Transcript for the Piece Audio version of Two Cape Cods: Hidden Poverty on the Cape and Islands - Part 3

For more than twenty years, social services advocates have pushed for frequent and reliable public transportation on the lower and outer Cape. It's considered a key component of getting both the working poor and elderly the services they need. Public transportation continues to be a problem in places like Truro, but some progress is being made.

It's a fairly warm day for early March, but 70-year-old Truro resident Bill Worthington can't get the side door of his Isuzu pick-up truck unlocked. It's frozen shut.

Late last year, Worthington lost his drivers license after he wrecked on the side of the road. His Isuzu has sat cold in the driveway ever since.

Bill Worthington: "I lost my drivers license in November because my diabetes acted up, I wasn't in good control, and my blood sugar got very low, and I, thank god, did not hurt anybody, didn't damage anybody's cars, but I just had to get hauled out of my car and got taken to the hospital because I couldn't drive anymore."

By sheer coincidence, Worthington's wife Vicky, who's 67, received her first driver's license just a few months earlier. She says she never needed one before moving to Truro. Even with her help, since the accident, the couple has occasionally had to rely on public buses to go shopping and get back from Cape Cod Hospital. Bill's even done a bit of hitchhiking.

Bill Worthington: "We have the Plymouth and Brockton schedule. Even in the summer, they only have three trips through Truro each direction, all day. In the winter they have two trips in the course of a day, two trips to P-town and two trips back. So it isn't a good way to go shopping for us or something like that because there isn't the kind of frequency that makes it easy."

Social services advocates say the lack of frequent and reliable public transportation is a major problem for both the elderly and poor people. It limits what jobs they can get, and prevents them reaching food banks and appointments.

The Worthingtons are not impoverished, but Truro Town Administrator Pam Knowland says transportation is one issue where older people and the working poor face the same dilemma.

Pam Knowland: "It doesn't matter if you are wealthy or poor, what people on the Cape need when people get older is transportation, and on the outer Cape, which is rural, it is much more essential to keeping them in their own homes and keeping them in the community. This is our goal."

Len Stewart, the director of Human Services for Barnstable County, says that when the county conducts surveys of residents' needs, lack transportation is consistently listed as a barrier to keeping the services they need.

Len Stewart: "Like, can they get to job training? Can they get to the food bank? Can they get to medical appointments? Tranportation right now is there is no public transportation to speak of from Orleans down to Provincetown. There is a couple of times a day private bus, but that doesn't really solve much of anything."

The lack of transportation on the lower and outer Cape, though, is one issue related to poverty where people have hope right now. This year, Knowland says a new bus line will be launched called the Flex Route. It will typically come every thirty to sixty minutes, and will not just go straight down Route 6.

Pam Knowland: "We are very excited about this service, it is going to begin right after labor day the first week in June, and there will be two weeks of free service for people so they can get used to the idea of the flex bus. If they want to be picked up at their home, they have to be within a mile of the fixed route. We know that it will provide a sense of community to the people in this rural area."

Michael Malinski is a twenty year old student from Truro who attends Cape Cod Community College. Last week, his car broke down. He was able to make it to school, but it meant that he had to borrow another vehicle from a family member. He knows of several students who continually have trouble getting to school; he's even driven some of them. Malinski he expects students would use public transportation if it was available.

Michael Malinski: "A lot of the 4Cs population are older adults who come to night classes, and if the service was provided frequently enough that they wouldn't have to wait around all day to catch the bus, then I think they would use that service."

Still, the Flex Route is not considered a complete solution to the Cape's transportation problem. The program is based largely on federal and state grants, which are not always stable from year to year. But Robin Carroll, director of human needs at the Lower Cape Outreach Council, says, it is a start.

Robin Carroll: "I think little pieces like the flex route, that is a small piece that might help somebody get up to Hyannis where they might be able to get a stable job, maybe work at Cape Cod Hospital. it is just a little piece of stability. It is just a little piece, but all these little pieces are certainly helpful."

Barnstable County estimates that ninety-five percent of the Cape population use cars to get around. So advocates say it may take some work to get people use to the idea of using public transportation. Still, as Carroll says, the flex route is another piece of the poverty puzzle. It's progress.