The Atlanta Formula
Hosted by Zettler Clay, this show explores the city's rich culture, history and vibrant energy of the people.
The Atlanta Formula
2. Transportation: Did Something Go Wrong?
As the hum of Atlanta's traffic weaves a story of infrastructure and societal evolution, our latest conversation invites you into the living history of a city's love affair with transportation. We lay tracks through the personal and the communal, sharing tales that are often overshadowed by the roar of engines—like the legacy of my own family's Pullman Porters and how these railroading pioneers laid the foundations for our economic growth. Dr. Chris Wyczalkowski from MARTA steps aboard to unravel the systemic challenges preventing Atlanta from fully embracing public transit, dissecting the complex intersections of race, city culture, and the stigmas that linger around bus and train travel.
Our journey continues as we navigate the societal impact of Atlanta's transit decisions, from the erection of neighborhood barricades against integration to the suburban sprawl that followed. We turn the spotlight on the unsung heroes behind the wheel, like Coy Dumas, with over two million miles of untarnished driving record, whose personal stories of perseverance remind us that public transit is more than just a mode of travel—it's the pulse of our communities. These narratives take us down memory lane, reflecting on the profound changes within Atlanta's landscape, from the Lakewood Assembly plant era to the present day, and how every turn of the wheel has left its mark on the city's soul.
Wrapping up our expedition, we celebrate the enduring spirit of Atlanta's public service workers through the story of a top-ranked transit operator, whose dedication and discipline exemplify the qualities of success in this field. We examine the pivotal role of public transportation in urban resilience, pondering the varied needs of city dwellers and suburbanites alike. With heartfelt anecdotes and critical insights, this episode is a testament to the hardworking individuals who keep Atlanta moving and a call to action for a more connected and equitable future on the roads and rails of this storied city.
Transit, unfortunately, is looked at as a second-hand mode of transportation. Right, it's not for me, it's for the lower-income people. It's how it's viewed. I remember one time somebody told me a story where they got off a bus in their neighborhood and the neighbor came up to them and said oh, what happened? Something go wrong? If you ever need a ride, just let me know. So the response was not like oh cool, you're using public transportation. It's like there's something must have happened to cause you to have to use it that one time.
Speaker 3:Let me tell you how we speak. We up y'all. This is the Atlanta Formula. I am your conciliator, I'm Zepp LeClaire IV and so glad to be with you here in the moment. I hope you all are splendid.
Speaker 3:I'm Will Shout out to all the viewers who, rockin' with the motion Episode 1 is out and it's a success, and I know this because you told me. And, yes, we plan to keep this thing going. Thank you for the condolences about my dear grandmother and, yes, the grief is there. But here's the thing about that. I was talking to a rabbit, with a cat recently who hit me on some game and helped me see things in clearer light about this. You know he was in Change of Stories and he had lost his mom some years back and said to me you know, it's not that over time your grief gets smaller, it's that you grow around it. And I felt that these moments, all moments, are meant for us to build through the fertilizer, the dung, the smelly matter you did and that I intend to do. Alright, let's get into it, let's do this.
Speaker 3:It all started with the railroad. Just as the internet irreversibly sped up and expanded communication globally, railroad transformed how information was transmitted across distances. Before railroads, the speed of information spread was as fast as your fastest horse. Railroads effectively altered the power dynamics of how people, cities, states and even nations interacted. Nothing was the same, and thus the city was built.
Speaker 3:The establishment of the terminus in 1837 was a promotion from a simple cornerstone that connected the western and Atlantic rail lines to an entity to be built upon. How often was this piece of land overlooked or ignored before the Georgia General Assembly found it? Like the scriptural verse, this was a cornerstone that set Atlanta on a path of rapid growth and development. Because of its level land it made for easy maneuvering, little break concerns and no need for expensive tunnels and high maintenance costs. It was affordable for businesses and merchants to operate from. It extended the reach of any enterprise looking to deliver steel, coal, timber, people. If you were an entrepreneur in Savannah or the Midwest at the time, your revenue and profit opportunities increased innumerably. Ask George Pullman, an engineer and industrialist who introduced a novel concept at the time sleeping cars for a luxurious overnight travel service. He specifically chose African Americans to employ, largely due to it being common at the time for them to serve, even though many were demeaned and called a lot of Georgia's boys and hard ER's among American Africans. When it didn't pay in dollars, it paid in value. It provided a way to experience the region and rest of the country, to make contacts and increase their network, spread information and gain general knowledge, and if you are socially impressive enough, you can walk away with significant tips. Two of my great-grandfathers were Pullman porters and consequently their sons went on to use these osmotic and taught experiences to leverage financially successful lives for themselves in Atlanta, setting their children yours truly included, up to do the same.
