SEMINOLE COUNTY, Fla. – For years, buses have been the backbone of Seminole County’s public transportation system, but this fall your ride will be on-demand and hopefully take you door-to-door.
Tuesday, the Board of County Commissioners gave staff guidance to move forward with a rideshare service that will provide passengers with a new option, rather than relying on a bus that can’t take you directly where you need to go.
The county will look at phasing out some LYNX routes at the end of the year, and working with Freebee, a south Florida-based company, to provide service throughout Seminole County, except the rural areas.
Discussion during Tuesday’s meeting focused on starting with a $5 million contract with Freebee, which would provide 35 vehicles in different service zone.
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Passengers would likely be able to request rides on-demand through an app and travel within those zones, during operating hours Monday through Sunday. Unlike an Uber or Lyft where customers can usually request a private ride instantly, the Freebee service will typically take 30 minutes for a vehicle to show up that passengers will share.
In order to cut costs with LYNX, the county is removing all fixed routes except the following, which have been identified as the most in demand:
- S.R. 436 North & South (Link 436S; 436S)
- U..S 17-92 reduced to Fern Park Super Stop (Link 102; 103)
- West S.R. 434 reduced to Seminole State Altamonte (Link 23)
- East S.R. 434 reduced to McCulloch Rd (Link 434)
- U.S. 441 Orange Blossom Trail stop (Link 1
News 6 first reported on Seminole County’s frustration with the current LYNX service last November when commissioners said improvements were “long overdue.”
“Years ago, we jokingly said maybe we should just do Uber for everyone in Seminole County. It might be cheaper,” Commissioner Amy Lockhart said.
Right now, Seminole County pays about $17 million annually for its LYNX service, which includes 11 fixed routes, two “NeighborLink” Zones, and paratransit service. They estimate up to 4,200 people use the LYNX service each year.
As the new rideshare service rolls out this fall, the county said they plan to also keep the current paratransit service with LYNX, along with a reduced number of routes.
Tuesday, commissioners made it clear that the bus service is not going away completely.
Commissioner Andria Herr, who represents District 5, said there will be a clear savings as they switch to the Uber-style service, but it will up to the commission to manage that cost moving forward.
“The savings that we realize through this through the future only works if we are disciplined about how we manage this,” said Herr. “We don’t want to become Lynx junior.”
She and others also applauded Commissioner Amy Lockhart, who Herr said first “challenged the status quo” and suggested the county look into expanding its transportation options.
“We can all see the tremendous advantage that this is going to bring to the community who is using the services of Lynx now, and others who don’t have the benefit of using Lynx will now be able to utilize this service,” said Lockhart. “The fact that we will be able to expand and serve more needs, for less money, is just an opportunity that we cannot pass up.”
As commissioners gave their feedback Tuesday, they said this new micro-transit model is not designed to replace private services such as Uber and Lyft.
“This is not a government-funded Uber replacement for your Uber and your Lyft rides,” said Chairman Jay Zembower. “This is to connect the Lynx absentee that we’re going to do away with for the people who most need it. Of course, anybody can ride it, but it’s going to help connect to the SunRail and other areas which will be beneficial to the community overall.”
They also asked the public to be patient as they notify them about changes to the transit system and start to use a new service.
“I’m sure, you know, people will find things to complain about, but they’re not going to be standing out for an hour at a bus stop in 100-degree weather waiting for a bus that may be late,” said Lockhart. “To be able to sit in their home or at their place of work in the air conditioning and wait for a ride that they call, you know, ‘yes, call me.’”
In the coming months, county staff will continue to work with Freebee on customizing their options in Seminole County and they will finalize fares. They are hoping the new rideshare service will be operating in October.
Cities like Mount Dora and Kissimmee already have contracts with Freebee and provide service on a smaller scale. Our News 6 team spoke with Craig Holland, the development service director for Kissimmee, to see how it has been working there.
[See News 6 videos on FreeBee service in Mount Dora and Kissimmee below]
“They provide us with four vehicles, three Teslas and a handicap accessible minivan, and we provide service Monday through Friday, 6 a.m. to 9 p.m., which corresponds with SunRail,” said Holland. “Because the primary reason we have Freebee is to get people back and forth to the SunRail station.”
Holland says Kissimmee pays Freebee around $400,000 annually, and that cost increases about 2% each year. They’ve used the service for two years now and have about 2,186 riders each month.
Holland says it’s a big jump from roughly 1,500 riders during the last calendar year.
“We’re looking for a big jump in ridership again, which is great,” said Holland. “The more people that ride it, the more economical it becomes for the city because you divide that overall cost by the number of people that ride it, and it goes down per ride.”
Holland says every six months they have the option to review the Freebee service, see where people are going and how long it’s taking, and make adjustments.
“We’ve already adjusted the boundary. We’ve added a second outer circle to our boundary and that way we provide the service to a lot more people, so it’s very flexible. And with it not being a fixed route system, it actually allows us to be super flexible in the service.”
He calls it a “big improvement” over the bus system.
“The biggest reason that kind of fell apart was COVID,” said Holland. “We had a 12-person van, and it was like, ‘Oh, look, the van’s full.’ But then when you get a 60 ft. Bus, 40 passenger bus, it looks practically empty. It just didn’t work, so this works much better.”
News 6 reporter Catherine Silver asked Holland who typically uses the Freebee service.
“It’s a little bit of everybody. We have people that get off the train and go to work. We have people that take it to the train to go to work or to just go to downtown Orlando or one of the other stations. We have people that take it to go to the store. We have some children that take it to school every day that live in the district,” said Holland. “I live downtown. I’ve taken it to work when it’s rained really hard and I didn’t really want to drive and it was really easy to use.”
Holland says enough people are using it now, that the city knows they rely on it. He calls it a success.
“We are probably unique to the Freebee customer base because a lot of places use it for tourism, and you know Kissimmee is a little bit off the tourism path,” said Holland. “It’s really meant to be the last mile service for SunRail, and then the supplemental service of helping people get where they need to go. So, it’s a little bit different here, but you know, it’s a great service.”