"Nickel and Dimed" (courtesy of George Mason University)

A book written by Barbara Ehrenreich, Nickel and Dimed sets out  to investigate the impact of 1996 welfare reform on the United States. Barbara Ehrenreich throughout the novel moved from Florida to Maine, and also Minnesota, working minimum wage jobs, such as a waitress, hotel maid, house cleaner, nursing home aide, and also at Wal-mart. All of these jobs came with no benefits at all. So if you had children, you would still have to depend on the state. She soon finds out that if you want to survive in America and at minimum wage you need atleast two jobs, because one just won’t work. I find this book to be very humorous, and an eye opener to America. Regardless of how Amercans feel we should have better living conditions when working at minimum wage. I really enjoyed the book and would like more young people to read it, and pass it along. Please feel free to leave a comment especially if you read the book.

Cinderella's Castle at Disneyland

This is my second post on  the book called Fantasy City (first post here).

With the exception of a few large metropolitan centers like New York, Chicago, and San Francisco, there was little attraction by tourists or suburban day trippers to come to the city . In the ten years between 1948 and 1958 there was a large decline in the level of dollar sales in one in four major business districts, with Los Angeles being especially hard receiving a nineteen percent drop off. There are a few reasons people believe people are leaving the city.  There are disamenity avoidance theories meaning people and/ or businesses leave the city for the suburbs so as to avoid negative factors such as high crime rates and energy costs tax avoidance theories, taxes are lower in the suburbs.  There are also positive upgrading theories meaning the suburbs provide a better standard of living and a wider range of amenities.  Another reason are economic evolution theories meaning suburbanization is a natural stage in the evolution of the city, combining activities and their locations.  Government policies influence investment, housing and economic activity and favor suburbs over central cities. The final theories are demographic trend theories which means that population growth or migration trends have a negative impact on central cities.

During the baby boom there was a a suburban building spree offering new, large houses at affordable prices. This was spurred by low-cost mortgages, tax breaks, and government subsidies.  During this time suburban growth outpaced that of the city tenfold. It was due to these factors that suburban growth was so great. This growth in the suburbs changed people’s lifestyles. One aspect that was changed was that of leisure. Recreation in a working-class suburb was mostly private and was located in ones home and yard. Contradictory to this Americans were taking to the outdoors like never before. After driving and walking, swimming was the third most popular outdoor recreational activity in the country. This trend was obviously caused by more than merely the baby boom and the shift of people to the suburbs. It was caused by a larger trend in which employers had shorter working hours, longer weekends, and paid vacations. Due to this there were less people going to the movies because there were other forms of leisure that were taking hold including surprisingly gardening and planting.Also due to a court case there was trouble building suburban movie theaters so a new form of movie theaters was formed, the drive-in. By the early 1960’s there were approximately 6,000 drive-ins This was not only an American phenomenon; it happened in Canada and Australia as well. Downtown entertainment districts faced competition not only from drive-ins and later movie theaters in suburban malls but also with the building of Disneyland, theme parks. Many, in fact all of the Disney clone parks had failed up until the building of Six Flags over Texas in 1961. Theme parks began to become popular after this.

The book Just Transportation is about justice in the transportation system for people of color, the working class, the poor, women, the elderly, and the disabled. Just Transportation clearly illustrates that the struggle for just transportation is not over. Two of the most historic movements surrounding just transportation are the Freedom Riders and Rosa Park’s refusal to give up her seat to a white man on the bus. Although those are two historical moments for Black folks, the fight for just transportation goes farther back to after President Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1^st, 1863. Even with the freeing of slaves, they were not truly free, forced to ride in rail carts in the back or standing up.

Freedom riders of the 1960s challenged transportation “laws” in place during the time period. They challenged interstate traveling even if it resulted in their death. Rosa Park’s refusal to give her seat is also a significant catalyst in history, for she challenged the racist Jim Crow laws in place.

Though landmark decisions such as the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Voting Rights Act of 1965, and the Fair Housing Act of 1968 were made, the scars and strains of racism are still profoundly embedded in America’s society today, even with a historic shift on November 4^th, 2008.

