InFocus
By Claire Miller
All Aboard
T
raveling from point A to point B without getting behind a wheel isn’t just convenient, it’s becoming more and more common. Ride-share services such as Uber and Lyft connect riders with drivers through the phone in your pocket. Then there’s COTA//Plus. For more than two years, the Central Ohio Transit Authority has provided residents and visitors with an on-demand mobility service. COTA//Plus can take commuters anywhere within 22 square miles of Grove City. Travelers can use the app to connect to a COTA//Plus vehicle in under 15 minutes. Since its start, the service has grown steadily in popularity, COTA and city officials say.
12 January/February 2022
The service was first implemented to meet the needs of the workforce in the area, such as the Mid-Ohio Food Collective, Walmart Distribution Center and the recently built Mount Carmel Grove City Hospital. COTA//Plus rides start at $3 with discount rates for day passes and adults 65 and over and students. “(Grove City) came to us and we had really good collaboration and partnered with them,” says Devayani Puranik, mobility development director for COTA. “The city council, their leadership, was very supportive. Our leadership was very supportive to really experiment with this on-demand system because it is a new system – it’s public transit offering a technology-based solution – which is
easier (because) we all have smartphones in our hands and it’s easier now people can schedule reliable, accessible service.” For Grove City, the on-demand service provides an answer to timely issues, says Mayor Richard L. “Ike” Stage. That includes the demand of a growing workforce but also the decreased accessibility of the city’s bus service for older adults during the pandemic. “COTA has helped us along with a very critical issue that is getting workers from their homes to the bus system but (also) being able to do the last mile to the place of employment,” Stage says. “I would label it a godsend.” The on-demand option for transportation helps fill in the gaps where www.DiscoverGroveCity.com
Photo courtesy of the city of Grove City
COTA offers on-demand service in Grove City
