Baltimore Trolley Pictures

We had trains that stopped at every little town and every big city. We had in Baltimore also - streetcars. As Baltimore purchased more land, making it city, more and more streetcars were added by various profitable trolley companies. Though segregation dictated as to where you sat, you could still go anywhere, all private streetcar companies - as long as it was Baltimore City. Real estate developers, with cheap forest and farmland were attempting to sell for profit, and thought streetcar owners would build rails to their properties. So along with them, they thought of outings: places people would like to go to - like amusement parks and beaches. They even built parks - some for beer drinkers, and some for prohibitionist (well before its time) picnic parks. These were all in the suburbs, and only for those they wanted to entice - exclusively for "white" people. One of these racist developers was Roland Thornberry (Roland Park, Lake Roland...) So with not being able to afford an automobile, the free blacks were completely isolated, except to see via a window on a train, to some longer distanced place.

"America has become a suburban nation. As jobs and opportunity migrate to the distant suburbs, where public transit is inadequate or nonexistent, persons without cars are literally left by the side of the road. In the end, all Americans pay for the social isolation and concentrated poverty that ensue from poor planning. This phenomenon is not new ....

In 2000, no other group in the United States was more physically isolated from jobs than blacks. UCLA scholar Michael Stoll’s research reveals that more than 50 percent of blacks would have to relocate to achieve an even distribution of blacks relative to jobs. ....

Suburbs are increasing their share of office space, while central cities see their share declining. ....

Unequal access to transportation alternatives in disasters heightens the vulnerability of the poor, the elderly, the disabled, and people of color. ....

The New Orleans Rapid Transit Authority (RTA) emergency plan designated sixty-four buses and ten lift vans to transport residents to shelters. This “plan” was woefully inadequate since the larger buses only hold about sixty people apiece. ....

Transportation is the second largest annual expense for American families, adding up to more than three times the cost of health care, and exceeded only by housing expenditure. On average, American households devote 19.3 percent of every dollar spent to transportation expenses. ....

Lest anyone dismiss transportation as a tangential issue, consider that Americans spend more on transportation than they do on food or education. Writing in Highway Robbery: Transportation Racism and New Routes to Equity, Congressman John Lewis summed up the challenge that lies ahead: 'Our struggle is not over. The physical signs are gone, but the legacy of "Jim Crow" transportation is still with us.'

The average household spends more than $7,600 annually on basic daily transportation. This is not a small point given the income gap between black and white households. Specifically, the median income of black households is about $29,000, only 58 percent of the median for non-Hispanic white households. ....

Transportation costs range from 17.1 percent in the Northeast to 20.8 percent in the South, where 54 percent of African Americans now reside. The nation’s poorest families spend more than 40 percent of their take home pay on transportation. ....

Most transit system officials have tended to consider low-income and people of color as “captive riders,” and have taken them for granted; instead, they concentrate their fare and service policies on attracting middle-class and affluent riders from their cars. Moreover, transit subsidies have tended to favor investment in suburban transit and expensive new commuter bus and rail lines that disproportionately serve wealthier “discretionary riders.” Almost 40 percent of rural counties in this country have little or no public transportation at all. ....

Transportation is a basic ingredient for quality of life indicators such as health, education, employment, economic development, access to municipal services, residential mobility, and environmental quality. Thus transportation continues to be a civil rights and human rights issue. Improvements in transportation investments and air quality are of special need to low-income families and people of color who are concentrated in the nation’s most polluted urban centers. Transportation investments, enhancements, and financial resources, if used properly, can bring new life and revitalize urban areas. They can also aid in lifting families out of poverty.

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