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Operator Name: North Antrim Community Transport Consortium NORTH ANTRIM (NACT) UPDATE OCTOBER 2006
The phrase You cannot change the direction of the wind, but you can adjust your sails has echoed through North Antrim Community Transport this past year.
It has been a year of some change, and some new directions. Frank Nealis, former Director of the Corrymeela Centre, Ballycastle has taken on the role of Transport Project Manager following the departure of Paul Fletcher, who had been with NACT and made an invaluable contribution from the beginning of our journey.
Doreen Keenan became Office Manager and was joined by another new face that of Frances Boyd who as administrator took on a special lead with our work in the Ballymena Borough and our rapidly expanding Social Car Scheme.
With a small fleet of 9 minibuses and 2 people carriers our passenger numbers continued to grow as we exceeded 80,000 trips covering almost 200,000 miles on the way.
Although we have 7 drivers in our staff team, we also have over 300 Midas trained drivers with our 100 member groups, which accounts for a great deal of our success in Providing Transport Solutions for the People in North Antrim (our new mission statement).
Our Social Car Scheme grew with over 300 people becoming members and 16 volunteer drivers covering the length and breadth of the Province, over 60,000 miles in fact this year. This service is a great gift to the many who are now members. As one member said,
Before the car scheme I simply could not travel for my chemotherapy as I was so sick with the long journeys and now I am picked up at my door by a friendly volunteer who not only brings me to the City Hospital and back but waits with me and has become a best friend and great support to me.
There are many highlights in the past year, whether it was creating a Santa sleigh towed by one of our buses and helping Santa visit many local communities in Moyle and raising much needed funds for our partner playgroups, or a haunted movie show and ghost bus tour at Halloween on another bus, there is no doubt that one of our drivers Paul Mullan becoming Midas driver of the year was a special moment. It was a tremendous achievement and lift for all the staff.
It was a great honour for Paul and North Antrim to represent Northern Ireland in the UK finals and while we began to tire of seeing his picture in our local papers on a weekly basis we certainly benefited from the additional profile it created for us. Credit must go to Shauna Haughey and CTA N. Ireland for their organising of this important competition.
This year was also certainly a time of discerning which way the wind was blowing as we set about finalising a new Business Plan.
We are proud to be a part of a thriving and growing community and voluntary sector in North Antrim and look forward to working in new and innovative partnerships as we meet together the challenges of this new funding, political and social era together.
Reflecting back on that opening phrase we wonder in North Antrim if we really worked together might we even be able to change the direction of the wind...? |
