Passengers urge JTA to bring back bus route 15

Passengers urge JTA to bring back bus route 15
District 14 Council Member Randy DeFoor addressed the crowd in Murray Hill

Passengers in the Murray Hill and Riverside neighborhoods are urging the JTA to reinstate bus route 15. Many passengers in the neighborhood say they now have to take multiple buses just to get to work or go grocery shopping.

The bus route was cancelled in September. On June 9th, neighbors came together at Edgewood Avenue Christian Church to voice their opinions in front of JTA officials, and city council members.

John Peck has been riding the 15 since he was a teenager. “In reality, eliminating the 15 just pulled the rug out of our community here,” said Peck, “I can’t get to my pharmacy, I can’t get to my grocery store or doctors’ appointment.”

Peck created a petition to help reinstate the 15. “We got almost 1000 signatures on the petition and a whole bunch of people on Facebook behind our movement; and I’m pretty sure a lot of them don’t ride the bus, but they care about our neighbors, our fellow citizens.”

During the community meeting, Charles Frazier, the new Chief Operating Officer for JTA spoke about goals and objectives: Improving reliability, increasing access to transit, and expanding services and increasing frequencies of routes. 

Frazier also spoke about the challenges JTA faced because of the pandemic. “JTA has over 100 vacancies, they are not filled, we cannot fill them, and that is why we are having a difficult time putting all the buses on the road,” Frazier said. “Ridership has declined about 50-percent for us, people are not traveling the same way they were before, which also has an impact on our revenue. But, neither of those reasons is why the 15 was retired.”

Frazier also spoke about the creation of a new curbside service called ReadiRide. Customers can call 904-679-4555 to schedule a pick-up.

Reservations can be made Monday through Saturday from 6a.m. to 7p.m.

The service must me in the same designated zone. For examples, if you are picked up the Beaches zone, you must be dropped off within the Beaches zone. Customers must call at least 2 hours in advance to schedule a pick-up.

Passengers like Stephanie Moir says this doesn’t help her situation. She’s a teacher who spends about $600 a month on Uber rides, since bus route 15 was cancelled. “I’ve been teaching all day, I’m exhausted and on top of that I have to go home and take care of my mother,” says Moir. “I have to do other things around the house so that’s even more energy and by the time I get done with that, I’m just exhausted, and then I have to do it all over again the next day.”

Moir says because she lives in a food desert, where grocery stores are not within walking distance, she has to rely on food delivery services now that the 15 is gone.

“The removal of 15 has also disrupted how I get my groceries, so I’m forced to rely on delivery services,” Moir says. “Then there are all the additional fees. An item price upcharge based on what’s in the store, there are also service fees, delivery fees, temporary fuel surcharge fees, and tips. Then I have to worry about the cost of everything, do I eat better, or have enough money to Uber to school?”.

Sign reading "Edgewood Avenue Christian Church" over entrance

Following the community meeting, Frazier promised to re-group and schedule a follow-up meeting within 3 months. He also suggested JTA do some targeted outreach at some of the senior centers and teach people how to use the curb-to-curb services.

Council Member Randy DeFoor, 14th District, spoke on behalf of her neighborhoods’ concerns. “This is public transportation and we’re supposed to be meeting people where they are and it sounds to me we’ve failed in that regard and we need to fix it.” said DeFoor.“

State Representative Nixon also attended the meeting and asked Frazier for a firmer dateline for the next community meeting; and challenged him to put himself in the passengers’ shoes. “It can’t be months because these people are hurting. gas prices are going up, food prices are going up,” said Nixon. “I want to see if we can have a deadline of 2 weeks to have a community meeting; and set up a time to catch the bus together, because something has to be done.”

Frazier responded to DeFoor and Nixon’s challenge. “I’m happy to report back to your offices within 2 weeks on the next steps. Let’s plan the bus route excursion, we’ll ride together.” 

At the time this article was published, JTA and City Council member Randall DeFoor are coordinating a second town hall meeting. The date is still being finalized.

By Debra Fine
Resident Community News

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