As stated in the book, unjust transportation policies keep poor people and minorities separate and apart from reaching their full potential. I agree that public transit too often does not link urban job seekers with suburban jobs. It’s no secret that urban job seekers want the white collar, upstanding jobs just like suburban job seekers. We too want a livable wage job. Since transportation isn’t connected, urban folks lose out on opportunities.

It’s not rocket science to find out that transportation affects every aspect of our lives and daily routine. Mobility directly influences where we live, work, play, shop, go to school, and attend medical appointments. The role transportation plays in shaping human interaction and human settlement patterns should be taken into consideration when deciding just transportation policies.

Grassroots community groups across the country have come together to put an end to transportation discrimination. Freeway construction, transit services and investments and facility siting are issues these groups are combating. A Los Angeles-based community organization, the Bus Riders Union, understands that just transportation can only be realized if poor people and people of color receive their fair share of transit services and investments. It is important to view transportation as an environmental, civil rights, and social justice issue. In order to end transportation discrimination, a link needs to be made between unequal treatment on buses and trains with violations of constitutionally guaranteed civil rights.

Well luckily the Bus Riders Union of Los Angeles was able to make that link. In doing so they sued the MTA in 1994. They filed a class action civil rights suit. The plaintiffs of the suit were the Labor/Community Strategy Center, Bus Riders Union, the Korean Immigrant Workers’ Advocates, and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference all represented by NAACP Legal Defense. The plaintiffs challenged the use of federal funds in building an expensive rail system and challenged the allocation of public funds in Los Angeles’ two-tiered (bus vs. rail) public transit system.

Some statistics: 90% of Los Angeles transit riders use the bus system (hmmm) the bulk of the dollars were being expended to build a rail system. There were questions of expenditures of  over $700 million on the newly opened Green Line. ( “the line to nowhere” LITERALLY). Fares Decrease- Ridership Increase; Fares Increase- Ridership Decrease (funny ratio)

After some years of court battling, an out of court settlement was reached (not surprised). The Consent Decree of 1996, which expired in 2006 sadly and was not renewed, was reached. In the Decree, monthly passes were kept, biweekly and weekly passes were implemented at reasonable prices, and the MTA promised to keep fares low, purchase 102 new buses over the next 2 years, use CNG fuel, expand bus service to new areas, and implement the Rapid bus service.

Well this seems like a great victory, (it is), but the fight continues with the 2007 fare increases and the continual allocation of funds to an unneeded rail system. Funds are needed more than ever to be put into the bus system. We need to be able to have just transportation as a human and civil right. According to Just Transportation, “a socially just and ecologically sustainable transportation has the potential to increase job and income opportunities, create environmentally safe communities, decrease fossil fuel energy consumption and improve overall social, economic and environmental quality of life.” Of course I agree. A final quote from Just Transportation: “transportation programs that continue to support suburban commuter needs and development at the expense of the urban core contributes to patterns of institutional racism, class bias in urban poor, working poor, and people of color communities.”

Give just transportation for education not long waits on the block where correctional handcuffs await young Tyrone.

Robbery !

I am still reading my book titled Highway Robbery.  I have read now chapters three and four. Chapter three talks about transportation issues in Atlanta. Chapter three mainly focus on a group called MARTA, which stands for Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority (or as the authors would say, Moving Africans Rapidly Through Atlanta).  MARTA services and responds to many lower income people of color.

In Chapter four, the authors talk about the details of how the construction of highways , parks, playgrounds, and housing will contribute to the shape of New York. It also talks about a guy named Robert Moses – how he was elected by no one but controlled everything like the parks and housing in New York. He also oversaw the construction of building new things that would have shaped the face of the modern New York. He was the symbol for the word wrong.  But finally the city of New York got rid of Mr. Moses and boy were they happy.

The reason I am still reading this book is because I enjoy learning new things. I also find it interesting that the same problems we face in California many others are facing all around the world. This transportation racism has to end, and we must try to help the activists who are trying to fight it, such as the BRU.

In Vukan R. Vuchic’s Transportation for Livable Cities, I read about how important transportation is to keep cities in the United States and the rest of the world functional. He emphasizes on how different transportation methods are analyzed in characteristics and uses. But when reading throughout the book I noticed that his idea of a perfect transportation system would be the construction and running of rail.

