuttle schedule →Real time
Track my bus, without leaving the site
Today the “Real-Time Tracking” link sends riders away to a Connexionz page. The redesign keeps Connexionz as the data source and shows it inside the Wave site, with a plain link as the fallback for older phones.
Why a frame and not a rebuild: the RFP says use existing customer-facing systems where practical. The frame is one CMS setting (tracking_provider_url). If the AVL provider changes, staff paste a new URL or we drop in a GTFS-Realtime adapter, and the page, menu and route pages keep working.
Provider-swappable by design
Every outside system is behind one named integration point with a documented contract, so Wave or any future contractor can replace it without a redesign (RFP 8.5, 8.6).
| System | Today | Method |
|---|---|---|
| Fixed-route real time | Connexionz, GTFS-RT | Embed or link; GTFS-RT adapter optional |
| RideMICRO | Spare app and web portal | Deep links, app badges |
| DART paratransit | CTS app and phone booking | Links; phone and email always shown |
| Trip planning | Google Maps transit | Link with Wilmington preset |
| Fare payment | Not yet selected | Reserved “Pay” slot: link, embed or SDK |
Fares
Fares and passes
Prices below are the current published fares. In the CMS each fare is a record with a regular and reduced price and an effective date, so a change is one edit and every page, including this table and the route pages, updates together.
| Pass | Regular | Reduced |
|---|---|---|
| One Ride | $2 | $1 |
| Two Ride | $4 | $2 |
| 10 Ride | $20 | $10 |
| 24-Hour | $5 | $2.50 |
| 7-Day | $20 | $10 |
| 31-Day | $80 | $40 |
| Transfer (ask the operator when boarding; valid 75 minutes) | Free | Free |
Reduced fare: age 65+, riders with disabilities, local veterans with an NHC Veteran ID, and K-12 or college students with ID. Children 0–4 ride free with a paying adult, up to three per adult. Source: wavetransit.com/fare-pass-information.
DART
$4 one way · $40 ten-pass book
Paper passes and the reloadable ParaPass card. Sold at Forden and Padgett Stations.
RideMICRO
$2 per person, per one-way trip
Pay in the app, with exact change on board, or with a ticket from either station. No transfers to the bus.
Where to buy
On any bus or van with cash (operators cannot make change), or at Forden Station, 505 Cando St, and Padgett Station, 520 N 3rd St, with cash, card ($10 minimum) or Apple Pay.
Future: online pay slot reserved
Route page example
107
College Rd
RunningEffective Aug 16, 2026
Detour on this route Illustrative
Buses are using S Kerr Ave between Randall Pkwy and Oleander Dr while New Centre Dr is closed for paving. Stops on New Centre Dr are not served. Posted by Customer Service, 7:42 a.m.
| Forden Station | College Rd & Randall Pkwy | Senior Resource Center | Monkey Junction |
|---|---|---|---|
| 6:00 | 6:11 | 6:19 | 6:30 |
| 6:30 | 6:41 | 6:49 | 7:00 |
| 7:00 | 7:11 | 7:19 | 7:30 |
| 7:30 | 7:41 | 7:49 | 8:00 |
| … then every 30 minutes until 8:00 p.m. Weekend span 9 a.m.–6 p.m. | |||
6:00 Forden Station6:30 Monkey JctCollege & Randall 6:11 · Senior Ctr 6:19
6:30 Forden Station7:00 Monkey JctCollege & Randall 6:41 · Senior Ctr 6:49
7:00 Forden Station7:30 Monkey JctCollege & Randall 7:11 · Senior Ctr 7:19
7:30 Forden Station8:00 Monkey JctCollege & Randall 7:41 · Senior Ctr 7:49
… every 30 minutes until 8 p.m. Cards replace the table on small screens so nothing scrolls sideways.
Last updated by Planning staff on Aug 16, 2026 · revision 14 of this route Illustrative stamp
Built for staff
Everything above is editable without a developer
WordPress with structured content types and no page builder. Staff fill in fields; the design stays consistent on its own. This is how the “20-second alert” and the “edit a fare once” promises are kept.
