Gas prices put free bar shuttle in jeopardy

This is an updated version of a story posted August 15, 2008.  The article has been updated to reflect a correction to taxi driver John Dowell's phone number.

BARSTOW — Many bar regulars rely on the Hooz on First Sports Bar shuttle to get them home safe and DUI-free at the end of the night. But the community service almost became a casualty of high gas prices.

Volunteer drivers have been shuttling tipsy customers home for the past three and a half years, working entirely for tips, said Hooz owner Phil Harris. Between 5 p.m. and 1 a.m. each night, drivers pick customers up at home in an 1980s-era brown-and-cream colored Mercury Grand Marquis and take them back at the end of the evening, free of charge. On occasion, one driver will take the patron in the shuttle while another drives the customer’s vehicle home.

Harris finances the shuttle out of pocket, but in recent months, skyrocketing gas prices and slow business had him contemplating shutting the service down. The bar owner estimated that he spent $900 on gas and $600 on repairs in the past couple of months.

“I was thinking about shutting it down because it was so expensive, with gas prices and mechanical prices,” he said.

When he told the drivers, they offered to pitch in some of their tip money to support the service. Business began picking up again in recent weeks, and Harris decided to keep the shuttle running, for now.

The first time Harris attempted to run a shuttle service at the bar, about 18 years ago, the service quickly folded from lack of use. Drunk driving enforcement was more lenient in those days, and bar patrons saw no point in taking a shuttle, he said. When he started the shuttle again in 2005, the public was slow to catch on, but the service is gaining in popularity.

“It’s been an uphill battle, but people are starting to use it now,” he said.

As laws have gotten tougher and police have begun to crack down more on drunk driving, people are starting to think twice about drinking and driving. Harris, who has been arrested for driving drunk himself, said his own experiences and the experiences of friends and family give him an added incentive to keep the shuttle running, to help others avoid the same situation.

The three volunteer drivers, all of whom have day jobs, said they see the shuttle as part community service, part supplemental income. On a good night, the volunteer drivers said they might give rides to 20 customers and take home about $200 in tips.

“Mostly, I just think it’s a really nice thing Phil’s doing for the community,” driver Jessica Barton said.

The Hooz staff act as emissaries for the shuttle, going as far as to take a reluctant biker’s keys and lock his motorcycle up in the bar for the night while the drivers take him home.

“No one wants to hurt someone or get in an accident when they’re driving, but once it happens, you can’t take it back,” said driver JoAnn Stalnaker, who also works as a bartender.

Bar regular Robert Porter said he takes the shuttle a couple of times a week. He remembered frequenting one other bar in Lake Elsinore that would give patrons rides home, but never one that would provide a free full-service shuttle service to and from the customer’s home.

“It’s a good thing,” he said. “It’s a real good thing. I love it.”

Mollie’s Pub assistant manager Michelle Sandoval said to her knowledge, Hooz is the only bar in town that offers customers a free ride home. Mollie’s had a driver who briefly provided a similar shuttle service, but the program didn’t last, she said.

Although the Barstow Police Department has no formal arrangement with the bar, city spokesman John Rader said the city and police appreciate the service Harris provides to the community and believes that it does help keep drunk drivers off the road.

For the time being, Harris said he plans to keep the shuttle running. To ask for a ride, call 760-590-0993 between 5 p.m. and 1 a.m.

Contact the writer:
(760) 256-4123 or abby_sewell@link.freedom.com

The cab is back in town

After more than a year without taxi service, Barstow has a new cab in town. John Dowell, with the Bell Cab company out of San Bernardino, began driving a single cab in Barstow on evenings and weekends a few weeks ago.

Dowell said he is the only driver operating in Barstow. He runs a wheelchair-accessible van week nights, starting at 6 p.m. and throughout the weekend, from Friday night to Sunday morning.

Dowell said the business has been slow, with about three or four calls on a typical night.

“I’m just starting out,” he said. “It’s increasing little by little.”

City spokesman John Rader said the city approved a business license for the cab company in the October 2007, but it took almost a year to find a driver who could be approved by the City Council and Barstow Police Department. The last cab service in town, Yellow Cab of Victor Valley, closed up shop in March of 2007, Rader said.

For more information on the cab service, call John Dowell at 760-684-9949, or call Bell Cab directly at 1-800-340-8294.