Speaker 3:Now, when people talk about transporting in Atlanta, the very first notion that comes to mind is traffic. Relatively few realize today that when you sit in traffic in Metro Atlanta that endemic to your endless road rage and long commute is the continuation of Atlanta's Confederate legacy. But how Well the math ain't mathin' 3.5. That is the percent of Atlanta residents that use MARTA to get to and from work. According to the Atlanta Regional Commission, this is compared with about 57% in New York City and 48% in Jersey City, new Jersey. In general, however, public transit is low in the southern region, with Atlanta outpacing Charlotte, nashville, orlando, houston and Dallas. Even still, many feel this low ridership is a reflection of a deep-rooted flaw. Many of us know about MARTA's bill for beginnings Before the newly initiated. Here's a quick red pill. Local scholars call it the original sin of urban planning in the city, the transit compromise of 1971.
Speaker 3:The seas were rooted late, however, in 1962, when World War II hero and founding member of the Morehouse School of Medicine, clinton Warner, moved into a white subdivision on Peyton Road in the Cascade Heights area. What the then mayor, ivan Allen Jr, built? A steel and wood three-foot barricade on Peyton Road with the intent to keep further American Africans from moving in. Many got involved, including Dr Martin Luther King Jr, and there were demonstrations, kkk cross-burnings, calls for boycotts, all that it was messy. Eventually, after 72 days, in January of 1963, a Fulton County Superior Court judge ordered it to be removed. Mayor Allen tipped down the wall within 20 minutes. True to the nature of Confederate roots, this led to white flight, a mass exodus of white departure that would carry on for the next generation. Next, forward to 1965, the same year Atlanta gained professional sports and the same year my maternal grandparents settled into the city, shot up to Dr James and Melville Costin.
Speaker 3:The Georgia General Assembly created the Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority for the City of Atlanta and five counties Fulton, decad, cobb, gwinnett, Clayton. At the years of political wrangling, only voters in the City of Atlanta, fulton and Decad sent it to Martin. The dissenting counties Cobb, gwinnett, clayton is where that mass exodus settled into. This was the creation of the Atlanta suburban sprawl, since only Clayton has changed its tune, but only after a significant demographic shift. Clayton is now majority African-American. Of course, the advantages to suburban life was there. They knew everything lower taxes, lower upfront living costs, better resources like schools, as well as distance from African-Americans. The decision not to expand Martin outwards to the burbs was, and continues to be, supported by fears that it will lead to urban problems spread into their communities.
Speaker 3:You know that familiar dog whistling, descendant of Confederate ancestry. So now we are here, and that ain't this and this ain't that. And now we ride strapped, stuck in arguably the worst traffic in the nation. Hello LA. More on you later. Well, seemingly no end in sight to this quackmire, wondering how we got to this point. But maybe it's a hidden factor that has led us here, something that, due to my ignorance or limited knowledge on city infrastructure and design, I haven't acknowledged. So I reached out to somebody smarter than me about these things. To get some answers, enter Dr Chris Vitakovsky, director of customer insights at Martyr, to help me get a handle on these things. Of course, the views he expresses are his and not of Martyrs. We met outside on a calm, breezy day at Fred Tumor Elementary School. It's a short walk from Pullman Yars. Fred Tumor was indeed a Pullman Porter himself.
Speaker 1:So one of the biggest challenges a city's public transportation system face I think the biggest challenge or one of them anyways is just the culture of the city itself. Right, where we have a culture of driving, people will drive to see their friends two or three blocks away, right. So if you don't have sort of the ingrained thing to where you're going to walk without walking, you can't have transit. There's just no way that those go together. You've got this first, last mile issues of getting to the transit station, right. And so if you don't have the culture in a city where people are thinking of alternate modes biking, walking, public transportation it just has no chance.
Speaker 1:Because in order for public transportation to work, people have to use it and they have to support its expansion and its funding. Right. So if I'm not in favor of public transportation, if I never use it and there's a referendum to fund more public transportation, I'm gonna vote no, because money could be used for other things that I might think are more useful. So it's the culture piece. If we get more people to use it, person by person, you know, I think people would start, and it seems like Atlanta.
