Stand Up for Your Right to Ride on May 15Wed. May 15, 12:45 pm
Our Fight For Your Right to Ride Continues at the CARTA Board Meeting
BCD Council of Governments,
5790 Casper Padgett Way, N. Charleston, SC, CARTA #13 Bus Route
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Charleston voters approved funding for a rapid transit line in Nov. 2016. After ten years of planning at a cost of over 5 million dollars, and a tentative contract negotiated by Glenn McConnel and others, the Exchange Club has withdrawn its agreement at to sell land for construction of a stop on our planned Lowcountry Rapid Transit Line at their fairgrounds. As always, people who drive cars and enjoy privilege want transit to be “somewhere else.”
Thus far the CARTA Board has stood firm, but the pressure being exerted by Charleston’s elite is powerful. Join us at the CARTA Board Meeting and public comment period to stand up for transit in the historic tradition of Mary Bowers, Charleston’s Rosa Parks (see below) .
We’ll have a short, peaceful demonstration outside the BCD COG Headquarters before the meeting, join the meeting at 1 pm and speak during the public comment period. You can sign up to speak for 2 min. If you want to share your written comments with the board, please bring 20 copies.
You can also sign the Online petition we’ll be presenting to the board. For info call 843-870-5299 or see https://tinyurl.com/fairbus.
This petition is being offered by Best Friends of Lowcountry Transit, Inc. William Hamilton, Ex. Dir. (843) 870-5299 or wjhamilton29464@gmail.com.
A petition is being circulated attacking the plan to place the Ladson area terminal for the long planned Lowcountry Rapid Transit System at the Fairgrounds in Ladson. The Fairgrounds have suffered from terrific congestion problems for years, which in turn is alleged to have substantially reduced attendance. As the Ladson area has developed along the accepted pattern of suburban sprawl, the extremely limited LINK rural transit bus service hasn't been able to contribute much to helping meet the area's mobility needs. Bus stop shelters were even removed in Summerville. As always, weak, unreliable transit doesn't work. Sprawl strangles our quality of life. The Lowcountry refuses to learn that inadequate effort in things like transportation, housing and education doesn't solve problems. it's time for the failures to stop.
A Plan that is Already Compromised.
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The 2014 I26 Alt plan for the transit line approved by Charleston County Voters in the 2016 referendum called for rapid transit from Charleston to Summerville, the result of over 20 years and ten million dollars in planning. This plan has already suffered greatly by repeated decisions not to surrender to resistance by giving up use of the railroad line into Charleston as a transit corridor and turning it over for use as a dog walking park for rich people. The plan to have a transit hub in the central city has retreated from the Visitors Center, to Line Street and now to Mt. Pleasant Street, almost two miles from the central city. The system no longer operates as rapid transit in in it's own dedicated lane South of Reynolds Ave. in N. Charleston, running as a regular bus in mixed traffic and flooding to MUSC downtown. The plan for a transit line stop connecting the LCRT to our Train and Bus Station in North Charleston has been abandoned and the nearest stop is now half a mile away. Plans to connect Summerville were abandoned when the system was cut back to the fairgrounds. A critical stop near Huger Street was moved half a mile South into an area with weaker connections. Each of these decisions has been made without a public vote, in secret. What is left is a system which won't have the capacity to provide mobility and relieve traffic congestion the region needs.
Our political leaders have quietly and undemocratically surrendered the region's rapid transit future to the piecemeal complaints of people who will be enraged when they're spending two hours a day snarled in traffic five years from now with no functional alternative to reach places of business who can't hire staff because people have no way to get to work there in a reasonable time and nowhere to live nearby which they can afford.
Sign the Petition.
Best Friends of Lowcountry Transit is circulating it's own petition to demonstrate support for having a public transit terminal at the Fairgrounds. For most of the year, this will have no impact on the fairgrounds at all, since it is deserted. On the handful of weekends when the Fairgrounds fully uses it's parking, the access provided by the Lowcountry Rapid Transit System will more than replace the fair attendance the loss of a few parking spaces might cause.
The Petition Reads
As a resident of the SC Lowcountry, I would like to be able to travel to and from our region’s fairgrounds by Public Transit using the planned Lowcountry Rapid Transit System.
I am disappointed that an agreement has not yet been reached to build a transit station at the Fairgrounds to serve the community, make this location more valuable to the region, increase fair revenue for local charitable causes and to reduce traffic congestion associated with events held there. A functional transit terminal adjacent to the fairground would increase the value of the fairgrounds to the entire community for all the events held there and activity at the adjacent Coastal Carolina Flea Market. Reducing traffic congestion will also help ensure safety by avoiding blocking fire, police and EMS services from operating in the area during the fair.
I do not believe it is appropriate for outdated attitudes about racism and discrimination to get in the way of assuring our community enjoys the benefits of public transit and a successful, inclusive fair in the future.
I am asking the Exchange Club to work diligently to reach agreement with local governments so we can all move forward quickly to the day when everyone will be able to reach the fair without fighting traffic including the disabled, elderly, those without access to automobiles and those who prefer not to drive.
Best Friends of Lowcountry Transit, Inc.
