Whats happening at TRIP

Things continue to be busy in the office with increasing demand for all of our disabled transport and services for the older person & the rurally isolated of any age.

TRIP is looking to offer a whole new range of services for people in the area- more news coming soon.

Developments and dreams for 2011.

Meeting room now available for local groups and clubs to use at a nominal charge.

New minibus now on order- this will enable us to further expand our range of services and destinations.

Fancy a weekend away? We are considering offering some longer trips away, departing on a Friday morning and staying away until Sunday afternoon. If you are interested in this then please contact the office- we would also welcome suggestions for places to visit.

Befriending Project for the Honiton area: One of our new projects is now in its early stages.We have now set up a management group, have recruited some volunteers and are about to commence their training (thanks to EDVSA for their help with that). We are hoping that the actual service will be in place and helping people within the community within the next month- please contact us if you need help or have time to volunteer as a befriender- no major time commitment is required.

Lunch Club: our Stage 2 plan- our aim (once the befriending project is up and running) is to develop a coffee club or lunch club centred on Honiton to give additional support for people using our befriending service and giving social opportunities for any isolated people in the area.

Centre: the third stage of the plan is to try to open and operate a centre for all sorts of community activities and classes. This is an ambition that could take several years to establish- funding being a major issue plus finding a suitable venue. Once operating we hope to also work with village halls through the area to take people from Honiton out there and bring people in to town as well.

Ring & Ride expansion: We are launching a major fund raising effort to acquire a new minibus- we currently have raised over £21000 towards the £46,000 target and have committed to cover some of the outstanding amount from our reserves. The aim is to then run 3 minibuses on a regular basis with a fourth vehicle as breakdown and emergency cover plus covering busy periods. We currently run 3 vehicles and are often struggling to cope with demand for group hire for days out.

Fund Raising- the above projects both need substantial efforts towards funding. Local donations have continued to be made and we are applying to local & national funding groups to enable the projects to take place. We are also holding local events to help raise funds and awareness of services offered. We are holding a horse race night in November 2011- more details avaliable soon.

2010 saw record demand for our Voluntary Car Services with Honiton reaching levels not matched for 7 years and Seaton reaching the highest figures in its history.

December 2010 saw entertaining times for all our services with the bad weather causing difficulties for our buses and voluntary car drivers. Some services and appointments had to be cancelled and buses dug out from the snow.

The Ring & Ride ran an extra service between Christmas & New Year in response to the demand- many people hadn't been able to get out before Christmas due to the snow so were running low on supplies so TRIP sprang (or slid) to the rescue.

The Community minibuses have been very busy over the summer, enabling many local groups of people to get out and enjoy what sunshine we had.

Demand continues to grow for transport to health appointments, both within the local area and for journeys elsewhere. Autumn 2010 saw the busiest month on record for the Seaton service, and both Honiton & Seaton user numbers are up on 2009.

Sales of aids for daily living continue to grow rapidly. We have expanded the range of items in stock (the office is now even more crowded) and more locals are able to resolve problems without having to travel out of town.

Honiton Ring & Ride is 20 this year!!! TRIP will be taking part in the Charter day Celebrations and linking this with our 20th Anniversary, come along, see the display and take part in our competition on 24th July on the All Hallows Field.

March 2010 brought a new Ring & Ride Community Bus to serve in Honiton & East Devon. The 5 year old vehicle will be used instead of the current 13 year old second bus to offer a more comfortable and user friendly service to our users. The newer vehicle has been funded through local contributions and donations, including substantial help from the Honiton Hospital League of Friends. All our vehicles are available for eligible groups to hire when they are not in use on Ring & Ride duties. The older vehicle will be used as a reserve bus and help out when when need the extra capacity.

Pictured left is a local group taking advantage of one of our Community buses for an outing to the Motor Museum.

January 2010 Snow in the area caused some journeys to be cancelled but we were able to run trips on some days. The Wednesday Dunkeswell trip caused some minor problems but at least we got people out- for some people it was the first time in two weeks!

OLD NEWS.....

Fashion Show was a great success- a good time was had by all on the 1st of December when over 100 people attended the show held at the Macarnes Hall. Over £800 was raised towards our funds.

September and October 2009- busiest months ever for Seaton Voluntary Car Service!

November 2009: Extra donations received towards our fundraising efforts towards updating our older Mercedes Ring & Ride minibus- still have a way to go though...

Important changes working well for the Ring & Ride:

From February 2009 TRIP has used its own vehicles to provide Ring & Ride services in our area. The benefits are being felt with a substantial reduction in running costs and vehicles that are more pleasant to drive. They are also more readily available to local community groups for their own use.

Seaton Accessible vehicle getting busier. The new vehicle is available to frail, elderly and disabled people throughout the area covering Axminster, Colyton, Lyme Regis, Seaton and the areas between. For more information please look at the Seaton Disabled Transport page.

For pictures of recent outings click here.

Feb 2009 Snow caused the Ring & Ride bus to get caught up in traffic problems-

The February 2009 snowstorms ended up giving a party of people from Awliscombe some problems when they were caught up in the road closures on the A38 when returning from an evening trip to Plymouth. After sitting in the queues for a while they were diverted via Teignmouth and Dawlish and eventually reached home around 3.00am. To the left is a picture of the bus outside Teignmouth Tesco- who kindly let the passengers use their facilities.

April 2009: Our fund raising campaign to update our older minibus received a major boost in April with a substantial donation towards our £45000 target.

Sunday 19th April saw the weather co-operating for our trip to Lanhydrock. Two minibuses arrived for 11.30 and everyone enjoyed the beautiful gardens and house. To see more pictures of the day out click here

Skittles Night on 25th April: over 30 people turned up to take part in the evening. Highest scorer on the night was Paul Gadd who won the event AND the play-off. Over £150 was raised towards TRIP funds. Many thanks to all the businesses in Honiton who helped us by donating prizes for the draw.

June 24th 2009 saw even larger numbers than last year attend our AGM, we had many of our volunteers attending as well as representatives from Devon County Council, Honiton Town Council, Help the Aged, Honiton Hospital and members of the public.

Saturday 19th September saw the Bingo night take place- a reasonable number of people enjoyed the evening and asked for more to be arranged- see below for dates.

2 buses now scheduled for the trip to Bath Christmas Market on 29th November.

In September 2009 the Seaton Voluntary Car Service saw its busiest month ever and demand continues to grow. Honiton Voluntary Cars Service also is very busy with general demand and coping with the seasonal rush for flu jabs. Lyme Regis Volunteers are coping with demand but have already provided more journeys in 2009 than last year- numbers have almost doubled!

Forthcoming Events:

New Ring & Ride journey lists for local trips and weekend passenger club journeys now available- Ring the TRIP office to get your copy if not already received.