Speaker 3:why has it that culture taken root? You know, and Atlanta is not unlike a lot of other metropolises Detroit is another one and LA, I believe, is another one that does not value, I guess, or doesn't have the culture of it. Why is it that it has a hard time?
Speaker 1:developing. So it's really interesting, right? Because we're sitting here in a neighborhood that was developed on a streetcar line. You mentioned Los Angeles In. Like the 1920s, Los Angeles had the best public transit system in the world. They have a street grid and they've ran streetcars all over the place. You can get anywhere with no problems. So somewhere along the line, things change.
Speaker 3:Another enormous factor was at play in transportation policies of the late 1960s and 70s Atlanta's burgeoning and flourishing love affair with the automobile. As Atlanta's monochromatic migration took hold in earnest, workers at General Motors' vast Lakewood Assembly Plant in Southeast Atlanta was cranking out the finishing touches on many of the cars we will hear later from these organized noise and DJ2 produced classics, low riders, civilians, ale dogs, nothing but them lax. All the players, all the hustlers I'm talking about a black man having here and now, how you tame a young ball of that ride? Suburban caprices and candy and parlors, raspberry manticolors that march like a wilder, all the kala addicted to hustling and stacking minded dollars. Yeah, y'all know it. These iconic lines were set up 40 years prior by scores of American African workers at the GM plant. Significant this was because it enabled many with only a high school education to earn for themselves and families. Truly enough, the plant started bringing black workers in and many traveled from counties outside city limits to commute there.
Speaker 3:The Lakewood plant played a pivotal role in manufacturing these cars, contributing to the economic growth and industrial prowess of Atlanta during that period. The presence of such a significant manufacturing facility like Lakewood not only provided jobs and economic activity, but also helped integrate Atlanta into the broader narrative of American industrial and automotive history. The allure of roaring around Atlanta in cool cars took over and kept hold Once Marta started running. Why rather bust a subway when you could drive a sleek, powerful car and fill it with cheap petrol? Only the people who couldn't afford the car. Marta became known as an isolated castaway, shunned both by large segments of up-willies driving blacks and segregationist minded whites. Looking back, it would be easy, perhaps lazy, to draw conclusions that Marta was capped from the start. Still, somebody had to try.
Speaker 1:If people look at the automobile, right, they identify with it. Like, just think about when people buy a car oh, I got this ride, I got that ride, here's my whip right. People like want to show off like whatever their images of themselves. It's kind of a reflection of it in their cars. So this is the issue that we're fighting. Is this entrenched car culture, that sort of identifies? You know, we identify the car with independence, with freedom, and so I think that's what we're really fighting is turning that tide, saying actually, you know it's healthier, it's better, on a whole lot of different fronts, to get out of the automobile to meet our neighbors. How many doors down do you actually know your neighbors? You probably know the person right next door to you Two houses, three houses down. You have no idea you know what their car looks like.
Speaker 3:Right In 1970, lakewood became the world producer of the Chevrolet Grand Prix. Perhaps there is no car in Atlanta that symbolized the era's optimism about cars more than the Chevrolet. It was available in several body styles, including a sedan, coupe, convertible and station wagon. Even more than that, it has inspired countless songs for some really talented hip hop artists, including the two earlier I referenced. As you could probably tell, I'm quite partial to heavy sharevies by TI and PSC, one time to DJ Tune and them symbols. In August of 1990, after 62 years and more than 7 million automobiles, the last Chevrolet Caprice car rolled off the Lakewood line. When that happened and there was no viable economic engine to replace it, well, you know how nature treats vacuums. What a generally outside of car culture impediments to that density housing density, population density.
Speaker 1:If you don't have that density, you don't have two things. One is, if you put it, a public transit system is when you put it in. You have to travel such long distances to get there that most people won't do it Right. So that's a big issue, just getting there. People talk about, hey, let's make transit go out to the suburbs. Well, where are you gonna put it so that people can access it? Not by foot, right, it's, you have to drive to it. So once you're already driving, are you gonna get out of your car to get onto the train? Right, in some cases you might if you have a habit of doing it. You might. If there's a real reason, you might, but if you don't have that reason or that habit impetus, you're just gonna continue driving.
