With high gas prices putting pressure on citizens, some local municipalities have contacted CARTA about possibly bringing bus service back to their communities.

East Ridge and Signal Mountain officials said some residents have expressed interest in buses to get them into Chattanooga. The cost, however, is too steep to justify the service extension, officials said.

“We knew that the cost was going to be too high,” said Honna Rogers, town manager for Signal Mountain.

Tom Dugan, executive director of the Chattanooga Area Regional Transportation Authority, said it would cost about $100,000 a year to provide the seven trips a day that were offered when regular fixed-route service went to and from Signal Mountain. And to get service all day long with trip frequency of more than once an hour, East Ridge would have to pay about $250,000 a year, Mr. Dugan said.

Mr. Dugan said he expects to get more inquiries from municipalities interested in bus service.

“It’s a natural because of fuel prices,” he said.

On Sunday, the average price for a gallon of regular unleaded gasoline was $3.84 in Tennessee and $3.93 in Georgia, according to AAA.

At one time, CARTA’s fixed-route service served the following municipalities: East Ridge, Signal Mountain, Red Bank, Lookout Mountain, Tenn., Lookout Mountain, Ga., Collegedale, Lakeside, Soddy-Daisy and Fort Oglethorpe, Ga., Mr. Dugan said. Tight budgets forced the various governments to end the service, he said.

“They started looking and saying, ‘No, that’s not where we want to spend our money,’” he said. “That was pretty much the answer in every one of the smaller cities. They did not believe the number of people riding justified the cost.”

Mr. Dugan said these municipalities dropped out over time. For example, he said Fort Oglethorpe started using CARTA service in 1973 — the year the transit agency formed — and already had left when he came to the agency in 1979. The last municipality to go was Lookout Mountain, Tenn., in 2003, Mr. Dugan said.

Mr. Dugan said Signal Mountain still pays CARTA for Care-A-Van service, which uses smaller vehicles to transport people who cannot ride the fixed-route buses because of a disability, sickness or injury. CARTA also provides trips to a kidney dialysis center in East Ridge, he said.

East Ridge Mayor Mike Steele said many of his city’s residents are elderly or baby boomers who need or will one day need mass transit to get around.

“Seniors are becoming prisoners in their own home because they have no way of going anywhere,” he said.

Mr. Steele said East Ridge cannot pay for bus service right now, but he hopes to restore some service so people can get downtown and to the Hamilton Place mall area.

“It is a goal of mine to try to find a way to bring public transportation back to my city,” he said.

Red Bank City Manager Chris Dorsey said the city discussed getting some basic bus service a couple of years ago, but it was going to cost roughly $85,000 a year. Right now, he said he is unsure what demand mass transit has in Red Bank.

Ms. Rogers, in Signal Mountain, said few individuals rode the bus when it last went up and down the mountain. She said it “doesn’t make sense” for more than 7,000 taxpayers to finance a service if only a small number of people would use it.

“I understand why it costs so much to bring it up here,” she said. “(But) we have to budget according to what serves our population.”

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