Posted on February 10, 2022
Post categories: Research
Though Transit Equity Day is just one day, the issue of equity on Seattle’s public transit is an ongoing and important conversation to Seattle and King County residents. Neighborhoods across the county have unequal access to transit lines; bus stops are often located in inconvenient or dangerous places due to oncoming traffic and lack of sidewalks; and bus schedules are irregular or sparse, with long wait times. These are just a few of the challenges folks might experience before getting on the bus.
Master of Urban Planning Graduate, Isis Moon Gamble, dove into equity and access within the King County transit system in her thesis research, and we sat down with her to learn more.
In 2019 when Gamble started her research, she realized there had been no analysis done on the relationship between race and fare enforcement on King County Metro (KCM) RapidRide buses. While this analysis existed for houseless and housing unstable riders, there was a lack of analysis regarding race.
Gamble had originally been interested in affordable housing, but her internship with the Seattle Housing Authority (SHA) pushed her to explore the connection between housing and transit access more deeply. While at the SHA, she worked on the ORCA Opportunity Project, an ORCA card for people who were Seattle Housing Authority residents making less than 30% of the average median income. As a pilot, the project gave out 1500 free and unlimited use ORCA cards for a year.