Paul Bass Photo
Mayor Toni Harp pledged to ride the bus Monday as part of a campaign to get more New Haveners to “think outside the car.”
Her administration will be asking citizens across town to sign similar “I Walk,” “I Bike,” and “I Ride The Bus” pledges. The pledges are one part of a broader “goNHgo” campaign unveiled at a press conference outside City Hall.
The campaign is the latest in ongoing efforts by the Harp administration to make the city more bikeable and pedestrian and mass transit-friendly. A recent study showed that commuting by bus to 70 percent of jobs available to New Haveners would require at least an hour and a half ride each way, noted city transit chief Doug Hausladen. That’s because bus routes are geared to commuting models from a half century ago, when people traveled in town to factories or other city jobs, rather than at odd hours to, say, retail positions on Boston Post Road or North Haven’s Universal Drive. Meanwhile, a quarter of New Haveners (and far more than that in lower-income neighborhoods) have no regular access to a car to go to work. (Click here for a story about a recent NAACP study showing poor bus routes and mass transit as a major impediment to employment for citydwellers.)
The goNHgo campaign—which features this website—calls on employers to help their workers to travel to work without driving a car, and on employees to take advantage of opportunities.
It aims to do so in part by:
• Offering citizens points, redeemable as discounts with national retailers, for carpooling, busing, biking, or walking to work over the next 12 months; and providing detailed advice on the website about non-car-commuting.
• Asking employers to commit to helping employees navigate non-driving alternatives, with customized advice from the not-for-profit CTRides organization.
• Launching a contest in September to reward companies that most successfully reduce their carbon footprint.
• Beginning a 14-month $1 million study this month, in conjunction with the state, of how to improve bus routes, connections to commuter rail, and transit facilities (by, for instance, having a centralized bus depots with restrooms).
“Our boomers and millennials want to live here. And they want to” avoid using their cars to get to work, remarked Hausladen (pictured).
Harp, meanwhile, repeated a declaration made earlier in her term that urban access to an effective mass transit system is a civil right.
Yale-New Haven Hospital has pledged to work with the campaign, Rodney Slaughter, manager of parking and sustainable transportation, said at Monday’s press event. The hospital already subsidizes up to $60 and offers payroll deductions for its employees’ monthly train or bus passes, offers shuttles from park and ride commuter lots, and provides financial incentives for workers to carpool. (Click here to read a brochure the hospital gives employees about its “traffic demand management” program, which has won “best workplace for commuters” awards.)
Nick Phillips, representing Alexion Pharmaceuticals, said his company will also participate in goNHgo when it opens its 11-story office tower at 100 College St. He said the company will provide secure bike racks and showers for employees who cycle to work. “It’s all about eliminating excuses not to take” buses, trains, or bikes, he said.
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