Disabled riders in Twin Cities weigh transit options as potential rideshare exit approaches

Almost every day, Mark Hughes rolls his wheelchair into a Metro Mobility van.

It’s how he gets between home, work, errands and family dinners across the Twin Cities metro area. He’s one of 18,000 Twin Cities residents who are signed up for the service. They schedule rides when needed, and get door-through-door service in accessible vans. 

Hughes says Metro Mobility generally gets him where he needs to go — but he’s also come to expect delays, long detours, and trouble scheduling rides when he wants them. 

That’s fine if he’s just running errands.

“But for somebody who has deadlines, is working, has places to be, then it can get to be pretty tricky sometimes,” Hughes said.

He’s worried about what could happen if more people start riding Metro Mobility — which could happen if Uber and Lyft leave the Twin Cities, as they say they will on July 1 in response to a Minneapolis city ordinance. Some disabled riders and advocates cite similar concerns about the future of transit for people with disabilities.

Michael Sack is another Metro Mobility user, and sits on the Minneapolis Advisory Committee on People with Disabilities. 

“My biggest concern is that if those two rideshare companies depart Minneapolis, there would be a giant hole in accessible transportation and an increase of individuals who would need to start utilizing the already-busy Metro Mobility,” Sack said.

A recent legislative study surveyed nearly 200 Metro Mobility users; just over two-thirds of them said that the system meets their needs.

Users noted a scheduling process that requires them to be flexible about their pickup times. Riders can request a ride one to four days in advance. Staff arrange a new van timetable every day based on those requests and assign people a specific pickup time — within an hour of the requested time. 

A van is considered “on time” if it comes within a half-hour of the scheduled pickup. About 90 percent of rides last year were on time, according to a state legislative audit of Metro Mobility published last month.

Metro Mobility is meant to mirror the fixed-route bus and light rail system — so, like the bus, it’s affordable, but sometimes tricky to predict. It serves roughly the same area, runs on limited hours, and can detour to make other pickups and dropoffs.

So some people prefer other options. 

Dan Meyers works at a nonprofit called Rise, which connects people with disabilities to social services, including transit. He uses both Metro Transit and Lyft. Some clients can have their Lyft trips reimbursed through Medicaid when they schedule through a nonprofit like Rise. 

“Metro Mobility is great,” Meyers said. “But once people try Lyft, they usually don’t want to go back.” 

He said Lyft rides are faster. They take riders directly to their destination, and don’t require scheduling in advance. 

But rideshare has its limitations, too. The vehicles are not wheelchair-accessible — and unlike on Metro Mobility, drivers don’t help riders into the vehicle or in the door at their destination.

But Meyers says that for people who can use rideshare services, it’s a good resource — and it’s one more option among slim choices for people with disabilities. 

“Transportation for people with disabilities is a struggle everywhere,” Meyers said. “It’s like a universal thing. If you ask somebody who works at a provider like Rise, what’s one of the biggest things? It’s transportation.” 

Meyers said Rise has only a few clients who will be affected directly if Lyft leaves Minneapolis. Those clients will be switched back to Metro Mobility.

He’s been keeping an eye on some of the smaller rideshare companies that say they’ll move into Minneapolis should the bigger companies leave. But working out a new partnership would be tricky — and one of the reasons Rise uses Lyft is its background check policies, which Meyers isn’t sure other providers will have.

“More providers — that’s a good thing, right? More competition, prices will go down,” Meyers said. “I just don’t know if they have the infrastructure or the capacity.”

Charles Carlson is the executive director of Metropolitan Transportation Services at the Metropolitan Council, which operates Metro Mobility. He said Metro Mobility is meant to reliably complement the fixed-route bus system, but isn’t necessarily meant to be the fastest transit option every time. 

“People with disabilities use a lot of different services,” Carlson said. “There’s also driving, there’s rideshare, there’s getting rides from others, there’s Metro Mobility — it all fits together.” 

Carlson said Metro Mobility is preparing for a possible increase in demand. That’s a little hard to plan for, Carlson said, because they’re not sure exactly how many people are using Uber and Lyft who might qualify to use Metro Mobility.

Hennepin County reported that residents with disability waivers took more than 50,000 rideshare trips in February. Metro Mobility reported that, last year, it provided more than 160,000 rides per month — 2 million over the whole year. 

At its peak ridership before the pandemic, the service provided about 2.6 million rides in a year.

“It’s certainly something that we’re tracking,” Carlson said. “We’d be preparing to respond to whatever we need to do to ensure that we’re bringing our customers where they need to go.” 

Metro Transit — and other transportation agencies around the state — are testing out more and different ways of providing service — some of which are closer to the services that rideshare companies provide. Metro Mobility recently introduced a program that subsidizes taxi rides for certified users: for a higher fare, riders get a faster, direct trip. 

And this month, the Met Council is rolling out Metro Move, another option for people with disabilities. It will take people on certain waivers to regularly-scheduled appointments, and will run on fixed hours that the agency says will improve access across the region.

Met Council officials say that contracted partners have made progress in hiring more personnel, to address a challenge faced by many transit companies since the pandemic. Metro Mobility is also rolling out hundreds of new replacement buses and new tech systems that aim to make trips quicker.

Hughes wants to see services expanded — especially faster options like the subsidized cab rides.

“I’m grateful to what we have, but we can’t do any less,” Hughes said. “We need to take a look at doing a little more.”

The Minneapolis City Council and the Minnesota Legislature are both continuing discussions about rideshare driver pay policies, with the potential to change the rules — and potentially avert the planned departure of Uber and Lyft — before the Minneapolis city ordinance goes into effect in July.

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