Moorhead City Council

LinkFM, the free bus rides that have carried event-goers between parking areas and downtown events, has come to end. The reason? Changing times.
City boards in both Moorhead and Fargo must agree to the change. The Moorhead City Council voted to end the 11-year-old program at its meeting Monday, agreeing with the MATBUS Coordination Committee that the need for the connecting routes has diminished with time. The Fargo City Commission will take up the question at its meeting May 27.
Cole Swingen, assistant transit director of operations, told the council that the need for transportation between the downtowns of Fargo and Moorhead has changed since the free program was created in 2014. Intended to solve the problem of limited parking in downtown Fargo, he said, “it provided a bridge between the two downtowns. People could park in the lot at Moorhead’s Center Mall, then travel to Fargo and back.”
That intention changed in 2020. LinkFM was reduced to carrying visitors to special events – among them Fargo’s Downtown Street Fair and events at the Hjemkomst Center, including the Frostival Frozen Fortress and the Celtic and Scandinavian Festivals. Rides to and from parking areas to events at the Bluestem Center for the Arts, site of the annual Trollwood summer musical and, during some years, Pride in the Park.
But, he told the council, the situation has changed. Several parking ramps have been built in downtown Fargo, easing parking woes. At the same time, demolition and redevelopment of the Center Mall area has eliminated the free parking it once offered. At the same time, ridership has dropped substantially in recent years. Another change: MATBUS’s operating hours, which once continued until 11:15 p.m., now end at 10:15 – well before the Trollwood musical ends, leaving show-goers with no way back to their cars.
Swingen shared the MATBUS staff’s recommendation that LinkFM be eliminated with one exception; if Pride in the Park returns to Bluestem in 2026 or 2027, the Minnesota-funded LinkFM bus would continue to make runs to the park. The bus will be retired in 2027.
A display explaining the change will remain at the Ground Transportation Center for public review and comment for the rest of the month.