Street-Level Math: On Free Busses, Hospital Trips, and The Good Life
We all want to live the good life, the rich life. We find ourself in times highly connected, to a point of fragmentation. And the solution is a quip: "get back to where you once belonged". Belonging together is the fundamental cause of advancement: "if you want to go fast, go alone, if you want to go far, go together." So what does any of this have to do with a vagabond bachelor Saturday afternoon? You didn't ask, but I'll tell you. Please read on, I'm only talking big.
I'm a member of Better Transit for a Better Memphis, a quality of life and economic mobility advocacy group. It's a motley crew, comprised of a Sierra Club octogenarian, a lion of old school Chicago community organizing, a current day set of MICAH's own Memphis community organizers, MATA-dependent citizens with disabilities, old school home-grown public transit advocates, and riders of choice like myself. Admittedly, I'm a staunch alternative-transit advocate and biology grad who does data infrastructure for a living, so the potato blight and being solely car reliant being bad biodiversity-lacking problems are, unfortunately, statistically probable, occurrences of monopolistic behavior. But I would like to discuss synergistic behavior.
Get on the Bus
We get the word bus, a short unassuming little word with great power, from the Latin root omnibus which means, "for all" or "for everyone". Notice there is nothing in the word about transport... it's just about an integrated system that's for everyone. For example, the Universal Serial Bus system, USB, is a common industry standard for connecting computers for data transfer, power sharing, and integration. I'm not going to go into the history of bussing because I'm not a historian, but I want to give a sense of how bussing can be hugely propelling for the wealth and enjoyment of our city, albeit currently fraught with inequity and social divides. Some chosen, some not.
I'm also not going to dive despairingly into the research backed emphasis of my claim that economic mobility, itself a sign of economic vitality. I am sitting in my pajamas on Sunday morning listening to a record I picked up for $5 at the Memphis Listening Lab at Crosstown Concourse of John Williams' score of Close Encounters of the Third Kind. It is brilliant, by the way. Unbelievably complex and mind-alteringly emotional. So, I'm just not going to work that hard. Sorry. But I will leave you with this rather conclusive study, done by the landmark Equal of Opportunity Project, done by Harvard economists Raj Chetty and Nathaniel Hendren, which concludes that commuting time is the single strongest factor in determining whether a low-income family can escape poverty and achieve upward economic mobility. This work became close to home when it was extensively integrated into the work done by U of M's Benjamin L. Hooks Institute for Social Change in The Hooks Policy Papers. They highlight that while income gap between transit riders and car drivers is narrow nationally, it is massive in Memphis due to geographic sprawl and transit dependency. Pause on that: you do know that income inequality is not good, right? Like, it's a sign of bad health. Cancer is when a rogue actor in the body goes all monopolistic, saying "to hell with a system supporting trillions of diverse cooperating cells, carpe diem!" I don't know about you, but I want to live!
So, I got on bus at Burnham and Watkins across the street from Frayser Bicycle. The owner and purveyor, Brian, was helping me immensely with my daily commuter bike which was in dire need of bottom bracket ball bearing and cup replacement. I biked up to his shop from my home on McLean near Dino's to get it evaluated and worked on and it was clear that I was going to have to leave the bike with him. The bus stop was in shambles. I imagine a lot are. But why? We who believe so strongly in Blue Crush and broken-window theory allow decrepitude in our "beloved" city. We do love our city, but like all families, sometimes we do not show it right. A car-crushed and one-bolt dangling bus stop bench strewn with paper cups, chip bags, and debris. And we know it's "out there", in the further reaches of our city. But we don't see it. We're not a part of it. It's not a part of us. And so it goes with cities that are cool and interesting and darkly bright. We are the one kingdom to rule them all! There is a natural kind of meritorious sifting that goes on in a city: inflow of people with all manner of talents leads to generative capacity. Those who don't make the cut are often cast to the side. To my thinking they merely need to learn how to get back inside. Economic Mobility.
At the bus stop I meet April Gibson, who is to become our main character. In my field notes I first dubbed April "swf" for single white female. I learned that she has had 11 children, and is with a man currently who has "about" 10 kids. She was on the way to see her mom at Methodist's ICU and the cost of travel was a burden, for sure. Somehow she had not heard that MATA was currently free and she hoped that the $2 she had was enough to get her Frayser to the hospital on Union, a straight shot, mind you. We'll get back to that in a bit. April is a normal person who maybe has not had the same chances as you, and may see the world a little differently, but her voice and personhood matter. I want you to meet her! She's lovely. Doing her best with an ethos about the common good not far off from anyone's own. She may have more children than you, but she lives in a different ecosystem, one where more r-selected behavior is a methodology at the abundant life. She likes bringing babies into the world. The universe will take care of them, I'm sure. In fact it has not. 2 of her children died, one to murder. And April has no money to her name to speak of. But she can live the good life. A connected life. She can come inside my world and take her shoes off and hang around and meditate for a while.
Today's rumination in Tolstoy's Calendar of Wisdom maintained by The Anarchist Library, read Libertarian?, is as follows:
September 27
Blaming others is an entertainment which some people like and cannot restrain themselves from. When you see all the harm this blaming causes, you see that it is a sin not to stop people from practicing this entertainment.
If you want to blame me, you should not be with me. You should be inside me.
—ADAM MICKIEWICZ
Truth is achieved through discussion, but the wiser man stops the arguments.
Our greatest imperfections are in our inner vision. We are so shortsighted that we cannot see bad things in others, but we cannot find bad things in ourselves as well.
