Don’t Take My Ride!

Helene Mills, a retired auditor, is concerned about how she can continue her busy schedule as a volunteer and activist in her neighborhood. She lives in Sweet Auburn, a historic district in downtown Atlanta where Martin Luther King Jr. grew up. Mills knew King as a child and proudly carries on his tradition of community involvement.

“Everything that happens around here to bring the neighborhood back up, I’m involved,” she says. “Meetings about improving the schools. Neighborhood planning initiatives. The restorative justice board to help young people who have committed felonies.” So active is she in providing Sweet Auburn’s older citizens with activities and care that the facility that hosts the arts and crafts classes, fitness programs, computer training, senior day care and photography lessons bears her name—the Helene Mills Senior Center.

But it’s not age that makes Mills, 82, worry about staying involved in community projects. It’s the end of bus service on the 99 and 113 lines running through her neighborhood. Under cutbacks proposed by the Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority (MARTA), buses would stop seven blocks short of her home, leaving her to walk through a high-crime area to reach a transit stop.

“Except grocery shopping, I go everywhere by bus—church, the doctor, shopping, plays, meetings, volunteering,” says Mills. “If I couldn’t get somebody to drive me, I’d just have to stay home.”

She is also concerned that the Helene Mills Senior Center will lose its bus service. “We have 200 people a day who come, and a good portion of them ride the bus,” she says.

Faced with a shortfall in revenues because of the recession, MARTA drew up plans this spring to slash bus and train service by 25 percent, according to Cheryl King, assistant general manager for planning. Sixty-five bus routes would be scrapped, leaving just 66 left to cover Atlanta and sprawling DeKalb and Fulton counties.

Meanwhile Clayton County, just south of Atlanta and home of Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport, pulled the plug on all public transportation March 31. The system provided 2 million rides last year on buses, and 65 percent of its customers have no regular access to an auto, according to a Clayton County survey.

National cutbacks

The problem isn’t Atlanta’s alone. Fifty-nine percent of U.S. transit agencies have curtailed service or raised fares since January 2009, according to a March survey from the American Public Transit Association (APTA). Last year, St. Louis cut 35 percent of its bus system and reduced the frequency of light rail trains by 20 percent. Colorado Springs, Colo., cut bus service by 55 percent since 2008, ending all weekend and late-evening rides. More cuts are foreseen across the country as local and state governments face wrenching budget problems.

New York, Chicago, Boston and the San Francisco Bay Area, where millions depend on buses and trains every day, are facing particularly acute crises. Next month, New York City is closing down two subway lines and more than 20 bus lines. “San Francisco’s MUNI bus and train system just cut 10 percent of its service despite the fact that they are busting at the seams with riders,” reports Rob Padgette, APTA’s director of policy and research.

Deep transit cuts also come at a time when there are more reasons than ever to diversify the U.S. transportation network beyond automobiles, say transportation experts from a number of organizations. A weak economy wreaks havoc on family budgets, and fears about rising gas prices resurface. An oil spill fouling the Gulf of Mexico, congestion clogging our communities and dependence on foreign oil make the case that the country should be, perhaps, less reliant on vehicles that run on gas.

And then there are the increasing numbers of active Americans seeking driving alternatives as the first boomers turn 65 next year. “For millions of older Americans, public transportation is critical to maintaining independence and quality of life,” says APTA President William Millar. “Our investment in public transportation must grow as the number of older Americans we serve dramatically increases.”