Speaker 3:What are the biggest misconceptions that people have when it comes to Mardah.
Speaker 1:Biggest misconceptions, I think one is, and it's again tied to the car. Right, it's that people think of not having a car as not having freedom. But Mardah, I think, actually allows you to have freedom because when I, at one point in my life, I lived without a car for a few years by choice, and I found it a freeing experience. I didn't have to worry about parking it, I didn't have to worry about what's happening to it. If a car alarm's going off, I know it's not my car alarm. Right Maintenance when you go somewhere, parking is a pain, like you gotta pay for it. In some places there's ample parking, other places there isn't. So I think that freedom piece is a misconception.
Speaker 1:I wish that people would stop thinking of public transit as a secondhand form of transportation, only if you need it. Right, it's healthier, it's more social, right? I mentioned the neighbor thing, that you walk by your neighbors. You build these community ties, these human connections, which this would take us off base. But I think this is some of the social problems that we're having, as though we're all in our little bubbles. We forget that these other people exist.
Speaker 1:So on public transit you actually bump into real people. You know, you talk to them. You have these spontaneous conversations and you learn things because you run into people that have different perceptions than you do, different perspectives. They think differently and as long as you're the kind of person that can have a happy, honest conversation, this to me. I enjoy riding transit for those reasons. I run into people. I see things that I otherwise wouldn't. I don't have to worry about people cutting me off Like think how much angst you get when you're in traffic, right, and somebody cuts you off, or you're trying to merge and someone doesn't let you in. All that stuff builds up in your body. You can actually eliminate a lot of that stress by riding transit because the only thing you're worried about is okay, when's the train coming or when's the bus coming.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, traffic in Atlanta. It has a physiological toll, it takes it for sure. Yeah, go away, it's a thing. Help me paint the connection between Marta and the developing Beltline.
Speaker 1:Marta really is there to operate the public transit system. We run the buses, the trains, the streetcar paratransit. The Beltline is more of an infrastructural amenity.
Speaker 3:Ryan Gravel, a Georgia Tech graduate student, proposed the Atlanta Beltline, a circular ring of light rail that will touch on 45 neighborhoods throughout the city. City planners and administrators swiftly backed it and the city council voted to approve it as a tax allocation district in 2005. A tax allocation district TAD is a popular method for funding redevelopment projects in urban areas. Without weighing you down with the details, here's the gist. Gravel saw the Beltline as an equity equalizer of sorts, connecting residents and communities in the city, but developers saw something different in it, more as a private public venture to reform the city demographically and physically. Seeing the inherent equity concerns, gravel resigned from the project's board in 2016.
Speaker 3:According to Dan Emmergluck, author of Red Hot City, referenced in the first episode, two issues are of major concerns in regards for whom the Beltline is being built. One is transit Would it effectively connect people to their jobs? Does it complement the existing MARTA system? And the other is housing. What would it do for housing affordability? Would it spur gentrification pressures?
Speaker 3:In 2006, marta conducted a study of potential alternatives for building and operating transit along the Beltline. The study found that, based on technical feasibility and cost effectiveness, rapid transit offered a $315 million less expensive option than the light rail Beltline. Many advocates for it say it will boost the city's image as an international destination and will serve as an economic engine, while others say it would only increase gentrification pressure and add to the affordability crisis the city currently faces. The Beltline is still being developed as funds become available and has received massive attention nationally and globally. By the end of this year, 80% of the main line trail is expected to be complete or under construction. Seamless collaboration between MARTA and Beltline is crucial for making Atlanta a more connected and accessible city for its citizens.
Speaker 1:So the connection is that if it's decided that which we can talk about more, this equity issue of this, but so we can think about the neighborhood effects. So if you add again any kind of transomentary, or even the Beltline itself already results in these gentrification pressures. And the issue is that when you design a transit system for the people that are there at one point in time, but if that system acts as a sort of a gentrification magnet, those people can no longer take advantage because they're not there anymore, they've been displaced to other places that they can afford.
Speaker 3:How does public transit accessibility impact the daily lives of residents in underserved communities. If we take rest to Vouge and give it one seat.