One of his main emphases, however, was the construction of rail systems are the main way of maintaining a reliable transportation, basically saying that Rail is number 1. From my own point of view after reading this, I felt like he shared some of the same ideas that I have about transportation. However, you definitely need a public transportation made up of the bus and existing urban city rail. If rail was the only source of public transportation alone it would not be sustainable. Cities such as New York, Chicago, Philadelphia and around the eastern seaboard implement not only rail transport but a first class transit system composed of road vehicles such as buses, van pools, carpool and para-transit. The use of the auto is all well and good, but people need to be ready to limit their use of the automobile, especially in the United States and Canada. If we want a stable city and civilization the use of the car needs to be in moderation.

The implementation of urban transportation would create a better balance for major big cities, civilians would have better transportation choices, and they would be able to decide whether to drive their car which would cause more traffic and congestion, or sacrifice their use of the auto temporarily and get on either a bus or an existing rail service that would take them to work, school, etc. Its about moderation, if the use of auto was limited, then the world would have a better transportation infrastructure.

Lately I have been reading a book by John Hannigan called Fantasy City, subtitled pleasure and profit in the postmodern metropolis.  The subtitle largely explains the content of the book as it is about entertainment and the business surrounding it in cities.

The first chapter of the story is titled “At Prices all can Afford”.  The topic of this story is the so called “golden age” of entertainment which supposedly took place 1895-1930.   Prior to this time the entertainment was segregated by class.  The upper class went to social clubs and cultural institutions like art museums and opera houses. The working class’s entertainment revolved around the saloon and cheap variety theater.  These included restaurants, lecture halls, fraternal lodges, beer halls, billiard parlors, bowling alleys, picnic groves and pleasure gardens. The middle class’s entertainment was generally very private but sometimes included trips to libraries, concerts and other church sponsored activities.  There was almost no crossing of class barriers when it came to entertainment.  The one exception may have been sporting events.  Although some working class people could attend sporting events baseball clubs scheduled afternoon games, kept tickets prices high and the number of seats low so as to limit the number of working class people that could attend.

Also there were people being called “merchants of leisure” that were entrepreneurs.  They had to think of, and create a new public culture that was affordable, non-threatening, and attractive.  Later the working class had both a little money and time to spare on entertainment but these entrepreneurs did not trust them as a reliable or very profitable market.  The middle class had its fears of the working class, believing them to be a rowdy and drunken crowd.  The entrepreneurs had quite a job set out for them.  They had to appeal to both parties, the working and middle classes.  They needed to convince the working class that they were getting something magical and great while getting the middle class to believe that these places were clean and safe.

Another misconception about this time period was the idea of “democracy’s theater”.  This was the idea that entertainment was not segregated.  This may have been true for a short time but when they were no longer needed they were not included.  They tried to include all by creating theaters with no reserved sections, cheap ticket prices, and many seats.  People have studied before where movie theaters were built and they were never built in working class neighborhoods.  They were built in traditional entertainment districts, high density ethnic areas, such as Little Italy and Jewish Harlem, and sometimes in upper and middle class areas.

Robbery !

So I have been reading this book titled, Highway Robbery, by Robert Bullard, Glenn S. Johnson, and Angel O. Torres. This book has made me realize that transportation racism started way back during the civil rights movement, and has still continued today. One example of it during the civil rights movement was the Plessy vs. Feguson case . The book mainly focuses on people of color, and their struggles with transportation equity. Transportation equity is made with the goals of the larger environmental justice and civil rights movements. The book also defines transportation equity as a basic right. While reading chapter 1 I realized that the civil rights struggle really has a effect on transportation. Chapter 2 is written by the activist Eric Mann; it mainly talks about the legal victory by  LCSC and the BRU over the MTA, and some other groundbreaking cases. The BRU mainly consist of blacks and Latinos, Asian, and Pacific Islander. They are fighting against the unequal transit racism. This book is really interesting and full of great facts. I now have realized that this was a problem along time ago, but it took me reading this book to find out. We as environmental justice fighters are in it for the long run , we are or should be long distance runners and and not just sprinters. We must FINISH THE RACE!!!!!!!