Sacramento’s new River District Greyhound bus terminal – the “greenest” in the country with a LEED silver certification – will replace the L Street location and begin operating July 19.

“This is a community-friendly terminal that really makes transportation by Greyhound bus viable for everyone in the city,” said City Councilwoman Angelique Ashby at the ribbon-cutting ceremony Wednesday morning. She praised the support from multiple politicians and the business community the project has gotten.

Located across the street from a police substation that will possibly become police headquarters, the new bus terminal at 420 Richards Blvd. provides a safe transit point for the community, according to Police Chief Rick Braziel.

“This is a much better location for a lot of reasons,” he said. “Greyhound buses are sharing a driveway with patrol cars, there aren’t any liquor stores across the street and there isn’t a dense population of single-occupancy housing where people have nothing better to do than hang out at the bus station.”

The city-owned, 10,000-square-foot facility includes six bus bays and sits on 3 acres of land in the River District, which is in a transitional phase as the city looks to revitalize it.

The $7.6 million project cost was funded largely by impact fees – fees imposed on developers and industrial projects for infrastructure, redevelopment funds and capital improvement funds.

Mayor Kevin Johnson said at a Tuesday press conference that the L Street bus station has been an eyesore for quite some time, and moving to a new, green facility will help the city revitalize the J-K-L corridor and advance the goal of building environmentally friendly structures.

He also applauded its being done nearly a year ahead of schedule.

“We feel good about relocating the Greyhound (station), and we’re talking to the folks who own the (L Street) building and thinking about how to use it to add to what we’re already doing in that area to make everything even better,” he said.

City Councilman Kevin McCarty, said Wednesday that he remembers riding Greyhound twice a month between Sacramento and Oakland when he was growing up. The new depot will be a safer and cleaner place where families can come and travel by bus, he said.

“It’s a realistic means of travel for many people in California,” he added.

Former City Councilman Ray Tretheway, a leader in the beginning stages of the project, said it has spanned about seven years.

“It’s been turned into a green showcase,” Tretheway said.

The facility uses high-volume ceilings and concrete floors to help with cooling as well as numerous skylights and windows monitored by photo cells that allow interior lights to be kept dim and use less energy, helping earn the LEED certification.

Image by: Brandon Darnell

Greyhound Vice President for Customer Experience Myron Watkins said the station is the greenest Greyhound terminal in the country and represents the transition to the more environmentally friendly direction Greyhound is heading, with more “green” terminals opening in Memphis and Nashville in the coming year.

“From a business standpoint, it’s more efficient and a lot more cost-effective to operate,” he said.

One notable change over the older location is the type of bus loading, he added.

The L Street terminal had lanes for buses, meaning passengers were walking around between them to board different buses. The new depot uses “sawtooth loading,” in which buses pull into widely spaced parking spots while passengers wait in a designated zone a few feet from the buses’ doors.

Image by: Brandon Darnell

“It’s a lot safer,” Watkins said. “You don’t have people walking where buses are.”

The facility includes a full-service restaurant as well as ticket counter. Watkins said that automated ticket machines are scheduled to be installed in January for convenience, but ticket agents will still be present in the station, and passengers can always book online as well.

When the transit hub planned for the downtown railyards is completed in approximately 10 years, the plan is to have the Greyhound station move there, where light rail, Amtrak and high-speed rail are anticipated to connect, Ashby said.

At that time, the Richards Boulevard Greyhound terminal will likely be converted to use as a city building, she added.

“It was designed with that in mind, and there are many ways this building can be used,” she said.

Currently, the bus depot only has short-term parking and is not connected to light rail, but when the light rail Green Line is extended – a project currently under way, with construction around G and Seventh streets – there will be a light rail station close to the Greyhound terminal.

Brandon Darnell is a staff reporter for The Sacramento Press. Follow him on Twitter @Brandon_Darnell. Staff Reporter Melissa Corker contributed to this report.