nothin “Transit Equity” Pushed | New Haven Independent

Transit Equity” Pushed

Allan Appel Photo

On her 107th birthday the spirit of the late civil rights hero Rosa Parks had a commemorative seat on a New Haven/CT Transit bus and took a spin around the Green

The memory of the activist whose refusal to sit in the back of a city bus helped spark the civil rights movement was invoked to make the point that in the third decade of the 21st century, the issue is no longer where you get a seat on a bus — but whether the bus takes you where you need to go.

That argument — that transit rights are civil rights, tied to job and educational and economic opportunity — formed the heart of an event Tuesday marking Transit Equity Day in New Haven.

About 40 people gathered on the Green for New Haven’s version of a national event to put pressure on legislators who, in the case of Connecticut, are about to vote on Gov. Ned Lamont’s transportation funding package.

Speaker after speaker, including Mayor Justin Elicker, who made a brief appearance before heading to Hartford (in an electric vehicle), addressed the intersectionality” of the issue of equal access to public transit and how it promotes a healthier, more democratic city.

I’m a bike rider, a bus rider, and I drive. In each I interact with other people. The least interactive is in the car. The most is on bus and bike. That’s better for the city,” Elicker said.

New Haven State Rep. Roland Lemar, who co-chairs the the legislature’s Transportation Committee, recently said on WNHH FM’s Dateline New Haven” program that he is committed this year to land New Haven $23 million to fix our broken bus system, and other improvements for cycling and pedestrian safety.

Event organizer Melinda Tuhus read aloud a note of support that Lemar, derailed in Hartford by legislative business, had sent.

Disability rights activist Elaine Kolb and Hamden legislator and cyclist Justin Farmer arrive at the Green

It’s not about getting a seat on the bus,” said Dottie Green, a civil rights activist who works on preserving Rosa Parks’s legacy. It’s where that bus takes you.”

She pronounced unjust a state bus system that makes it difficult, if not impossible, for car-less families of incarcerated people to visit their relatives in small towns around the state that have no transit connections. Transit equity means being able to go where you need and want to go,” she said.

If you’re like me, you get a little nauseous when you hear a deadly crash involving a pedestrian or cyclist referred to as an accident,’” said Elm City Cycling’s Aaron Goode.

I’m here to tell you that from a … transit equity perspective there is no such thing as an accident. Every cyclist or pedestrian death is a preventable tragedy, through better infrastructure, better education, and better enforcement … Five pedestrians slaughtered in one month last summer? Not an accident!”

Goode called for implementation of the city’s Safe Streets program along with vigorous enforcement that’s about taking dangerous and distracted driving recidivists off the road. Zero tolerance for drunk driving and zero tolerance for distracted driving.”

Hamden Legislative Council member Justin Farmer said he bikes from ten to 15 miles a day to get to meetings and see constituents.

I’m concerned about the last mile,” he said. That is, how he makes connections, for example to the train. Amtrak doesn’t allow bikes on rush hour [trains] on the Hartford line,” he said. He bemoaned that he often finds himself at a bus connection where the bike rack is full.

Ben Martin, of 350 CT, said he trained into New Haven for Tuesday morning’s rally. Now he had to wait three hours to get the next train back to Wallingford.

What’s important to know is that the state’s transit plan doesn’t highlight trains, but highways and airports. Gov. Lamont and the legislature need to do a better job supporting transit, in words and deeds. Keep riding!” he charged.

I might be the only person here who has been arrested trying to get on a bus,” said disability activist Elaine Kolb. Those arrests, she said later, occurred not in New Haven but in Washington D.C. and San Francisco.

Civil rights includes people with disabilities getting on the bus. We do not want charity,” she declared and then led the crowd in a song of her own composing. The refrain: We will ride with the strength of truth and justice on our side.”

After the rally concluded, Kolb was one of a dozen people who boarded a specially commissioned CT Transit bus for a brief ride around the Green and the downtown area. During the ride Kolb and Farmer swapped stories about the special challenges of people with disabilities on public transit.

Others were more pensive as they sat surrounding Rosa Parks’ seat, empty except for a long-stemmed white flower, wondering if this is indeed the year when, instead of speeches, city residents will see more dedicated bus lanes and hubs, more sensible routes and schedules, better and more frequent service.

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