It’s a lot harder these days for Celeste Mammoser of Lake Forest. But the 75-year-old who uses a walker and does not drive is still able to meet friends for a weekly bridge game at the Lake Forest-Lake Bluff Senior Center.
Riding to her rescue is a kindly driver and a shiny 1999 Chrysler Concorde, donated last month to the center’s senior car service.
“I think (the service) is wonderful,” Mammoser said on a recent brisk sunny morning as she was chauffeured from her home to the center in the Gorton Community Center on Illinois Street. “It gets me where I want to go. Otherwise, I’d be housebound.”
Mammoser is one of nearly 100 senior citizens from Lake Forest, Lake Bluff and Knollwood who use the car service for medical appointments, visits to area malls, grocery shopping and trips to the beauty shop.
The Monday-Friday service was started six years ago with the donation of a 1993 Chevrolet Caprice to shuttle seniors who could not get to places on their own, said Anne Bolotin, the center’s transportation coordinator.
The car, donated in 1993 by Gordon and Judy Wilson, logged more than 135,000 miles and 20,000 rides before it was retired two weeks ago. Judy Wilson is the center’s assistant director.
A Lake Forest couple, frequent users of the service who asked to remain anonymous, donated the money to buy the new dark green car, which was bought at dealer cost from the Knauz car dealership in Lake Forest, Bolotin said.
The Lake Forest-Lake Bluff program is the only one in Illinois that center officials said they know of that offers the personal, door-to-door service of a car and driver.
“Lots of towns have buses,” Bolotin said. “But buses have routes . . . and have a whole different feeling.”
The center is looking into buying a mini-bus with a wheelchair lift, officials said. The estimated $60,000 bus would seat 14 people and would be paid for with donations, including from the Waud Foundation of Lake Forest.
The center employs seven drivers and has one volunteer driver to pick up seniors who schedule rides, Bolotin said. Seniors need not be members of the center but must live in Lake Forest, Lake Bluff or Knollwood; fares are usually $2 each way, she said.
Driver Ben Wagner, 68, and a retiree from Lake Forest, said on a typical day he has about 18 pickups and drop-offs. His favorite part, he said, is “the people. And I get a sense of doing something good.”
Jan McWilliams, of Lake Forest, has used the service for several years and said “I don’t know what I’d do without it sometimes.” Gertrude Bowman, 101, of Lake Forest and also a frequent user, said “It’s wonderful–that’s all I can say.”
