NC: I took the 77X CATS bus from Cornelius to Charlotte. Here’s how it went.

I had the chance this month to commute to uptown Charlotte on the CATS 77X express bus from Lake Norman.

Despite hiccups that any first-time rider might encounter — well, maybe just me — I ended the day with a single happy dream thought:

If I didn’t need my car to get from one breaking-news assignment to the next each day, I’d leave it parked in my garage. The ride was that good.

In no time, we zipped along in the Interstate 77 toll lanes the 21 miles to uptown. I stared at the bumper-to-bumper traffic in the regular lanes and thought, “You can’t beat the bus.”

Traffic-Clog Central

I hadn’t taken a CATS express bus to Charlotte in at least 15 years, whenever the route was dropped after formerly transit-enthusiastic Mooresville withdrew financial support. Iredell County government never backed the bus, with most all of the county commissioners from Statesville and rural north Iredell deeming it a waste of taxpayer money.

Mooresville, where I’ve lived for 25 of my 36 years in the region, is Traffic-Clog Central, and has been since at least the late 1980s.

Back then, the N.C. Transportation Board voted to start the expansion of N.C. 150 in the rural Gaston County city of Cherryville instead of at bottle-necked Interstate 77 exit 36 in Mooresville.

I had brown-blonde hair back then, which is now gray from all the traffic aggravation since, I’m certain, not because of age.

Finally this year, Charlotte contractor Blythe Development began expanding N.C. 150 in Mooresville, thanks to the persistence of State Sen. Vicki Sawyer, R- Iredell, and Mooresville commissioner Lisa Qualls to speed up the $249 million project. Qualls chairs the Charlotte Regional Transportation Planning Organization board.

Public transit? How I’ve missed it.

Drive a car to a climate summit? No way.

Riding the bus on April 10 immediately relieved the blood pressure spike I and so many others, I’m sure, experience on jammed-up Mooresville roads.

I live at Brawley School Road exit 35, which I dub Brawley Expressway with its 24/7 police and ambulance sirens responding to wrecks around town.

It’s like living on the set of the 1980s’ “Hill Street Blues” TV police drama. If you long for the show, stop by for a spell.

Which is why I couldn’t wait to board the bus.

I caught the 77X around 7 a.m. on N.C. 115 outside Cornelius Town Hall, where parking is free! That was the first best thing about the day and how we’re not like uptown Charlotte in terms of pricey parking.

I decided to take the bus because I registered for WFAE’s daylong Carolinas Climate Summit in the Dubois Center at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, in the 300 block of East Ninth Street.

Drive a combustion engine to an environmental summit? No way. It was bus or bust.

My dad, a World War II veteran, taught his kids how to prepare for travel, so I called CATS the day before to see how much the trip would cost.

“$4.40 one way,” the CATS representative said.

A less-expensive-per-trip monthly pass wouldn’t be worth paying if this was my only trip, he said.

I rousted up the coins from my change containers at home and got $10 in singles from the teller at my bank. I mean, who carries nickels and dimes and dollar bills anymore?

When I boarded the bus, I asked the driver where to insert the coins and bills. She looked at me puzzled and said, “It’s three dollars.”

No coins? I asked.

“Three dollars,” she repeated with a smile.

Wow, OK, I replied, surprised that something costs less these days than someone tells you it does.

I mentioned that I’d need to deboard at Church and Ninth. I’d studied the online 77X route the day before and determined that was the closest stop. I think I was totally wrong, but what’s bad about being a few blocks off? Walking is good for you.

None of which mattered, because, when the bus arrived in uptown, the driver breezed past Church and Ninth, then Church and Eighth, then Church and Seventh.

Uh, oh, I may end up in Matthews.

Then I realized I’m supposed to pull a cord or hit a button or something at or above my seat to have the driver stop.

I put two-and-two together when “STOP REQUESTED” appeared on the electronic sign above the driver a couple of times. When another passenger requested a stop, I looked out the window and saw Church and Sixth quickly approach. I better get off, too.

“Thank you, have a great day,” I told the driver as if I were a bus regular and hadn’t mentioned needing to get off at Church and NINTH.

“Thank you, and a blessed day to you,” the driver replied.

Missing street sign

Walking back to Ninth, I realized how much Charlotte’s uptown landscape changes by the day, let alone over a decade or two. I was completely lost.

Still, I arrived an hour early to the summit. “We haven’t set up the registration tables yet,” an organizer said, so I chilled at an outdoor table.

I wasn’t imagining it when I say I didn’t know if I’d gotten to the right intersection near the university: Only when I returned on the bus at the end of the day did I realize there’s no sign for College Street at its intersection with Ninth near the university.

I saw just a vape shop on one corner and a nondescript white building on an opposite corner.

The online 77X route shows an outbound stop at College and Ninth, but none of the four walkers I encountered crossing at the traffic light knew the name of the intersection or whether buses stopped there.

Three of the four asked me for money before they crossed to said vape shop, which did a brisk trade. “I’m sorry,” I told them, “I only have enough to catch the bus.”

They seemed sympathetic.

I watched as several CATS buses with other route numbers passed. No signs designated a CATS stop at the intersection, at least as far as I could see when a heavy rain suddenly dumped down.

And definitely no shelter for riders. Good thing I remembered to pack a baseball cap. Again, thanks to Dad.

The outbound 77X bus approached right on time somewhere around 5, just like in the morning in Cornelius. I waved from the sidewalk and the driver stopped to let me on.

“Three dollars,” the driver said.

“I have exactly that,’’ I told her and fed the bills into the bill taker.

I thought I’d plop right down on one of the first seats behind the driver but was shocked to see that at least one seat was occupied in every row on each side of the aisle all the way to the back. Far fewer riders were on the morning ride, 15 tops.

I finally snared a seat in the next-to-last row. Are all these riders headed to Cornelius? I wondered. They were. Public transit sure has caught on, I thought. We really are a big city!

Many of the return riders seemed of high school age, a few were professionals.

When the bus returned to Cornelius exit 28 in no time flat, stops were in reverse order, with most everyone getting off at the park-and-ride lot on Sefton Park Road.

Traffic was a bear. Stuck in bumper-to-bumper cars, the bus seemed to take just as long getting to the park-and-ride lot once off I-77 and then to Town Hall, as the ride on I-77 took from uptown.

Two young women chatted in a nearby row as the bus trudged along in the backed-up traffic toward the park and ride. One visiting the other said, ”This traffic is really something.”

“Oh, it’s like this all the time,” her friend replied nonchalantly, unfazed and relaxed, I’m sure, because of the bus she rides.

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