—EDWARD BROWN
As soon as you start blaming a person, stop yourself. Remember not to say something bad about someone, even if you know it to be true, and especially if you are not certain but are only repeating gossip.
We know this wisdom, even if we do not like or practice it. April, I don't blame you for the problems of our city, furthest from that, I exonerate you on no basis other than making it this far. We chatted about your family and my work, your wanting to get out of the city and wanting to stay, my wife and daughter away for the weekend at Girl Scout camp, and your love of children. You're a lovely person. But you could be more connected to a different world, you just have to get there. Now you can! MATA is free. It's running reliably, and the Transit App is absolutely amazing. It's tracking all the buses and makes getting from place to place like a video game. Pick it up! I promise you it is so fun. See what's going on in the city everywhere. Stuff is happening everywhere. Google: "stuff happening in Memphis or today or this week". And then get there.
That's what Wisdom has taught me. "Get there." It's what I tell me students all the time, whether that be school, connecting with what they love... get there.
An hour later, taking the 32 to the 42 southbound, I got to Crosstown Concourse from Frayser Bicycle. I met a cast of people that showed me the FIXD app for saving on car costs, talked to me about their fake podcast (you don't have a podcast, bro), and who, without knowing it, enjoyed the quiet delight of traveling together via omnibus, "for everyone". While April went onto the hospital, I went into the Concourse for a look around. It was perfect "peacock" time and I wanted to fluff my feathers and see what was going on in the neighborhood. Disappointed that there was no art exhibit on the second floor up the red staircase, I went to the Memphis Listening Lab, where I picked up 4 records and listened to Tenacious D's Post-Apocalypto. You can skip it. But it was fun to hear those guys get all realmy.
From there I went to the Mad Hatter, a funky place that you need to check out and grab a sandwich from if you've not been, and picked up a Memphalotta, sweet potato and poblano salad, and sparkling drink for my girls and I when they returned from Girl Scout camp. And a few gifts. I walked home down the V&E trail to Tutwiler to McLean. 20 min.
On Time: It's Time
40 minutes biking to the bike shop. An hour there. 20 minutes on the bus. 40 minutes at stops. An hour at Crosstown and 20 minutes walking. 4 hours. An afternoon well spent. But, a bit gratuitous. This is Saturday time, not Monday time.
As I've involved myself with MATA for a few years, and with alternative-transit advocacy institutions such as MICAH, BTBM, and Innovate Memphis, I find 2 main roads to travel. One is cultural and one is logistic. The need to coordinate Memphis' bus system for trips every 15 minutes on main corridors like what's outlined below for a peak time high frequency commute solutions for everyday Memphians is tantamount to success. The only way to build trust in the system is to have a system that truly works at the timescale of modern life. People don't have time to waste. So, we shouldn't waste their time with a system that isn't operating for a Memphis solution, more so than a welfare solution.
| Route / Line | Inbound Origin | Hub Arrival Window | Dwell / Transfer Window | Hub Departure Window | Outbound Destination |
| Tier 1: Poplar Trunk | East Memphis (7:00 AM) | 7:10 AM | 7:10 – 7:13 AM | 7:13 AM | Hudson Transit Center |
| Tier 1: Lamar / American Way Trunk | American Way (7:00 AM) | 7:11 AM | 7:11 – 7:14 AM | 7:14 AM | Hudson Transit Center |
| Tier 1: Jackson / Austin Peay | Raleigh (6:55 AM) | 7:09 AM | 7:09 – 7:12 AM | 7:12 AM | Medical District Terminus |
| Tier 1: Elvis Presley Spoke | Whitehaven (6:55 AM) | 7:10 AM | 7:10 – 7:13 AM | 7:13 AM | Medical District Terminus |
| Tier 2: McLean/Bellevue Interceptor | North McLean (7:00 AM) | 7:09 AM | 7:09 – 7:12 AM | 7:12 AM | South Bellevue / Elvis Presley |
| Tier 2: Hollywood/Airways Interceptor | Frayser (6:50 AM) | Connects at American Way Hub at 7:15 AM | Connects at American Way Hub at 7:15 AM | Connects at American Way Hub at 7:15 AM | Airport / Industrial Hub |
The logistics problem is the easy problem. We can do that one, fairly easily. It necessitates creative thinking about the "last mile" in travel. But there are lots of entrepreneurial spirits here in Memphis and I believe people can get that last leg of where they're going reasonably well. It will take time but we can build it. Let's start from the right place, though, traveling at the pace of our current busy lives.
The Culture problem is the harder one. It starts with professionalism in the MATA system, which itself is an extension of our own expectations for our city. The bus stops and the buses can be in rough shape and we have to give a lot of love and support to the people who drive, maintain, and clean the buses, and those who work really hard at clear communication and common practices within the industry. Without our encouragement, there will be discouragement during this time we are in, between a free ride for the homeless and a representative cross-section of Memphis, traveling from here to there. How can we encourage unless we "get on the bus"? It's like with church, you can give money, but the church is not going to be successful if you don't go. If you don't play your part in being together.
Ride the bus this week. Download the Transit App. Talk to a stranger like you're on an airplane. Put in a ticket at 311 if you see something "out of order" at the bus stop, or call #. Get in touch with BTBM. Become a member. Share your bus story. Don't live in the past. By all means, go there and romanticize, but come back here, to earth, to the Wheels of Time, to the awakening of your animalness, and your great striving for humanity. Every system is perfectly designed to get the results it gets. When the going gets tough, the tough get going. GO901. Go!
