YOUNGSTOWN - The self-driving shuttle for downtown Youngstown sits idle in a garage while the city figures out what to do with it. 

The vehicle started picking up passengers on its loop down Federal Street in March but ended in June after grant money ran out and contract ended.

The shuttle was completely autonomous but required a driver monitoring the operation behind the wheel per Ohio law. It fits eight people plus two wheel chairs. 

After four months of use, the city found it wasn’t as useful as they hoped.

“It was convenient for someone to just grab it and take a ride down the street,” Chuck Shasho, the Deputy Director of Public Works for the city said. “...It was a little bit restrictive in that sense that the route that we picked. It basically just went up and down Federal Street.” 

The city was required to spend more than $116,000 on the shuttle in order to get a $10 million grant for the Smart 2 revitalization project for downtown. That money covered the vehicle and four months of operating costs.

Officials knew the service would end in June and wanted the WRTA to take over but had no official agreement.

Now that time is up, WRTA officials say they’re not interested in buying it.

“With the technology and the cost of the autonomous portion it's actually just cheaper to hire a person to run the service,” Dean Harris the CEO of the WRTA said. 

The WRTA has its own self driving shuttle that is almost identical to the cities. It's intended to run the route from Fifth Avenue, to Youngstown State University, Stambaugh Auditorium then loop around Mercy Health. However, a manually driven electric shuttle has taken over that route as the WRTA works on a glitch with the self-driving vehicle.

Harris said the public transit company is interested in borrowing the city's shuttle while theirs is out of service.

Shasho said they’re currently in talks about a lease but it wouldn’t be long term since Harris noted the route is scheduled to end in June of 2026.

“I can see it in a few years maybe…probably not here,” Harris said about the likelihood of more self driving vehicles in the city. 

Shasho said the city has no plans to completely sell the shuttle and could use it for departments if public transit doesn't work out.

“We’re just trying to get some more benefits out of it and whether that's going to be operating autonomously or whether it’s going to be in more of a manual mode,” Shasho said. 

Shasho said the city hopes to have the shuttle back on the road in the fall.