To black activists, transportation justice matters

In a statement, CTA spokesman Jeff Tolman said that if a child who looks to be of elementary age doesn’t have a student fare card or ID with them, the bus driver or customer assistant can let them pay the reduced fare, but he indicated that teens who lack these items are required to pay full price.

However, Tolman also said that there haven’t been enough reported incidents of teens trying get the discount without the proper fare card or ID to suggest that this is a routine problem.

Still, Ware argues that this issue could be avoided if the CTA just gave free fare to CPS students. The cost of transit can be significant for these students, Ware says. Even the reduced CPS fare can total a few hundred dollars a school year, and it’s not uncommon for students to ask him to tap his Ventra card to get them into the system, he says.

“It could have a lot of impact if the city just gave every CPS student free fare,” he says. “Students who are pinching pennies for the CTA might [also] have problems paying for uniforms and school supplies.”

Along with problems with el and bus service, many residents of lower-income communities have little or no access to bike lanes, paths, and bike share, even with Divvy’s recent south- and west-side expansion.

“There’s not as many [bike-share] stations in black and Latino neighborhoods,” Ware says. However, he praises the city’s Divvy for Everyone equity initiative, which offers $5 annual memberships to individuals making less than $35,310 a year, saying, “We need more programs like that.”

On the other hand, Ware says, poor and working-class residents may view new bike lanes and transit stations in their neighborhoods as harbingers of gentrification that could force them from their homes. For example, he notes that the $203 million revamp of the Wilson Red Line stop will make economically diverse Uptown more attractive to higher-income folks who want easy rail access to their downtown offices.

Carruthers argues that it’s important for the city make sure that black and brown communities are on board before reconfiguring streets to make room for bike lanes.

“You have to ask, who wanted the bike lane—was it the neighborhood or just city officials making plans for newcomers?” she says. “Black people ride bikes too. But bike lanes, like new coffee shops, can be seen as markers of gentrification, so I think people have a right to be concerned.”

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