NY: We’re still fighting for transit equity, just as Rosa Parks did (Your Letters)
To the Editor:
Wednesday, Feb. 4, was transit equity or equality day, commemorating Rosa Parks’ birthday and her quest for racial equality — famously on the bus. Parks fought racial segregation on buses but today’s battle lines look different: low-income workers facing longer commutes as routes are cut, wheelchair users unable to board when their mobility devices are damaged, and communities of color watching as transit investments bypass their neighborhoods. The “back of the bus” battle has been replaced by inaccessible stations, unreliable service and funding cuts that disproportionately harm the same marginalized communities Rosa Parks fought for.
Unfortunately, in 2026, the experience of moving from place to place on public transportation still can expose the often-invisible architecture of inequality surrounding race, disability and poverty. Our federal Department of Transportation (DOT) is losing ground rather than making progress towards Rosa Parks’ goals.
Travel offers a broad range of social goods — knowledge, experience, connection, autonomy and joy — and public transit opens these possibilities to us all. As Americans, we have the right to free movement. The federal DOT’s role is to ensure a safe, efficient, modern and sustainable national transportation system. It develops policies, regulates all modes of transport (air, rail, road, maritime) and invests in infrastructure to improve safety, economic competitiveness and quality of life for Americans. Few Americans realize how vital the DOT’s work is to our right to move freely within our communities, cities and country.
In his year since taking over running the DOT from Pete Buttigieg, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy has removed equity requirements from federal grant programs, thus removing requirements designed to enhance diversity hiring. He cut funding for two Chicago subway transportation contracts designed to support minority and disadvantaged businesses. He eliminated $54 million in university funding he considered “woke,” some of which would have supported research into transportation equity. His administration has also opposed congestion pricing, an admittedly controversial policy which nonetheless was intended to generate funding to modernize subway travel used to serve working-class New Yorkers. This administration has also threatened funding to state transit systems by tying the funding to non-transportation issues and delayed enforcement of a rule which would have made it a violation of the Air Carrier Access Act if airlines damage a traveler’s wheelchair.
Rosa Parks took her seat. We need to take ours — in Congress, at Transportation Department hearings and at the ballot box. Call your representatives. Show up at local transit meetings. Because if we don’t fight for transit equity, no one will.
Duffy has made his priorities clear and they don’t include access for all Americans. Make yours just as clear: Transit equity isn’t “woke” — it’s constitutional. It’s about whether your neighbor in a wheelchair can get to work, whether your grandmother can afford to visit her grandchildren, whether communities historically denied resources will continue to be denied to them.
Demand better — or watch your right to move freely disappear, one delayed wheelchair rule at a time.
Cora True-Frost
Syracuse University College of Law
Syracuse
The writer is Laura J. and L. Douglas Meredith Professor of Teaching Excellence at the law school and faculty director of the Journal of Global Rights and Organizations and Impunity Watch News.
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