Senior Transportation in Maryland: Rides for Seniors (2026)

Senior transportation in Maryland isn't one program, it's several. When an older adult stops driving, the hard part isn't that rides don't exist; it's knowing which of Maryland's separate systems fits the trip in front of you. The state aging network offers rides through the Older Americans Act, reached through Maryland Access Point and your local Area Agency on Aging.1 Public transit must offer door-to-door paratransit to riders who can't use the bus, Maryland Medicaid covers medical rides for the people it insures, and a volunteer and private layer fills the gaps.2,3 Which door you use depends on who the rider is and where they're going.

In This Guide

• Key Takeaways
• Why Maryland Has No Single Senior Transportation Program
• Start Here: Maryland Access Point and the Aging Network
• ADA Paratransit: MTA Mobility and Your Local Transit Agency
• Medical Trips: Maryland Medicaid, and Why Medicare Usually Won't
• Statewide, Senior-Center, and Volunteer Rides
• Which Maryland Senior Transportation Option Fits Which Trip
• How to Start: One Phone Call
• Frequently Asked Questions
• Learn More

Why Maryland Has No Single Senior Transportation Program

Families go looking for "the Maryland senior ride program" and can't find it, because it isn't one thing. What Maryland has instead is a set of separate systems, each with its own rules, its own paperwork, and its own idea of who it's for. One is built around age, one around disability, one around who insures your parent's health care, and one around whoever in the community is willing to drive.

From the outside that looks like a maze. But it resolves into a simple question you can answer trip by trip: who is the rider, and where are they going? A ride to dialysis for someone on Maryland Medicaid runs through a different door than a ride to the grocery store for a 72-year-old in Baltimore County who just let their license lapse. The rest of this guide walks the Maryland menu one option at a time, then lines them up so you can match the option to the trip.

Start Here: Maryland Access Point and the Aging Network

Start with the aging network, because it's the widest door and the one most families don't know to use. In Maryland the entry point has a name: Maryland Access Point (MAP), the state's No Wrong Door Aging and Disability Resource Center. MAP is the single front door for older adults, people with disabilities, and caregivers who need to find and reach long-term services and supports, transportation among them. It is overseen by the Maryland Department of Aging and delivered primarily through the local Area Agencies on Aging, and you can reach it statewide at 1-844-627-5465 (1-844-MAP-LINK).1

Behind that front door sits the funding that makes rides for older adults a durable program rather than a favor. The Older Americans Act requires that a protected share of each area's funding go to a set of "access services," and transportation is named among them, right alongside information and assistance and case management.4 Two features make this the first call for a Maryland family:

• There's no income test. An Area Agency on Aging and its providers may not means test for a service for which contributions are accepted, and may not turn away an older adult who won't or can't contribute.5 Your parent may be invited to chip in voluntarily, but savings don't disqualify them.
• The age bar is 60, not 65. The Act defines an "older individual" as someone 60 or older, so that's the threshold.6

What the ride actually looks like is local. MAP is delivered through your local Area Agency on Aging, and each one arranges the transportation that fits its community, which might be a dial-a-ride van, a senior-center shuttle, mileage reimbursement, or a volunteer driver. Because the program has a local name, the efficient move is to call MAP and ask what operates where your parent lives, rather than searching for a generic term.

ADA Paratransit: MTA Mobility and Your Local Transit Agency

This is the option families most often don't realize is a legal right. Under the Americans with Disabilities Act, every public transit agency that runs fixed bus or rail routes must also provide complementary paratransit, a door-to-door or curb-to-curb ride, to people whose disability keeps them from using the regular fixed-route service. The service has to be comparable to the fixed-route system it shadows, it generally has to cover trips within three-fourths of a mile of a route during the same days and hours the buses run, and the fare can't be more than twice the regular fare.2

In the Baltimore region, that service has a name: MDOT MTA Mobility (also called MobilityLink), the Maryland Transit Administration's ADA complementary paratransit service. It is a shared-ride, door-to-door service for people who, because of a disability, are functionally unable to get to a bus stop, wait unassisted, or board or ride a bus or train by themselves, and it operates within three-quarters of a mile of any Local route in Baltimore City and in Anne Arundel and Baltimore counties, and within three-quarters of a mile of a Light Rail or Metro Subway station, on the same days and hours as the fixed-route system. To apply, call the MTA Mobility office at 410-764-8181 and request an application; the agency reviews it, often with input from a health professional, before determining eligibility.8

Two things are worth knowing before you apply:

• Eligibility is about function, not age. Qualifying turns on whether a disability prevents fixed-route use, which the transit agency decides through its own application, often with a section a doctor helps complete. Age alone doesn't qualify a rider, and being older doesn't disqualify one.
• It's tied to the bus map. If your parent lives well outside a transit agency's service area, as many rural Maryland residents do, paratransit may not reach them, and the aging-network, statewide, and volunteer options below matter more.