Speaker 1:There's a lot of mental illness for most people If you don't have access. What that means is just, by definition, you can't get to certain things, so you're limited. So think about it like this let's say there is a grocery store that sells things in large quantities. It's cheaper, right, but you can't get to that grocery store. You're going to go to whatever store you can access, right, so they might be selling bananas for a dollar a banana At a grocery store. You could probably buy a dozen bananas for like three bucks or something like that. And so that person who doesn't have access to the grocery store actually is spending more money, right, because they don't have access. They can only go to what's available to them. Or maybe they don't even have bananas. All they have are Twinkies, right, and so that's what people eat, and we know that if you eat enough Twinkies they talk about, you know, buckhead to bankhead life expectancy is like 20 years apart, something like that right, Though the exact number varies based on the study.
Speaker 3:Dr Chris is on the money. The gap is basically a generational part. An average bankhead resident is expected to bounce around 63 in buckhead 87. That's not even 10 miles apart. I don't even think there's anything else to add to that.
Speaker 1:And they're five miles apart and yet people have different outcomes. Same thing with jobs, right? So we did a paper published in January so about a year ago where we looked at the effects of removing public transportation from Clayton County. This happened in 2010. The bus system there went bankrupt with only like three years so month notice to the people who were living there.
Speaker 1:Clayton County was never a wealthy county. People moved there in those days partly because they could have cheap housing. Again, there's this connection between housing and transportation, right, like that's, your biggest piece of your personal budget is where you live and how you get around. Food is third on that list. And so in 2010, all of a sudden, this system went away completely. Like we had transit. Now we don't have transit, and it stayed that way for five years until Clayton County voted to add martyr.
Speaker 1:But over that five year period of time, what we found is that poverty went up and unemployment went up. So the people who were there either lost jobs or they had to take lower paying jobs because they couldn't get to the other jobs they may have had. This is anecdotal now, but this is a mechanism by which this could happen. So there is that if you can't get to all the good jobs. You're going to take a worse job or you're not going to have a job at all. Either way, you're making less money. If you have less money, you eat worse. You have less access to healthcare, right, these are all. These things are connected. Quality of life, quality of life. Quality of life you can't get to the gym, you can't get to all the stores. We talked about that a moment ago. So that's the thing it's like without public transit for the people who have no other way of getting around. It limits their life choices.
Speaker 3:How does a freeways affect, you know, affect public trans spaces.
Speaker 1:Well, they affect it in that you know it takes customers away because people are now going on the highways. They also separate neighborhoods, right. So where you point, you know you had a viable neighborhood, maybe middle income, maybe lower middle income neighborhood and now you cut it in half.
Speaker 3:And here is where we subtract the noise, the myth that highways are not an intentional tool of destruction for certain communities. Atlanta I-75, 85 and I-20. New Orleans Claybourne Expressway. Syracuse I-81. New York City the Cross Bronx Expressway. Miami Interstate 95. Detroit Interstate 375. Nashville I-40. Oakland I-980. Here's where you may say, like many policy makers and urban apologists now, zett, these are just unintended consequences of urban renewal. Tulsa I-244. Denver I-70. San Francisco I-280. Washington DC I-295. Memphis I-40. Charlotte Interstate 277. Birmingham I-20. I-59. That's more than 15. It only takes three years. I just gave you that times five plus a few.
Speaker 3:Beginning with the 1949 Housing Act, the federal government delivered significant funding for urban renewal projects, using the term slum clearance, which is a dog whistle for black residential neighborhoods listen up, kids. They paved the way literally for commercial projects and public facilities. This is where eminent domain earns its name. Black neighborhoods were targeted to make way for new interstates, primarily designed to carry white suburban commuters into the city. Feeling the next several decades of incredible suburban expansion in nearly all directions, the many interstates and massive interchanges that follow separated white and black communities in Atlanta and accelerated the flow of white Atlantis into the suburbs.
Speaker 3:In Atlanta, at least 4,000 families 4,000, were displaced under this act. Nine out of ten were black. This is actually a conservative count. I want to say all of them, but my grandfather taught me to never say all or every in any conversation that matters, so I'll stick with the given statistics. West End, butler Street, bedford Pine, buttermilk Bottoms, summer Hill all streets known to Old Atlanta shout out were included, not to mention the historic, iconic Auburn Avenue. And the thing about a highway is it's not like you can just hop across it. There's only certain points that you can get through to the other side of the neighborhood.
Speaker 1:So you can look at I-20, right, grand Park was called the Grand Park. You mentioned Summer Hill, down by the stadium, right? All these used to be unified neighborhoods that were segregated by highways. So now let's say you had a bus line on one side of the highway. Well, the people from the other side can't get there, because then we think about how long the spans are between underpasses, under highways.
