Community Transit helps seniors navigate buses, trains

EVERETT — Seventy years ago, Brian Hunt used to ride the bus every day.

Growing up in San Diego, he had fond memories of using public transit to get to his school. But when he first tried to ride the Link light rail, its complexity, as he saw it, got the better of him.

“Here’s where I got stuck,” Hunt said, pointing at an ORCA ticketing booth outside the light rail station in Lynnwood on Wednesday.

Transit agencies know the ticketing systems, connections and route mapping required to fully utilize their services can be confusing for some at first, especially for seniors. That’s why Community Transit partnered with YMCA of Snohomish County to host educational workshops to give older adults an in-depth lesson on getting around the county — and beyond — using public transit.

On Wednesday, the transit agency hosted one of their workshops at the Everett YMCA. A group of more than a dozen seniors heard from Community Transit employees on best practices for riding transit and took a field trip to the Lynnwood City Center station to experience the (relatively) new light rail station.

“It’s scary for people, especially as they get older, if it’s not something they’ve done before,” said Jennifer McCoy, a marketing specialist with Community Transit who helped teach the workshop. “But I really wanted to help share that it’s not as difficult as people may think it is, but sometimes it’s scary until you do it that first time.”

Link light rail arrived in Lynnwood in August 2024. Voters approved the system’s expansion in 2008. After it opened last year, there was a jump in public transit ridership numbers across the Puget Sound region.

In 2016, voters approved Sound Transit 3, a major $54 billion expansion of public transit service throughout the Puget Sound region to help lower traffic fatalities and injuries, reduce pollution, cut travel costs and alleviate some of the worst traffic congestion in the country. The expansion plans include extending Link light rail to south Everett by 2037. It will be the first rapid transit rail line to serve the route between Everett and Seattle since 1939.

But transit is more than just trains. Bus service, provided largely by Community Transit throughout Snohomish County, is how most people in the area can connect to light rail.

For newcomers to public transit, bus rides can be especially daunting. Finding the right bus stops, making the right connections and finding out how to pay can be difficult for seniors who have driven for most of their lives.

During the workshop, the seniors learned how to load ORCA cards and use them to transfer between different transit services in the region. Community Transit gave those who attended the workshop a month of free rides. Many of them had never ridden transit.

Senior fares on buses and the light rail are $1. Youth 18 and under ride for free.

“As people get older, they may lose their ability to drive, and that might affect their independence and their ability to get out and about,” McCoy said. “This is a way of teaching people that you can still take transit, you can still get out and about.”

Robert and Ginny Schuweller, a couple who attended Wednesday’s lesson, said they were looking ahead to the future as they signed up for the class. Yes, the two want to be able to get to the airport easier, they said, but they also want to be sure they can get around after they’re unable to drive.

“We’ve got to be looking ahead,” Robert Schuweller said. “Are we always going to be able to drive, or should we even drive? We both agreed, let’s learn how to use this because we’re going to need it.”

Community Transit offers a free travel training program for those who need extra assistance riding transit. More info: https://tinyurl.com/3exbbjaz.

Will Geschke: 425-339-3443; william.geschke@heraldnet.com; X: @willgeschke.