Pictured here are first-time SPHERE bus riders Sister Martha Bowes, CND, Mary Conway, Don Ciota, and Justine Naphols outside of Ballard Green. —Bonnie Leavy-Mello, Laurel Ridge
With a maiden voyage last week, a bus has begun making morning and afternoon loop runs every Wednesday, offering senior citizens, the disabled, and their companions free rides from housing complexes to shopping and medical facilities around the town center.
“It’s being used,” First Selectman Rudy Marconi said Monday.
“We’re running it on Wednesdays. It has a good route,” he said.
The bus, manned by a professional driver, allows riders to access services such as shopping, medical services, recreational, education, and cultural programs around the town center.
The bus has a loop route it runs Wednesday mornings and again Wednesday afternoons.
The Wednesday morning run begins with the bus going to a series of housing complexes, starting at the Fox Hill condominiums at 9 a.m., then Casagmo at 9:15, Sunrise Cottage at 9:25, the Prospect Ridge Congregate Housing at 9:30, the Nolan Housing on Halpin Lane at 9:35, and Ballard Green at 9:43.
The bus then goes to a series of public, medical and commercial facilities, starting with the library and Bissell’s Pharmacy at 9:51, hitting Town Hall, Quest Medical and Family Medical, Parks and Recreation and Founders Hall, and ending at Stop & Shop and Kohl’s at 10:22.
Then, beginning at 10:30 at the library and Bissell’s, the bus does a kind of reverse run, re-visiting all the commercial and public facilities first and then going to the housing complexes, ending at Ballard Green at 11:54.
The pattern is repeated in the afternoon, starting at Fox Hill at 1 p.m. and ending at Ballard Green at 3:54.
The SPHERE bus made its rounds for the first time on July 31.
Don Ciota, chairman of the Commission for the Disabled, was pleased with ridership and hoped many other people would take advantage of this service.
The bus belongs to SPHERE — Special People Housing Education Recreation and Employment. Founded over 20 years ago in Ridgefield, SPHERE helps “improve the quality of life for individuals with developmental disabilities.”
“Today is a day of many firsts,” Alice Kenney of the town Housing Authority said after last Wednesday’s inaugural run. “And we encourage people to continue to use this wonderful service.
“Thank you to SPHERE for providing this bus transportation to our citizens!”
For more information and to access the SPHERE bus schedule, visit ridgefieldct.org website.