Want better transit? Get people on the bus, literally!
Organizing pro-transit events is key to winning hearts & minds.
SEP 18, 2023
It’s no secret that I want more people to take transit. A world in which people can easily & joyously choose riding transit rather than driving a car is a greener, richer, more just and more dynamic world. Part of tipping the scale towards transit is winning the political fights for funding & infrastructure changes that make transit abundant and easy. Another part is winning the hearts and minds of potential transit riders. While winning hearts and minds doesn’t involve the ballot box, it is still deeply political, so let’s dig into how you can do it to support transit in your region.
Step 0) Understand that you aren’t your audience. I’ve said this before, and I’ll say it again. You are NOT your audience which means you should examine your assumptions about what “everyone” knows when it comes to transit. Start with a new baseline assumption that people do not know where their transit stop is, where the bus line goes, how to look up the directions & timing, what destinations it serves, how much it costs, how long it’ll take to get there, and how to use it. Start from there and your communications and plans will be much more inclusive and accessible. Sure, there will be some people who already know all of that stuff, but the goal is to grow the base of users, so you need to communicate to the people who aren’t users yet!
Step 1) Create a reason to take a transit trip. As French aviator and author of “The Little Prince,” Antoine de Saint-Exupéry said, “If you want to build a ship, don't drum up the men to gather wood, divide the work, and give orders. Instead, teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea.” If you want people to demand easy and abundant transit, teach them to yearn for the destination and to yearn for getting there by transit. To that end, as part of Bay Area Transit Month, last weekend I partnered with the Rosie the Riveter Visitor Center and the San Francisco Bay Ferry to host the inaugural “Rosie Ride: A Riveting Ferry Adventure.” Over 75 people came and took the ferry from San Francisco to Richmond to tour the Visitor Center and then ferried home.
For most people it was their first ferry ride to Richmond. For several, it was their first trip to Richmond ever, and for others it was their first ferry ride period. But after having a blast taking the ferry to learn about this iconic part of American and Feminist history, many of these Rosie Riders are sure to come back with friends and spread the word. Who knows how many hundred or potentially thousands of future Rosie Riders there will be. Each one helps fund the ferry with each trip and becomes that much more pro-transit.
Step 2) Make it easy and provide support. Maps and timetables exist and in theory anyone could piece together whatever transit journey you plan out. But for whatever reason, they aren’t doing it yet. That’s the gap you are stepping into. Don’t just publish an itinerary, host an event and make it easy and fun for people to join in. People experience bumps along the way with any journey, be there to help smooth out whatever bumps come up. The goal isn’t just for people to take the trip – it’s for them to have a great time doing it!
This is more work than just publishing an itinerary, but you get much better results. Afterall, you could give me all the ingredients, equipment and a recipe needed to make an eclair – but if you want a great one and for me to enjoy the experience, I’d like to have a trained chef walk me through the process!
Step 3) Institutionalize it. Now that you’ve done it once, try to get it adopted into an institution or organization so that it perpetuates. Maybe it lives with the relevant transit agency, or the destination, or another local group like a tourism board or relevant non-profit. Or maybe you host the adventure on a regular basis. See what works for your situation. You just put together a gift of riders, visitors, publicity and revenue for all the parties involved, help them incorporate it into their existing promotional work and it’ll likely live on.
Step 4) Directly politicize it. Congrats – you’ve successfully created Transit Joy and built more cultural power for transit. Much like with Bike Joy, cultural power doesn’t inherently translate into political power. You need to make that connection yourself. You can do that by any number of ways, but the simplest is by inviting elected officials to speak at your event and/or getting attendees to voice their support of transit to elected officials.
Want help improving your skills and strategies for winning bike, transit, or pedestrian safety improvements in your community, let me know! I provide 1-on-1 training sessions and group workshops. Let’s talk. Email me at Carter@carterlavin.com to set something up.