The Appointment Is in Belfast. The Road Is Everybody’s Problem.

The letter says Belfast. The bus timetable has other ideas.

Around Newry, a hospital appointment can begin with a second problem: getting out of a rural driveway and all the way to the clinic. Craigavon or Dungannon might be on the letter instead. The distance still has to be crossed, and the appointment clock is not interested in excuses.

So Bolster Community’s Home2Hospital volunteers bring car keys. Its drivers logged 557 hospital journeys and 52,357 miles in 2025–26, according to the group. That is a lot of road for a local outfit. The engine does not run on goodwill, though goodwill seems to spend plenty of time behind the wheel.

A letter is not a lift

The service takes people aged 60 and over from Slieve Gullion, the Mournes and now Crotlieve to out-of-area appointments. Bolster says public transport is not a workable option for many of its rural users, some of whom live alone. Local reporting on 20 September says some Crotlieve residents had missed important appointments because of transport. It does not establish how many, or what happened next. Their medical stories are theirs. The missing link between home and hospital is public business.

Newry, Mourne and Down District Council did make a practical choice. In March it agreed to keep supporting the service in the first two areas and pilot Crotlieve from September 2026 to March 2027. Credit where it is due. Yet a pilot is also a clock ticking on a need that will not politely pack up when March ends. What evidence will secure the next journey?

The people doing the miles

The names on the road are not abstractions. Local coverage identifies driver Geraldine McCullagh and coordinator Paula McCracken. Bolster calls volunteers the backbone of Home2Hospital. No cape in the boot. A working car, a reliable person and a bit of conversation on the way: ordinary things, until you need them and they are not there.

There is a quiet lesson in the odometer. Systems like to measure the appointment. Somebody else measures the miles. Around Newry, those somebody elses have names. The council has put money behind the work; it should use the pilot to show what lasting access would take.

One useful turn

If you are local and can give time, ask Bolster about driving. If you or an older neighbour may need a lift, check the service and eligibility with Bolster. Its official support page lets you help directly; The Rose Mission holds none of it. You can also ask the council how it will judge the pilot and plan beyond March. That is a useful question to keep asking, without making an older person answer it from a missed appointment.

I’ll leave you today with a line from Leonard Cohen, ‘Anthem’:

“Ring the bells that still can ring.”