Content model
Route: number, name, description, frequency, span, timepoints, map PDF, status, related alertsAlert: type (detour, delay, seasonal, weather), affected routes, start and end, text, severityFare: pass name, regular, reduced, rules, effective dateService: hours, fare reference, booking links, app badgesDocument: PDF with title, category, accessibility status, expiryPage: standard blocks (text, steps, FAQ, contact card) only
Roles and safeguards
- Contributor drafts, Editor publishes alerts and routes, Administrator manages users and settings
- Every save is a revision with name and time; one click restores a previous version (RFP 8.2)
- Alerts expire on their end date, so stale detours cannot linger
- Document uploads are checked for a title and tagged language; untagged PDFs are flagged, not blocked
- Recorded 60-minute training plus a two-page “how do I” guide (RFP 8.11)
Post an alert in 20 seconds
- Alerts → Add new. Type the headline and one sentence.
- Tick the affected routes, pick Detour, set when it ends.
- Publish. It appears at the top of every page, on each route page and in the alerts feed. No layout decisions.
In use today, keptReserved for the futureOwned by Wave
Fast on older phones
Performance budget, measured on this page
The RFP asks for a site that works quickly on older and slower phones. We set a budget and build to it: under 300 KB per page, no scripts that block rendering, no raster hero images, system-cached fonts with text visible immediately.
…KB transferred for this page’s HTML
target: under 300 KB
target: under 300 KB
0render-blocking scripts
all JavaScript deferred; page reads without it
all JavaScript deferred; page reads without it
0raster images above the fold
inline SVG only; brochure maps load on demand
inline SVG only; brochure maps load on demand
…ms to first content on this device
Core Web Vitals “good” target: LCP under 2.5 s on mobile
Core Web Vitals “good” target: LCP under 2.5 s on mobile
Accessibility
WCAG 2.2 AA, shown not promised
Target the standard the RFP names (8.7). Every item below is demonstrated on this page; the real build adds a documented manual test with NVDA, VoiceOver and keyboard only, repeated before launch and at every release.
- Skip link, landmarks and one
h1Keyboard users jump straight to content; screen readers get header, nav, main, region and footer. - Alerts in a live regionNew alerts are announced; the bar can be hidden for the visit and returns on the next one.
- Visible focus everywhere (2.4.7, 2.4.11)3 px gold ring with offset; sticky header never covers a focused element (
scroll-margin-top). - Target size 44 px (exceeds 2.5.8)Buttons, menu items and links in bars are at least 44 px tall.
- Contrast at or above 4.5:1Navy on white 13.6:1, teal ink on white 6.4:1, dark text on gold 10.9:1; muted grey 5.6:1.
- Reduced motion respectedReveal animations and smooth scrolling switch off when the device asks for less motion.
- Tables with scopes and captions; cards on small screensNo horizontal scrolling for schedules on a phone.
- Consistent help (3.2.6)Phone number in the header and footer in the same place on every page.
- Plain language and 17 px base typeShort sentences, no jargon, reflow to 320 px without loss.
- Documents handled, not ignoredActive PDFs tagged to WCAG 2.2 per Addendum 1; archived PDFs labeled; high-traffic PDFs converted to HTML.
For the evaluation committee
Where each scored criterion lives in this prototype
| Criterion (RFP 10.4) | Points | Shown by |
|---|---|---|
| Understanding and approach | 20 | Alerts first, three rider tasks, existing systems used rather than rebuilt (hero, tracking section), PDF policy from Addendum 1. |
| Design, usability, customer experience | 20 | Route finder, service tiles, fares table, Route 107 page with detour, cards on phones, translation menu. |
| CMS functionality and staff use | 15 | Content model, roles, revisions, 20-second alert flow and sample form, “edit a fare once” pattern. |
| Relevant experience and references | 15 | In the proposal: portfolio and references; this prototype was built from your public content in two days. |
| Technical approach and integrations | 10 | Integration map with swappable adapters, reserved fare-payment slot, AVL-provider flexibility (8.5, 8.6). |
| Accessibility | 10 | WCAG 2.2 AA checklist above, each item live on this page; document remediation policy. |
| Cost and total cost of ownership | 10 | In the proposal, Attachment C: open-source CMS, no per-seat licences, hosting and support itemised for years 1–5. |
Content sources: wavetransit.com pages for routes, fares, RideMICRO, DART, trolley and Seahawk Shuttle (read November 7, 2026) and the amended RFP with Addenda 1 and 2. Anything invented for illustration is labeled on the page.