Fight for your Ride

In their search for a second HQ site, Amazon’s essential requirement for high-quality transit was, in the words of Laura Bliss at The Atlantic, “a come to Jesus moment for cities where high-quality service has long been an afterthought.” In many regions, the public transportation service just isn’t up to the task, offering infrequent, slow service and poor access to job centers or critical destinations—turning away potential riders and punishing those who must rely on transit.

But long before Amazon’s kick in the pants last year, scores of community leaders, business leaders, local elected officials, and grassroots advocates have been looking for ways to change the status quo. Many are eager to improve their local transit systems to speed up commutes, expand access to jobs and opportunities, attract and retain businesses and talent, and grow their economies.

This Transportation for America guidebook, Fight For Your Ride: An advocate’s guide for improving & expanding transit, offers local advocates and transit champions practical advice for making real improvements to public transit. Drawing examples from successful campaigns and reform efforts in small, medium, and large cities across the country, the guide illuminates effective ways to speed up transit, expand its reach, and improve service for riders. It offers tactical lessons on building a coalition, developing an effective message, and organizing a campaign for better transit in your community.

Kickoff webinar

We held a webinar to mark the release of this useful guide. Hear from Karen Rindge, Executive Director of WakeUP Wake County, on how a broad coalition led a campaign to pass long-awaited new funding to expand transit there in Wake County, NC, part of the Raleigh-Durham metro area. And hear from Christof Spieler, who, through his tireless advocacy as an everyday rider, became a board member for Houston METRO and led the effort to reimagine and redraw METRO’s network of bus routes to provide faster, more convenient bus service to more riders. In addition, we walked through the new guidebook and described how you can use the guide’s case studies to shape your own successful campaigns.

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