Roger Colehower waits for the light to turn green. He’s on his way to get groceries. He has no other choice but to walk across a busy intersection.

A truck tears through the light on Litchfield’s main arterial road.

The light turns green, and a walk-assist sound alerts Colehower that it’s safe to cross.

The 55-year-old only has his white mobility cane to tell what’s directly in front of him. Colehower strides forward just as a car whizs by, narrowly avoiding the resident.

“It’s dangerous crossing Camelback for anyone, let alone a blind person,” said Matthew Williams, Litchfield Park’s city manager.

Williams worked to slow truck traffic on the road before the state Legislature shut it down with a law preventing cities from restricting traffic on major roads like Camelback.

Through grassroots efforts, Colehower worked with Williams and the city of Litchfield Park to find solutions for the traffic problems hindering resident mobility, amid unprecedented population and developmental growth in the region.

Demanding more

In 2021, Colehower moved to Litchfield Park to be closer and support his retired parents. He lost 85% of his vision to a rare disease in 2016 and wasn’t satisfied relying on his family for large amounts of money  for transportation or to leave his house.

He can’t use ride-hailing apps like Uber or Lyft – the lighting needs to be perfect for him to see the screen. Unable to drive, Colehower’s sister or elderly father usually took him to work at Agua Fria High School.

Colehower believes he and other Litchfield Park residents deserve an independent means of transportation, a means for dignity.

“There are people who need help that won’t speak up,” he said.

He knows others need a service like this but are just resigned to the fact of being limited. Colehower did some research and found Valley Metro offered a service called RideChoice. The transit service costs $3 per trip, up to eight miles, for people with disabilities and those over the age of 65.

According to Colehower, the city was unaware people needed a service to connect them and there were people in the city who didn’t know how to ask.

Colehower approached Valley Metro in February, looking to get registered and use their disability services, which would make it safer for him to travel. There was just one issue, the Valley Metro employee told him there was no service in his area.

The employee pointed to a map of the entire Valley with a white, stamp-sized area that didn’t offer services for people with disabilities, that stamp was Litchfield Park.

“Is that legal?” he asked.

Breaking the camel’s back

Colehower went home and called Williams. It was in fact, legal and Williams told Colehower that Litchfield Park hadn’t had a need for any transit services in over two decades.

“I know the population around here, they’re old. A lot has changed since the '90s. There are plenty of people in wheelchairs who would use this service,” Colehower said.

Over two-tenths of the nearly 7000 Litchfield Park residents are over the age of 65, according to the census. Since 1990, the population has more than doubled. Furthermore, Maricopa County gained the most people in the nation in the two years following 2020, according to 2023 and 2022 U.S. Census Bureau reports.

Conversations went back and forth between Colehower and the city manager for months. Williams planned to reach out to churches and do an online survey to ask if this service was needed.

 “Matt, I’m legally blind and I don’t go to church,” Colehower recalled. “How would I know about the poll? You’re the only town in the Valley that I know of that doesn’t have this service. I know Surprise has it, I know Goodyear has it, I know Avondale has it, I know Glendale has it.”

 “Do you really want people with disabilities crossing Camelback to go to the grocery store?” Colehower asked.

That was the straw that broke the camel’s back for Williams.

In May, the city manager invited Thomas Young from the Valley Metro Accessibility Advisory Group to present RideChoice to the city council for a vote.

“I know another gentleman that’s blind that’s crossing Camelback, that’s all I’m gonna say,” Williams said during the council meeting before the vote. The name of the busy road was enough to convince the council, amid a battle with the state and interest groups to slow traffic on the busy road.

Seven Litchfield Park council members voted unanimously to give seniors and people with disabilities the ability to travel independently for a significantly reduced cost.

Colehower was in attendance, it was the first time Williams had seen him in person after months of phone calls beginning in February.

“He (Colehower) was one of the reasons that we added the service,” Williams said.

“I’m really proud of our community that this is a possibility to offer this,” Ann Donahue, Litchfield Park Council Member, said at the meeting.

According to Williams, four to six people use RideChoice monthly, which is what the city expected when the service was implemented. However, he said these few people each use the service upwards of ten times a month.

“That’s four to six people whose lives have been positively impacted significantly,” Colehower said.

Colehower has gratitude toward the city of Litchfield Park and Matthew Williams for the quick time it took them to put this service in place since he first called to ask about it.

 The option to travel safely and independently isn’t always a luxury for everyone. “That’s the beauty of RideChoice for me,” Colehower said.