By MATTIE WONG
In the wake of 2020, many of us reconsidered our safety and retreated from the public realm. If we had the means, we weighed our options and decided to use individual forms of transportation – automobiles, walking, biking, etc. Many of us are still a little shell-shocked and find it hard to return to public transportation.
There are real – and imagined – issues with safety on public transportation. It’s a Catch-22 where in the retreat from public services, we also retracted the safety we GAVE when entering a public space. We left to keep our bodies safe, and in return, our bodies weren’t a safety to each other anymore. Now all our bodies are a little less safe.
A friend of mine said, ‘Oh, well, I don’t take the bus because I don’t have to.’ It made me wonder if taking the bus really is a ‘have-to’ situation, or why we frame it that way. Below are some reasons to reconsider your stance on the bus, and why riding the bus could be one of the most radical ways to interact with your city.
1) Buses are our most reliable and affordable ADA compliant transportation option. In contrast, biking is for people with a certain amount of mobility that some folks never have or lose due to life circumstances or age. By riding the bus, you are also supporting the safe transport of your neighbor who has some vision loss, or is older and finds it difficult to move about, for example.
2) Riding the bus is its own community. On the bus, you spend time with groups of folks that you might not encounter closely in your day-to-day. This is also your city. It helps to not forget the range of people who all call the Twin Cities home.
3) Riding the bus can be a meditation. Biking and driving both require high amounts of attention, while on the bus, you can sit, listen to music, or break out your knitting. It’s the kind of in-between space, or third space, that we are losing rapidly in our individualized society.
4) You know more about how the city actually works. You can theorize about crime, cars, the economy, immigration, or any other pressing issue, but you don’t actually know much about it until you become more immersed in the public life of a city. One of the best places for that is the bus, especially in a location like ours where outdoor spaces are pretty inhospitable for a good part of the year!
5) You know what you are advocating for. Frustrated that the bus is late? That it takes an hour and half to get somewhere by bus when it is a twenty minute drive? Be frustrated! It makes you a good advocate for better services, which in turn benefits us all. It is no longer up to the people who ‘have to’ take the bus to also be their only advocate.
6) You can challenge your own perceptions. What is more radical than challenging your own thinking? Whether that is about another ethnic group, or even what constitutes public joy. Sidequest: Have you ever caught the Holiday Bus? I have never had my heart swell so much as when sitting on this bus with a bunch of strangers excited to see the joy on the face of another stranger when they unsuspectingly board the Holiday Bus.
7) You can practice active safety. Uncomfortable situations will almost inevitably arise when you spend more time in public. You often have options, and more importantly, you start to practice active safety for yourself and others, rather than the passive safety we are so used to when we retreat from the public realm.
8) You can practice gratitude. Because, the reality of life in the USA is that we have very poor public transportation in lots of places. So instead of ‘having to’ take the bus, we ‘get to’, while other places wish they could.
Ready to consider taking the bus? If you are nervous, make it easier for yourself. Take the bus with a friend. Pick a time of day you feel most comfortable. Have a very exciting event you are taking the bus for to help balance out the anxiety. Start slow. Take the bus once a month. Then see if you can increase that number. Practice is key. Have you had a bad experience? Talk about it with a friend, and ask if they would ride with you next time, or make a safety plan for yourself if that situation arises again.
Because humans are dynamic, the experiences on the bus are as diverse as we all are. Being on the bus puts us together, realizing how we all actually rely on and relate to each other in a way that almost no other public experience can.
Mattie Wong is the editorial layout coordinator for the alley. She has been connected to the Phillips Community for many years through various jobs, projects, and community events.
