I’ve written before about the various challenges I have reaching Mt. Pleasant, Michigan, from the East Coast. I never wrote it up, but back in January 2022 I went the long way round, taking Amtrak to Kalamazoo via Chicago, then Indian Trails buses to Grand Rapids, Lansing, and finally Mt. Pleasant. It worked, but looping through Chicago effectively adds a day to the itinerary.
Since then, Indian Trails has stopped interlining with Greyhound and started interlining with the Trailways system. Greyhound is in a real race-to-the-bottom ever since Flix bought it, but that’s another matter. I figured I’d give the Toledo connections another look. I’ve resisted mating up Amtrak’s Thruway Motorcoach with the Lansing-Mt. Pleasant bus because it meant a 4-5 hour layover in Lansing.
Good and bad news here. The good news is that there is Barons Bus/Indian Trails itinerary between Toledo and Mt. Pleasant. Eight hours and two transfers (Detroit and Lansing). The departure time from Toledo is 9:50 AM, which is a healthy buffer for a delayed Amtrak train. The bad/weird news is a bizarre pricing overage from the Trailways ticketing platform.
And that’s how much?
For testing purposes I’m using Monday, March 4, 2024. No special significance to that date that I know of, and prices don’t seem to vary. I plug in Toledo and Mt. Pleasant as endpoints, and get three results, though it’s really just one result with some variations on the transfers. You’re always leaving Toledo on Barons Bus 33 at 9:50 AM and arriving in Mt. Pleasant on Indian Trails 54 at 5:55 PM. The pricing was unexpected:
I’m not sure what number I expected, but $97-$103 for a one-way journey seems unreasonable. By comparison, a one-way coach ticket on Amtrak’s Lake Shore Limited between New York and Toledo for the same day is $40; $108 if you tack on the East Lansing bus connection.
Components
As a test, I decided to work backward and price out each leg individually. First, I looked at Toledo-Detroit, operated by Barons Bus. That’s a direct trip, 2 trips per day. The price is $20. The first of these is longer because it hits Ann Arbor on the way up.
Next up is Detroit to Lansing on Indian Trails. You get seven results, ranging from $23-$25. Relevant to us are the last three, since they connect with the bus from Toledo. It’s all just a question of whether you want to transfer in Flint or East Lansing.
Finally, and simplest, is Lansing to Mt. Pleasant. One bus a day, continuing across the straits to St. Ignace. It’s $15.
You add all three fares together and you get $60, not $97-103. This feels like a bug in the ticketing system. I might be willing to pay a few bucks for the convenience of three tickets on one itinerary, but I think these connections are guaranteed regardless. I’m not sure what I’m missing here and I think it’s worth contacting Indian Trails.
Layovers
I’m not sure how I feel about the layovers. Depending on the timing of the Capitol Limited or Lake Shore Limited into Toledo, that’s a few hours before your bus. There are restaurants near Toledo’s Amtrak station but I’ve never eaten at one. In Detroit, Indian Trails uses 1001 Howard Street in Corktown, not the Amtrak station in New Center. I don’t know that part of the city at all. It’s only an hour though.