Another small step

Last week i was surprised to see this little line in the minutes from the most recent PAC 2 (Partners Against Crime - District 2) meeting:

"Question of whom to call for having a covered shelter installed at a Bus Stop. This is Durham One call – 560-1200."

I've occasionally posted pictures of some of Durham's neglected bus stops, and Lord knows there's a lot of them.
Somewhere between 80 and 90% of all the bus stops in Durham lack shelters or benches. Partially because it's convenient, but also because they are fairly well used and both unsafe and unsightly, i've kind of adopted the bus stops in the 1800 block of Avondale Drive.

Seriously? This is all you need to do to get a covered shelter installed at a bus stop?

I'm going to try this out immediately for the bus stops on Avondale Drive and let everyone know how it works.

That's what i posted back to the PAC2 list. I called One-Call and requested bus shelters for the Avondale Drive bus stops on Friday. I didn't get a tracking number for the request, because the operator wasn't sure how to process it, bu i expect to hear back soon, because of this announcement by Councilman Woodard to the last on Monday night:

I'm pleased to report that the City will [use] ARRA (stimulus) funds to provide 20 new bus shelters with solar lights, 20 new bus benches, and more trash cans at bus stops. I don't have the exact locations right now.

None of the elaborate plans for light rail and other mass transit will work until we enhance our bus service and make it transportation of choice, not just chance. Some of us--elected and appointed officials--are working hard to make that happen.

Twenty's a small step in the right direction; and since we can't count on stimulus funds every year, we're going to need to figure out another source of funding to move this project along in subsequent years. But the notion that we need to make bus service the "transportation of choice, not just chance" is especially welcome.