Providing Transportation for Guests

We provided guest transportation from our main blocked hotel (we had two blocks) because it was a 30 minute drive, and the venue was in a rural community with limited service so no ubers, lyfts and we knew our heavy drinking crowd wouldn't need to be driving. I think if ubers are available easily and it's a quick ride, transportation is a nice offer but not required. For us, it felt required. We had an option on our RSVP card to use it, so that helped us figure out how many 55 person buses we needed. We ended up needing two, they were $1,100 a piece and were very large charter buses with restrooms on the buses.

I did provide transportation, but for me it was necessary for a couple reasons:
1. The closest hotels were ...not that close. A 20-25 minute drive. ...in a dark windy-roaded suburban middle of nowhere type area, which leads me to number
2. The wedding itself was on an island accessible by a single lane causeway ...no street lights. There are people that know the area and visit often that are scared to drive it, so didn’t want to terrify first timers. People that didn’t know where they were going HAVE driven off the causeway (AND uhhh...if someone did have an incident, everyone behind them probably would’ve been stick, haha)
3. The parking situation wasn’t ideal (there was *room* but the overflow lot would require a little walk.
4. Non venue related— we are from the city in a state other than where the wedding was. So a lot of our (city living, non car owning) friends took public transportation & cabs to the hotel and didn’t have a car in hand for getting back and forth!

So for us, a condition of choosing to have our wedding there was that we HAD to provide transportation.
In a more standard situation, I think it’s a nice perk but it’s not a requirement. I love using shuttles when they’re available but it’s usually a solvable problem when they’re not.

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That makes sense with where your venue was located. Our venue is located in the Washington D.C. Metro area so there are usually plenty of Lyft and Uber options which is why we don't think it will be a deal breaker. I do like the idea of including it as an option on the RSVP card. Thanks!

We’re not. I’ve had people question it but it’s really just not in the budget so they’ll have to get over it. Our hotel is only 7 miles away and an easy Lyft or Uber ride.

I have the same question; our ceremony will be 30 minutes away from the reception and I was planning on providing transportation for out-of-state guests. There are hotels near the reception that are pretty close, so do I also need to provide transportation for guests after the reception?

We weren't going to because the venue is 7 miles away and I think it's silly. Plus we were allowed to use two small shuttles to and from the venue for free..so for 28 people total..but FMIL decided they wanted to rent a bus in lieu of the shuttles which is an additional $250..to drive fifteen minutes.

Does your venue provide any parking for guests? I think that's the real deciding factor. If guests have the option to drive themselves at no cost, then I don't think transportation is necessary. However, if you don't have parking and they will all be relying on Uber/Lyft, it might be difficult for that many people to all get cars at the same time and prices can spike.

Our venue is within walking distance of several hotels, but we are booking a trolley for guest transportation anyway. We have absolutely no parking available (not even for us, ugh), and in the case of bad weather/older guests/drunk guests/etc. I think its best to have one safe way for everyone to get there and back.

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We have plenty parking at the venue and the venue said that if anyone needs to leave their car overnight, it's not an issue. We are having an open bar and quite a few of out of town guests as well but again, the hotels aren't that far and there are lyft/uber options. I'm still on the fence about it but my FH thinks it's a waste of money. I might get some price quotes and go from there.

View Quoted Comment If “pretty close” is further than walking distance, I would definitely provide transportation at the end as well. It would be odd as a guest if I got a ride provided to the ceremony and reception but then was stranded there at the end of the night and suddenly had to fend for myself.

Our venue is only 10 minutes from the two hotels, but we decided to rent buses to shuttle them back and forth regardless. There probably won’t be a large enough volume of Uber’s in the area for the size of our wedding (170 guests), and knowing our family/friends, most will want to fully take advantage of the open bar. We just didn’t want people to feel pressured to drive, or feel like they weren’t able to party the way they wanted. It’s definitely a high-cost option, but we just felt it was just the right call to make, especially for our group.

Some hotels will provide free shuttles if you have x number of guests who stay in your block. Find out if your hotel does that. Even if it's only a few miles away, it would be nice for guests to not have to pay for their own Uber/Lyft. Our hotels in Northern Virginia provide two free shuttles if 10 rooms are booked. Or you can create your own Uber/Lyft code, but I'm not entirely sure how that works.

Providing transportation is a nice to have, not a have to have. If it’s not included with your room blocks, and not in the budget, don’t feel bad. An Uber or Lyft won’t cost much for such a short trip. Your guest was probably just asking, not necessarily expecting you to have a shuttle.

We looked into it also since venue is downtown. Looked into lyft code credits. But we opted out.

We see paying for everything too. But people can take care of themselves or ask hotel for transport

Let them worry about that

I'm on the same boat. My venue is about 10 mins away from my hotel blocks but because I am on a budget, I was just thinking of having shuttle transportation available for my wedding party only. I know someone else that has had their ceremony at my venue and they recommended her guests to get an uber/lyft to and from venue but that is only if you're on a budget..maybe that could be an option to you. But then again... for my brothers wedding, he had a shuttle available for their guests and it was nice so just relax and not worry about getting a ride. I guess it depends on your budget.

@Waldy thanks for the suggestion on the Uber/Lyft Codes. I didn't even know they had that for weddings! It looks like that might be an option to consider.

I've been to over 30 weddings in my life, both locally and internationally, and I've NEVER bothered the bride and groom with questions about how to get to the venue because, you know, I'm an adult with a job and access to Google maps. I had my wedding in a major metropolitan area, sent STDs six months in advance, and included detailed public transportation info on our website, yet people still were harassing me on how to get to there up to the last minute. But knowing my crowd, providing private transportation would've been EVEN worse (would've had to answer 1,000 questions about the pickup/dropoff timing, locations, etc.).

I think it’s a nice to have, not a must have.
Our hotel allows us to rent out their shuttle buses, so we will have 1x 14 person shuttle person an hour before & 1x 14x person shuttle an hour after. Our hotel is close to the venue - under 10 min drive.

We have one large block at one hotel (the best option by far, price wise) and they offer a shuttle to and from the reception with the room block. Can you check with any of the hotels to see if that’s offered? Our hotel is close enough to the venue that it shouldn’t be a problem, but we’re happy for the transportation option all the same.

We did. However, we only blocked 1 hotel and it was 1.5 miles from the venue. The hotel had a shuttle cost me like $190 to rent to take guests back and forth. To me, it was worth it since there wasn't that much work I had to put into it, nor was it that expensive. If it was anymore complicated than it was, I would have skipped it.

We have a shuttle for our first look and pictures prior to the ceremony and there’s an extra hour we have paid for that we wanted to use (they had a 4 hour minimum), so we’re having the shuttle do two loops between the hotel and venue after dropping the wedding party off at the venue. The blocked hotel is legitimately two blocks from the venue... like from the one side of the hotel you can see the venue across the park that is there, so it’s more because we have the extra hour and didn’t want it to go to waste. Still deciding how to word it on the website, since we won’t be providing transportation back... 🤷‍♀️