Bus service provides lift

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CTS driver Dwain Smith helps Margaret Chancellor with her things as she disembarks from the bus Thursday. Chancellor is a semi-regular rider of the Navarro/Ellis transit system. Daily Sun photo/Janet Jacobs

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June 21, 2008

Fare increases not on map

By Janet Jacobs The Corsicana Daily Sun Sat Jun 21, 2008, 06:09 PM CDT

On a typical day, Community Transit Service buses trundle all over Navarro and Ellis counties and, despite the rising cost of gas, the price per trip is still $1.

CTS is an on-demand bus service open to any resident in Navarro or Ellis counties, and the headquarters is right in the heart of Corsicana, in the former bus terminal at Business 45 and Seventh Avenue. Although seniors and low-income residents make up the majority of the ridership, the service is available for anyone who needs transportation within the area.

“We do a worker route, and then we have others who just call in if they want to go to lunch or see a friend or to the doctor,” explained Charlotte Clower, transit director. The “worker route” takes employees to Kohl’s, The Home Depot warehouse and Russell Stover’s but, like Cinderella’s pumpkin, CTS’ day ends early, so late shifts aren’t a possibility.

“The rural public service stops at 4 p.m., that’s why we’re looking to extend to midnight,” Clower explained. “We’re hoping in the near future to extend the hours to include second shift workers, to get them to work and home.”

Margaret Chancellor is a resident of Friendship Towers who took the bus Thursday to her regular hair appointment about half a mile away.

“I have Parkinson’s, and they took my car away from me,” she explained in a slow, careful voice. “I told them, ‘you might as well shoot me.’”

She rode with friends for awhile, but has recently discovered the convenience of the bus system for her trips to the store, doctor’s offices, or those important beauty shop appointments, she said.

“We may be old, but we’ve still got our pride,” she said.

Preserving people’s pride is part of the deal, and currently there are no plans to raise rates on the service.

“We’re not looking at that, no,” Clower said. “Most of our clients are low-income people. Without us, they wouldn’t be able to get around and stay active.”

CTS is funded primarily by contracts with the Texas Department of Transportation and Medicaid. Under the Medicaid contract, the buses take clients to medical treatments all around north and east Texas, but the buses generally stay within the two-county territory.

For Patricia Ware, who uses the service to get to her regular dialysis and doctor’s appointments, it’s a lifeline. The blood-filtering dialysis treatments are exhausting, and make driving too risky, Ware explained.

“We have a car, but I like the bus to take me,” she said. “You’re weak coming off dialysis.”

The bus system has been growing for years, not just this year, Clower said.

“We’ve been growing by leaps and bounds since 2006,” she said. “In 2006, we had nine vehicles. Now, we have 19 buses, and are getting three more in October. This year, we won the federal transit award for the most increase in percentage and ridership in 2007. We’ve just had steady growth since 2006.”

CTS doesn’t advertise, and most people learn about it from friends and family, or from seeing the buses driving around the county.

“Our buses are our best advertisement,” Clower said.

The most commonly requested service is a ride to Dallas, but that’s one service that’s not offered.

“We can’t do that,” Clower said. “It’s considered a charter service, and our buses have to be open to anyone to get on.”

Texas has the largest rural transit system in the nation, with 39 operators, including CTS, serving counties and cities with fewer than 50,000 people, according to the Texas Department of Transportation Web site. Some of the systems cover enormous territories, while others serve just one county.

Some riders do complain that they have to wait for a ride, and that they can’t get to doctor’s appointments in Dallas without advanced notice, but most customers are complimentary about the friendliness of the drivers, and for the sheer luxury of having a ride when otherwise they would be at the mercy of friends or family.

Ruth, an elderly woman who preferred her last name not be used, sat up very straight in her bus seat Thursday, watching wide-eyed at the houses and buildings zipping past her window.

“You get to look around and see all the sights,” she said. “You don’t realize all you miss when you’re driving.”

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Janet Jacobs may be reached via e-mail at jacobs@corsicanadailysun.com

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