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It's been a busy summer in Massachusetts! This month's articles highlight some of the different benefits of transportation coordination. Read on to learn how stakeholders are collaborating to create a new transportation service in the Quaboag region, make service more efficient in Acton and surrounding towns, and expand capacity in Needham - all toward the goal of getting more people the transportation they need.
This August 2016 issue of MassMobility covers news about community transportation, human service transportation coordination, and mobility management in Massachusetts. This newsletter is compiled by the MassMobility team, a joint initiative of the Massachusetts Executive Office of Health and Human Services and MassDOT. Above, we have added the MassDOT Rail & Transit logo to the newsletter to emphasize the joint nature of the mobility management work between EOHHS and MassDOT and the close working relationship between MassMobility and our colleagues at MassDOT Rail & Transit.
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Hospital donates funds for new transportation service in the Quaboag region
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The Quaboag Connector will complement the
E2E: Education to Employment Workforce Training and Community College Center, a partnership with Holyoke Community College, Springfield Technical College, and other local organizations including the Ware Business and Civic Association, Country Bank, and area employers to bring college classes to the region. E2E opened in April and will offer both workforce training and credit-bearing courses this fall. "People in the Quaboag region without transportation to training, education, or work are stuck here. We know this is part of the reason for elevated unemployment rates and the difficulty employers face in recruiting qualified employees locally. So we recognized that this workforce training and community college initiative had to be done in tandem with a transportation initiative," explains Gail Farnsworth French, Training and Technical Assistance Program Manager at the
Quaboag Valley Community Development Corporation. The Quaboag Connector will help employees get to work, students get to classes and to clinical and technical rotations, and other individuals get to medical visits or other destinations in the region.
Stakeholders are currently developing plans for implementation of the Quaboag Connector. They have met with
CrossTown Connect and other providers to learn from their expertise as they develop routes, scheduling, and publicity plans. "We recognize that it is imperative that the Quaboag Connector connect with the existing PVTA service that is here because we see an opportunity for a multiplier effect. By connecting the two, ridership on both should improve," Farnsworth French notes.
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Four towns regionalize COA service through CrossTown Connect
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In July, the Councils on Aging (COAs) in Acton, Boxborough, Littleton, and Maynard regionalized their van services in partnership with
CrossTown Connect
, a municipally-led Transportation Management Association. The towns had previously centralized vehicle dispatch, but had been unable to coordinate further due to service area boundaries: Acton and Maynard are served by the Lowell Regional Transit Authority, while Boxborough and Littleton are in the Montachusett Regional Transit Authority service area. Earlier this year, MassDOT helped the two transit authorities develop a procedure to allow coordination, resulting in a
Memorandum of Understanding
(MOU) between the transit authorities and CrossTown Connect.
After the MOU was signed, CrossTown Connect convened the four COAs to work together to standardize policies so that riders would know the fare regardless of which town's vehicle came to pick them up. Through a series of in-person meetings, the COA Directors worked together to come up with a uniform set of policies, though they decided that operating hours would still vary by town. Meanwhile, CrossTown Connect reprogrammed their dispatching software so that it would treat the four towns as one region, allowing for vehicles from one town to pick up and drop off in another. All drivers have access to tablets that have maps and GPS capacity to help them navigate unfamiliar parts of the region.
"Previously, when you would go to Emerson Hospital, you would see a van from each of our towns waiting there to pick someone up," explains Pamela Campbell,
Director of Elder and Human Services in Littleton. "Our van might drive right by your house but couldn't pick you up." Under the new system, the Littleton van can pick up a senior from Acton at the hospital and drop him off at home on its way to drop off other riders in Littleton. "This makes it much easier for us to free up the vans," Campbell notes.
The new system went into effect July 11, and CrossTown Connect is treating it as a pilot. After six months all partners will evaluate whether any adjustments are needed to the structure. CrossTown Connect hopes to turn this increased efficiency into higher ridership over time, and the new system has already opened up additional opportunities for riders: Littleton runs a biweekly shuttle to Lahey Clinic in Burlington and hospitals in Boston, and offered to open up empty seats on the shuttle to riders from the other towns.
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Medical transportation program expands capacity through partnership with Uber and Lyft
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Last month, the Needham Community Council began a
six-month pilot
to expand the capacity of their volunteer driver program. Now, if a rider requests a trip but no volunteer driver is available, the Council calls the rider and offers them a ride through Uber or Lyft. If the rider accepts, the Council arranges for the ride and pays for the trip. Any resident of Needham over age 18 is eligible, and trips are limited to medical appointments in Needham, Newton, and Wellesley.
Believing there to be great need for additional transportation in Needham, the Council's Board of Directors decided to allocate operating funding for a pilot. Upon partnering, Uber and Lyft each sent representatives to the Council to train Council staff on how to access their online trip request and payment systems. Before implementation, Executive Director Sandra Robinson and her staff tried out Uber and Lyft themselves so they would be able to answer riders' questions. Robinson also reached out to the volunteer drivers to let them know that the new services were complementing - not replacing - the volunteers.
So far, Robinson reports that most riders have enjoyed the new services. She sends an evaluation survey to every rider to gauge their satisfaction and also asks what they would have done if no ride had been available. The pilot is an opportunity to assess the extent of need for medical transportation in Needham, and the Council also hopes this pilot will help them recruit additional volunteer drivers.