Speaker 1:So there's that effect, you know, dividing the city, making it less walkable, making it less bikeable, which also reduces access. Because we talked about this already, you need to be able to get to where the bus line is. Like the bus is not going to come to your front door usually, right, you have to travel some distance of time. Now, if you have highways or you know big, you know four, five, six lane roads that you have to cross. You have to get to where the bus line is. And then you have to get to the roads that you have to cross and play frog or with all these people who are angry, sitting in traffic, running lights because you know they're late, it definitely has an effect. The walkability of your neighborhood is definitely going to impact public transit utilization because you have to get from public transit to your house.
Speaker 3:In this country, it seems that highways were placed to create convenience for some groups at the expense of others. Many of you interstate highways as money meant to the American racist past, similar to the Confederate statues that we see all around. This can not quickly be taken down, because they underpin the automobile-oriented transportation system. And this is not to mention the health consequences of high asthma rates, heart disease, mental health risks and noise pollution that comes with highways, increased risk of premature death, neighborhood instability and community trauma. It was seen to us that every time that we drive on these highways, it's worth remembering what it took to get them there and the people who were affected. And this is where we divide and conquer as we talk about solutions to these challenges that we have discussed in this episode. In a case like Atlanta, is the genie out the bottle? What's the first step in transforming that into a place that relies more on?
Speaker 1:public transit. You have to force housing density where transit already exists. So it's not about building out the transit to go further out. Where is it working already? Let's improve that. So there are some people that are using it and some people that aren't.
Speaker 1:These neighborhoods, all these neighborhoods here, very accessible to transit. Some of these people also work downtown midtown. You know Buckhead, that's accessible by train. They're just not sort of familiar with doing that and so it's, you know, back to this culture thing where we put influence on each other, you sort of a peer pressure kind of thing. Like I'm doing it, hey, try it, you try it. You're riding, like, oh, I had a chat with my buddy, I met this person on the train or whatever, and it's, you know, person by person. And that's how it has to be, this slow evolution.
Speaker 1:What can we do from a public policy standpoint? Force people to build more dense developments where that transit already exists. We have the backbone here in Atlanta, right, we have, you know, the Marta Line. We don't have to expand it, just utilize what's there for the benefits that it can provide. When I was an advocacy, this was part of my soapbox. It's like let's be advocates that are promoting things that already work. Let's point those out. Let's get people to use those more, as opposed to oh, this is bad, and this is bad, and this is bad and this is why it doesn't work. Let's promote the positive. Use it for where you can.
Speaker 3:I'm sorry, I don't make cuts for that. You said something about expansion. I've always heard throughout my life. You know Marta needs to expand access to certain areas. But I also wonder is expansion an asset or is optimization an asset?
Speaker 1:I think you spoke to that a little bit today. It's definitely optimization. Listen, if we had unlimited funds, yeah, let's build it everywhere. But we don't. We have you know X amount of dollars that's got to be spread out over the whole city. So if we could improve what we have instead of?
Speaker 1:You know, all the politicians are always everywhere, not just Atlanta. This is just how it works, right. They want to bring the bling factor to themselves, and so we do new things you ribbon cuttings and shoveling the ground and all that kind of stuff because it's sexy, it's exciting, it gets people to notice. Nobody notices that we fixed the station or we put more trash cans out so it's cleaner, or we put more police force out there so it's safer, right? These things are hardly noticed. What's noticed are the big things. So you know, if you have a certain size operations budget but you build out the system to go to the suburbs, where it's not terribly efficient, now you've got to support that and so you're spreading your operations dollars thin. So you know your question. The direct answer is in my opinion it's just my opinion you have to take the assets that you have, optimize those and let it grow naturally from there.
Speaker 3:Can you discuss any specific strategies being employed to increase radicyp among those who prefer cars?
Speaker 1:Sure, none of these are going to be popular. Reduce parking availability right. Increase the cost of parking. Use those costs that funding to increase transportation right. Nobody really wants to do that. But if I mean, just put you know, anybody can think about this, like if I'm going somewhere and I have to go there and there's no parking, I'm going to find some other way, you know, to get there. Like people use the transit system to go to the, you know, atlanta United Games or the Falcons Games or basketball games. Why? Because it takes you right there and you don't have to worry about parking.