Baltimore's MTA is the state's largest system, but it isn't the only one. Montgomery County, Prince George's County, and others run their own local transit systems, each with its own ADA paratransit service and application. If your parent lives outside the Baltimore area, ask your county's transit office or MAP for the local paratransit service by name.

Medical Trips: Maryland Medicaid, and Why Medicare Usually Won't

When the trip is to a medical appointment, the rules change, and the single most useful thing to know is which program insures your parent.

Maryland Medicaid covers medical rides, because non-emergency medical transportation is a required part of every state's Medicaid program: a state must ensure necessary transportation for its beneficiaries to and from their providers.9 Maryland's twist is in how it delivers that benefit. Rather than one statewide broker, Maryland runs non-emergency medical transportation locally: the Maryland Department of Health funds the local health department in each county to administer the program, with Montgomery County's Department of Transportation running it there instead. The local health department screens each request to confirm the rider's Medicaid eligibility and that transportation is necessary, and the benefit covers Medicaid recipients who have no other way to get to their covered appointments.3

In practice that means the phone number depends on where your parent lives. In Prince George's County, for example, the county health department runs the program at no fee and asks that trips be booked at least 24 hours in advance. If your parent is enrolled in a Maryland Medicaid HealthChoice managed care plan, ask the plan too, since some plans arrange member rides through their own transportation vendor. To find the right number, call your county health department's medical assistance transportation program or ask MAP.

By contrast, Original Medicare does not pay for routine rides. Traditional Medicare does not cover ordinary non-emergency transportation to and from routine appointments; Part B pays for an ambulance only when it is medically necessary and other transport could endanger the patient.7 That surprises families, and it's the source of a lot of unexpected bills. If your parent has a Medicare Advantage plan rather than Original Medicare, check the plan: some Advantage plans add a limited transportation benefit, but it is a plan feature, not something Medicare itself guarantees.

Statewide, Senior-Center, and Volunteer Rides

Underneath the funded programs is the layer that often does the everyday work of getting an older adult to a hair appointment, a place of worship, or the pharmacy.

• A statewide specialized transportation program. According to St. Mary's County, which describes the program, Maryland's Department of Transportation helps fund county transportation for older adults and people with disabilities through the Statewide Specialized Transportation Assistance Program (SSTAP), created for elderly and disabled Marylanders who live too far from public transit routes, with its funds apportioned to the counties and Baltimore City, so what it looks like on the ground depends on your county's transit system.
• Volunteer driver programs. Many Maryland communities run programs where screened volunteers drive older neighbors to appointments, shopping, and errands, often coordinated by a county Department of Aging or a senior center. St. Mary's County, for instance, describes a Senior Rides Program that uses volunteer drivers for seniors who lack other reliable transportation. Availability and cost vary widely by county, so ask MAP or your Area Agency on Aging what operates locally.
• Ride-share, concierge, and community shuttles. App-based ride services, phone-based concierge services built for people who don't use smartphones, and shuttles run by senior centers, retirement communities, or grocery and medical facilities can all fill in for spontaneous or routine trips. These are mostly private and paid out of pocket, but for a parent who can still transfer in and out of a car independently they can be the simplest option for an unplanned trip.

None of this layer is an entitlement, and it's the part that varies most from one Maryland county to the next, which is exactly why MAP, whose job is to know the local map, is the efficient place to ask.

Which Maryland Senior Transportation Option Fits Which Trip

The menu resolves into a matching problem. Line the options up against who the rider is, what the trip is for, and what it costs, and the right door usually picks itself.

Read it as a decision, not a ranking. A Medicaid member going to dialysis starts with the county's Medicaid transportation program. A 68-year-old in Anne Arundel County who just stopped driving and wants to keep getting to the grocery store and church starts with MAP and, if a disability keeps them off the bus, an MTA Mobility application. Most families end up using more than one, one for medical trips and another for everything else.

How to Start: One Phone Call

For everything except the Medicaid medical benefit, the same first call does the sorting. Reach Maryland Access Point at 1-844-627-5465, or nationally through the Eldercare Locator at 1-800-677-1116, which connects you to the Area Agency on Aging serving your parent's address.10 Look it up by the address where your parent lives, not where you live, because the agency is defined by their location.

When you reach MAP, name the actual trips: "My father is 74, lives in Baltimore County, no longer drives, and needs to get to a cardiologist twice a month and to the grocery store weekly." A specific request gets a specific answer: which local programs exist, whether he'd qualify for MTA Mobility, and what each one costs. If your parent is on Maryland Medicaid, also contact their county health department's transportation program or their HealthChoice plan for medical rides, since that benefit runs on a separate track.3

Learn More

Find personalized help arranging transportation for an older adult in Maryland who no longer drives at brevy.com.

The information on Brevy.com is for educational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional legal, financial, or medical advice. Rules vary by state and program and change frequently. Always verify with the relevant agency or a qualified professional. Brevy is not a law firm, financial advisor, or healthcare provider.