KUDOS TO ADA PARATRANSIT SERVICE
RIPTA is striving to become a model for accessible public transportation, offering service that is safe, dependable and inclusive to all our customers, including those with disabilities. The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) requires public transit operators to provide paratransit services for eligible people with disabilities that prevent use of general public transportation all or some of the time. RIPTA’s ADA Paratransit Service is a specialized, door-to-door transport service for people with disabilities who are not able to ride fixed-route public transportation.
This may be due to an inability to:
• board, ride or disembark independently from any readily accessible vehicle on the regular fixed-route system
• access existing accessible fixed-route transportation because that transportation is not available at the needed time on that route
• get to boarding/alighting locations of regular public transportation
Below is a letter we received from Richard Winkler expressing his gratitude for the ADA Paratransit Program; the program changed his mother’s life.
Dear Sir/Madam:
I am writing on behalf of my mother to express her sincere appreciation in being a part of your Paratransit Service. Before being accepted into your program, my mother would infrequently use various ambulance services such as Med-Tech to get her to various appointments. The process for doing so was both cumbersome and expensive. It was also very difficult to get my mother’s long wheelchair into tight quarters. As a result, we very sparingly chose opportunities to have my mother venture out of her home. This fact most definitely negatively impacted her mood and her overall dissatisfaction with being cooped up in the house.
Thankfully, as a result of your service, my mother has a new lease on life. She can go to restaurants, movies, shopping and just about anywhere she wants to go with only 24 hours notices. This is not only exciting to her, it is also comforting to all family members who now see opportunities to expand her life in ways we never could have previously afforded.
Your reservation system, attending staff and promptness are simply wonderful. We cannot thank you enough for what you have done for our mother and what you also do for a great many other RI citizens. You deserve great praise for this program and we tell everyone we can how much we appreciate all that you do.
Sincerely,
Richard Winkler
For more information on The RIde Program, an umbrella service that provides transportation for individuals with disabilities and seniors based on the eligibility requirements of several state programs including ADA Paratransit Service, visit here.
