North Escambia Community Transportation Begins Service Today

February 20, 2019

The North Escambia Transportation Service Pilot Project begins today as a door-to-door on demand transportation project in the area north of Quintette Road.

The project will service Walnut Hill, Davisville and Bratt on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and Century, Molino and McDavid on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. The service will be available from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday-Friday.

Escambia County Area Transit (ECAT) gave the public a chance to check out the brand-new 10-passenger vehicle Tuesday at Community Health of Northwest Florida click in Century.

For more photos, click here.

“It was a beautiful ride. It drives real smooth,” said local resident Gloria Castleman after an inaugural trip. “It’s a nice van, one of the nicest ones we have ever had here in Century. It think it will be used very well. The public will benefit from it very well and we can utilize it to our benefit. It will help a lot of people here to get back and forth to doctors and other businesses.said Gloria Castleman after an inaugural trip.”

“This is going to be a really wonderful service for our patients,” said Chief Community Engagement Officer Ann Papadelias of Community Health. “We have a high number of patients with no transportation. Some walk to the clinic but sometimes the weather is bad. This is going to help in so many ways, whether someone is using it to get to the clinic, the store, visit a friend’s house of anything else.”

The service is $1 per trip within the North Escambia area. Riders will be picked up at their home or other location within the North Escambia area. The new service will not run a fixed route, but it will allow connections at the standard fare to the ECAT Route 60 bus that connects Century, Molino and Cantonment to the rest of the ECAT system.

“It’s going to be wonderful to connect people to their health care services,” Papadelias said. “It’s tough getting to an appointment when you don’t have a vehicle.”

To qualify for the program, participants must live north of Quintette Road within Escambia County and complete a short application (click to download). All trips will require a 24-hour advance reservation by calling (850) 595-0501 between 8 a.m. and 4 p.m. on weekdays

The service is available for anyone living in the service area that completes the application and meets one or more of the following conditions:

  • Persons with no other means of transportation that do not live on a bus route
  • Persons age 60 or older
  • Persons with disabilities
  • Persons that have an economic hardship

The North Escambia Transportation Service Pilot Project is funded through a Transportation Disadvantaged Mobility Enhancement Grant.

For more photos, click here.

NorthEscambia.com photos, click to enlarge.

Comments

2 Responses to “North Escambia Community Transportation Begins Service Today”

  1. Freda on February 21st, 2019 1:40 pm

    Does anyone know if there are any services like this for Beulah?

  2. Charlotte Bates on February 20th, 2019 11:28 pm

    This is so AWESOME!! I don’t live that far North, but I also have my own transportation, but for the people that don’t, this is so wonderful. I am so happy to see North Escambia is doing some good up this way.