Speaker 3:Right. I remember when I was young and my granddad used to take us to the Falcons game, we were on the water. We were on the park at the water station and ride you know the train to. In fact, that was the only time I would call a ride in the water in my life.
Speaker 1:And you're not the only one. We have lots and lots of people that do that. We see it all the time. You know Taylor Swift concert, beyonce concert, you know basketball, soccer. All these things people do. Just like you said, they only ride for that, but they're not going to do it, you know, for other purposes.
Speaker 3:As we talk, I just think how much of the city of Atlanta have I been robbed of because I have been in a car most of my life going to a funeral. You know, and you know just, the Atlanta formula. I've been born and raised in Atlanta, but it's certain aspects of Atlanta that I'm missing. I don't have missed out on, because you know, this culture. I've been brought up in driving everywhere.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, when you drive, you don't notice all this stuff around you, right. Get on a bicycle, you notice more. When you walk, you notice even more, right. So I think that's a really nice way of putting it. Like, what have you been robbed of by this car culture that you think and everyone tells you is so great and it gives you all this freedom because you can go all these places whenever you want. But I think it's a bit of a misnomer, right, like what happens when everybody wants to go somewhere at the same time. Like, think back to I think it was 2015,. We had the snowmageddon thing. Oh yeah, everyone tried to leave work.
Speaker 1:at the same exact time you talk to me about freedom of movement. There Nobody could go anywhere.
Speaker 3:It's two o'clock 10 hours.
Speaker 1:Yeah, they spent the night in the car, right, Because everybody tried to leave at once. Now we had a transit system. We could have gotten everybody to where they needed to go If people would have stayed off the roads, rode the buses, rode the trains what does adequate federal and local public transit funding look like for Mara or any other?
Speaker 1:big city, us? That's a really good question. I don't know that I've actually heard that question asked before. It's always we need more, we need more. But so I was thinking about this a little bit and I think you have to start thinking about the people first. Right, there are people that move the trains and move the buses. So, if you're talking about adequate funding, there's a shortage of those operators. I don't know if you've been reading about this, but, like every transit agency I just got back from a conference is having these kinds of issues with operators and staffing. Pay them more money, right? So that's a start. Is you have some amount of transit that you want to provide? You've got to have the funding to pay the people, because if you don't, they're going to go work at UPS. There are people you mentioned, you know, koi Dumas. He's been retired after 51 years. He loved his job, right.
Speaker 1:But getting started in a union type environment, you have to sort of pay your dues, and so by the time you get to where you're making good money and having the good routes, it's tough, and so we need to provide if, whatever service we're providing, you've got to make sure that you can pay the people a living wage. That's where it starts. See, whatever footprint you want to cover, you want to make sure that you can run an effective service with headways that are reasonable, right? So we talked about this a little while ago. If you have a train coming every hour or a bus coming every hour, it's really tough, right? So if you're going to have a route, let's make sure that it has those headways that are short enough that's easy for people to use, right? So you're helping the people who already need it, but you're also attracting more people. And, again, if you attract more people, we can have a little bit more money. We can improve the service.
Speaker 1:So I don't think there's necessarily an answer of, hey, you know, we need X amount of dollars, but it's making sure that the funding that exists can cover those kinds of things and not that we're scraping by and just trying to hire just anybody because they're just not going to make it very long. Right? It's the same thing with any public service. You look at teachers. It's the same problem. If you pay the teachers more, you're going to get better teachers, right? You're going to have teachers and not just better teachers.
Speaker 1:Maybe I'm saying that wrong. It's teachers who aren't going to have to worry about some of the other things and they can focus more on their job. Right, if you have a kid that you're trying to feed or you need taken care of and you don't get paid enough money to have that kid taken care of, that's a worry that you have right. So this isn't just bus operators or just teachers. This is just like anybody. It's just a common sense thing. So I think a lot of the answer in this funding thing is like let's start with the people, let's take care of the people.
Speaker 3:The man known as Mr Martyr. Coy Dumas is a walking Atlanta encyclopedia Coming from Adamsville Swatts. He knows the roads like the back of his hand and is as quick to deliver a pleasant word as he is to handle any unpleasant business to come his way. Recently retired after 51 years 51 of driving over 2 million miles with no accident, 2 million and thousands of passengers around he adores his wife, teresa, to whom he's been married to for 46 years, crediting her mightily for his success throughout the years. They are both grace personified. When I read about him, I knew I had to meet this guy and when I finally did, he was without a doubt better than advertised. I met with him at the Martyr station on Perry Boulevard and he proceeded to give me tremendous gain. So now let's multiply the vibes with Coy Dumas. Do you feel like a celebrity?
