Sudbury's Handi-Transit being updated

The City of Greater Sudbury says improvements and enhanced service is coming to the Specialized Transit Service, known as Handi-Transit.

The city provides specialized transit services door-to-door for residents with physical disabilities, who are unable to use conventional transit. The Transit Action Plan recommends changes and enhancements to the service, discussed on Monday at the city's Community Services Committee meeting.

The service will see new lowered buses, making it easier for passengers with disabilities to get on and off. The new buses will also have ramps at the front doors rather than the lifts at the back of the bus.

Specialized Transit Service will also replace the definition of "disability" with the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disability Act and the Human Rights Code, which will remove the current reference to "physical disability."

Currently riders with disability must have a physical disability to be eligible for Handi-Transit, changing the definition will make ridership more inclusive for riders with any disabilities.

"Having a more dynamic eligibility process, we need to talk to them more and also place them in the category that they belong, so we need to understand the applicants barriers and give that information to the service provider so that they can make the decisions of how this person needs to move to get to where they need to be," said Michelle Ferrigan, the director of transit services. 

Ferrigan says the Transit Action Plan — new routes and schedules will begin on Aug. 26 — will also include enhanced service, which will make it easier for for passengers with disability to ride conventional transit.

"With the transit action plan we have a new network and we have mobility hubs, we're bringing in a lot of improvements that will allow some of these trips to be preformed either in full or in part with the conventional service, so it's a mixture of everything," said Ferrigan.