Published: Aug 11, 2024
The City of Chandler’s popular micro transit service, Flex, is expanding thanks to a $1 million grant from Congressman Greg Stanton’s office.
The two new additional coverage areas will be a 2.5 square miles north of Chandler Boulevard to Ray Road and a 2—square-mile area east of Arizona Avenue to McQueen Road between Queen Creek and Chandler Heights roads.
Jason Crampton, the city’s transportation planner, said the second area previously had no other transit options. And the first area is a part of the city depends more on public transportation than others.
“Those are actually already in place; they began when the school year started,” Crampton said. “It’s kind of a soft launch. This is our announcement of those expansions.”
Stanton and Mayor Kevin Hartke hailed the expansion at an Aug. 6 press conference.
“As a former mayor, I’ll tell you great communities invest in as many transportation options as possible,” Stanton said. “Good transit planning drives good economic development. Making our community more accessible makes it easier for people to spend their money locally, right here in Chandler.”
The city started its Flex service to serve mostly the Price Road Corridor in South Chandler, where there is no Valley Metro bus service. It operates similar to a ride-sharing service.
Residents can use an app to request a ride and then follow the van’s approach on the app. Students ride free. Others pay a nominal fee.
The city has completed over 75,000 rides since the service began in July 2022. Nearly a third of those rides, 31%, begin or end at a school.
“We found that this micro transit solution has filled a much-needed gap in our transit portfolio for students needing transportation,” Hartke said. “Riders have given a 4.9 out of 5 rating for their Chandler Flex, with 98% of riders saying they would be disappointed if they could not continue to use this service.”
The grant will cover half the cost of the service for up to two years, Hartke said. In addition to Stanton and Hartke, other lawmakers also attended the event.
The grant comes from the Federal Community Project Funds, Stanton said.
Crampton said the city will continue to look for additional funding and expansion options. At one point there were some initial discussions with expanding the service into Gilbert, but Crampton said those talks have stopped.
One wish list item would be expanding it to include the Chandler Airpark area, which the city expects to become the top employment area in the future.
“The Airpark is just not built out yet enough,” Crampton said. “The Airpark could be incorporated if we do expand service to Chandler Gilbert Community College, that could be part of that expansion.”
Hartke demonstrated how easily the app works and then he and Stanton took a ride in a Flex van.
Crampton said one key to expanding the service to more areas of the city will be the fate of Proposition 479, which is the renewal of the half-cent sales tax that pays for most transportation projects in Maricopa County. The proposition is on the Nov. 5 ballot.
“If that does not pass, we’ll have to do quite a bit with all of our transit service, not just Chandler Flex, but everything will be impacted,” he said.