Free the Buses: Riders Say Transit Is a Human Right

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Free the Buses: Riders Say Transit Is a Human Right

Saturday, 25 April 2015 00:00
By Amy Roe, Equal Voice | Report


Mariluz Rangel takes the bus everywhere in Tucson, Arizona: to work, dentist’s appointments, grocery shopping. She’s been a bus rider for 25 years.

Rangel works at Wendy’s, where she makes $8.05 an hour, the state minimum wage. Her income qualifies her to buy a discounted bus pass that gives her unlimited rides for $15 a month.

“When you earn the minimum, it’s hard to afford a car. So it’s better to use the bus,” she said.

Rangel is a member of Tucson Bus Riders Union, one ripple in a wave of grassroots activism based on the belief that affordable public transit should be available to all. By organizing a previously invisible constituency, transit riders unions have emerged as an unlikely source of political power.

The transit movement took off in Los Angeles in the 1990s, when bus riders, most of them Black and Latino, came together to protest what they said was a separate and unequal transit system that penalized riders from low-income neighborhoods. ...............(more)

http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/30426-free-the-buses-riders-say-transit-is-a-human-right

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1. Buses are free here in Chapel Hill, NC

We have possibly the largest bus system with free fares. Almost all the buses within Chapel Hill and Carrboro are free to everyone and have been for more than a decade. A great success.

(The only exceptions are intercity routes to nearby towns and park and ride specials runs for major sporting events. Otherwise, free.)