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Consortium urges pedestrians to "Be Seen, Be Safe" in Southern Berkshire County
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On July 13, over 50 area residents gathered at the Great Barrington Senior Center to discuss pedestrian safety tips over a barbecue lunch. Participants received free, safety yellow vests with the motto "Be Seen, Be Safe," thanks to funding from the local Fairview Hospital. In addition, staff and volunteers gave out flags to attendees with scooters and helped them decorate their scooters with reflective tape.
AGE TRIAD, a group of public safety officials and senior centers representing Alford, Great Barrington, and Egremont, as well as the local Fairview Hospital, sponsored the event, which was spurred by a tragic crash in which a driver of an SUV hit a person using a scooter who was crossing the street from senior housing to the Big Y in Great Barrington last year. The driver said she never saw the pedestrian, so AGE TRIAD, at the urging of the Great Barrington Chief of Police William Walsh, decided to conduct a public awareness campaign to increase pedestrian safety and visibility.
AGE TRIAD Chair Bruce Bernstein, who also serves as Director of the Egremont Council on Aging, says this is just the beginning of the Be Seen, Be Safe campaign. He plans to offer additional programming in the fall and also hopes to expand the initiative to youth as well as seniors.
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Cape Cod celebrates Smart Transportation Week
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From June 26 through July 2, Cape Cod celebrated
Smart Transportation Week
, highlighting the many transportation options Cape residents and visitors can choose from: ferries, flights, local and intercity buses, trains, biking, walking, and carpooling. The County Commissioners officially designated the week as Smart Transportation Week, and the
Cape Cod Commission
and
Cape Cod Regional Transit Authority
organized
events
, in collaboration with
MassBike
,
MassRIDES
, and other partners. "We have a lot of traffic and parking congestion on Cape Cod, and so we're trying to get people to use a smarter option when they can," explains Lev Malakhoff, Senior Transportation Engineer at the Cape Cod Commission. "Anything people can do helps everyone out."
This year's celebration featured
NuRide, an online database where residents and visitors can log their smart trips for a chance to win coupons, as well as find potential carpools. Participants who logged trips during Smart Transportation Week were also eligible for special prizes.
Smart Transportation Week dates back to 1997, when the County organized a Bike Week, which expanded into a multi-modal celebration a few years later. Although
Bay State Bike Week is typically held in May, organizers shifted the dates for Smart Transportation Week to the last week of June so that seasonal transportation services would be operating and so that participants could enjoy the beautiful summer weather of the Cape.
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Volunteer driver program staff gather to share tips
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On July 19, MassMobility offered a volunteer driver forum at the Natick Council on Aging (COA). Attendees included volunteer driver program staff from nearby COAs, representatives of regional and statewide volunteer driver programs, and others interested in learning more about the topic.
Former MassMobility staff
Theadora Fisher shared information on program administration, driver recruitment, insurance, and software options for volunteer driver programs; this information was recently published by MassDOT in a
set of reports researched and written by Fisher. In addition, staff from the Wellesley COA presented on their program, and other attendees shared tips from their experiences during open discussion.
To learn more about running a volunteer driver program or to connect with peer programs,
contact us to join MassMobility's volunteer driver program listserv.
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MWRTA assumes paratransit service in Dover and Wellesley
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MWRTA paratransit trips cost $2 one-way. Customers can travel directly to Dover, Framingham, Natick, Needham, Newton, Waltham, and Weston; Dover passengers can also travel to Medfield. In addition, riders can travel directly to any location that is within three quarters of a mile of an MWRTA bus stop. Customers looking to travel to Boston or other locations in THE RIDE service area can transfer to THE RIDE in Newton by the Riverside T station. For RIDE customers transitioning to MWRTA, eligibility for the service transfers automatically, but riders need to
register with MWRTA and set up a fare account.
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Grant and award opportunities
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Applications for the
Innovations in Accessible Mobility grant opportunity
are due August 26. The National Aging and Disability Transportation Center plans to award grants of up to $50,000 to six communities around the country for innovative projects that will improve mobility for seniors and people with disabilities.
Check our
calendar for more information on these and other upcoming opportunities.
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Looking for a little summer reading while it's still beach weather? Check out these recently published reports.
Mobility managers will be interested in a new
report from the National Cooperative Highway Research Program that provides an overview of how state Departments of Transportation and other entities are helping seniors and people with disabilities access information about trip options through centralized repositories, One Call/One Click systems, and trip booking programs. Accompanying the new
report is a
toolkit to help states and other entities design, develop, implement, and evaluate their own "linkages," as the authors term these systems.
Shared use modes - such as carsharing, bikesharing, carpooling, or Transportation Network Companies - have become increasingly popular in recent years. A report and toolkit from the Shared Use Mobility Center looks at where shared use services are currently available and analyzes potential to better serve disadvantaged neighborhoods. The Center also reviews municipal policies and analyzes benefits from shared use modes.
The Transit Center surveyed over 3,000 people around the country about their transit usage and reports findings and recommendations in Who's on Board 2016.
Need a break from reading? Sit back, relax, and watch this
webinar
on how MassDOT is encouraging cities and towns in Massachusetts to pass and implement complete streets policies.
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Follow us on Twitter
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Are you on Twitter? If so, follow us @MassMobility for links to community transportation resources relevant to organizations and agencies here in Massachusetts. If you aren't on Twitter, you can still see our posts online at twitter.com/MassMobility/. |
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