Speaker 5:You know, my wife and I talk about that from time to time and we try to stay humble. But most people ask me that and they say they tell me that I'm a celebrity. Just last week I called Triple A to take a look at my truck and the gentleman. When he came out I met him down and I spoke to him. I said it may have been a week and a half ago and I said good morning and happy New Year to you. He spoke to me and he said I know you. I know you're the man that did 51 years with Marta. I said yes, sir, and he was so excited that I felt special. My wife came down a couple of minutes later. She tried to figure out what was going on and then he told me. He said I know your husband, I'm going to tell my grandmother. And when he said he was going to tell grandma I did not feel offended because she probably had more experience riding with me than he would have.
Speaker 5:But you hear me talk a lot about what my granddad had told us that's coming up. He always said, son, whatever you do, be the best at what you do, regardless of what it is. Now you hear people say that a lot. You know it's more of a cliche than anything, but this is something that I was taught coming up, and my brother and my sister was also. My mom had that kind of high insight, as whatever you do be the best is what you're going to, and my grandmother wanted to tell you that mama days she was a mess. Now that's my dad's mom, but my mom dad. We call him daddy Harvey Moses senior. They called him Jake. He worked for the railroad 41 years.
Speaker 3:So growing up you were familiar with trains and the railroad industry.
Speaker 5:Some what? Yeah, because we would take a trip up to New York or Florida where they had family members at, and of course we could ride the train for free because he worked with them. But he would my job as a young kid. He worked the midnight shift. I remember being seven, six or seven years old, waking my granddad up to get him ready about nine, 30, 10 o'clock at night, to make sure he ate before he went to work and to make sure he was quite awake as well. And that was something I did up for quite a few years, off and on, and I had much respect for this man.
Speaker 3:Right on, talk about your childhood. So you grew up in Atlanta. What part of Atlanta?
Speaker 5:Well, I grew up in Atlanta, adamsville, the West Side, griffin Office, simpson, oliver Street and College.
Speaker 3:Park. You grew up in Atlanta. Adamsville I grew up in Cascade very similar areas. Can you talk about Atlanta as when you were a child and the changes you've seen in the city over the years?
Speaker 5:Oh man, I don't mind telling my age, but I might tell it more than that by saying so. But I've been blessed to see a lot of changes in this. I remember when I started driving the line of transit we had what we called the 200 buses, the 400s and the 500s and the 600s those are the series that was on 1953. The line of transit had that unit. They started in 1953, 1954 to 1974, and they retired it. The bus that's a replica of the one Ms Park refused to stand up in. Normally when Dr Mollif's King birthday they bring that bus out and they bring the other antique out of me, because I was the only one still here that was blessed to drive a bus similar to that for over two years. Off and on. Who led you to it? My uncle. I was managing a shoe store. I guess back then it was Ashway and Martin Luther King. It wasn't the White Harbor Street, ashway and Martin Luther King. My uncle, he's about eight years older than me. We kind of grew up in more like a big problem. I can tell my aunt that's 10 years old and so she won't like a big sister to me. I've always been mature for my age. He would come by the shoe store and it'd be about 10, 30, 11 o'clock. I said I thought you was at work. He said, yeah, I've been at work. What you off already? He said now I have what we call a two-timer. I said a two-timer, what's a two-timer? He went to work at five that morning and got off at about 9.30, 9.45. He had a three-hour break and he was going to go back about one or something. He explained to me a two-timer. He wouldn't come every day, he would come maybe a couple of times a week and I said, well, I might be interested in that.
Speaker 5:Originally, when I was at Washington High, the Atlanta Transit came by. I was getting stuck looking for students to help clean the buses. I was supposed to have been in that group but it never did evolve and to have full circle, God's grace he brought me back. My uncle came in. I said I thought a couple of things about it. I said I think I would do that. So initially, when I took the first test, I was bored of lying for being old enough. So I thought I said, well, I'll put in for a hostel. Because he explained me the difference. The hostels are the ones that clean the buses and service the bus and I knew I took a lot of tests. But I took a test and Mr Dean was going to. He was doing my final interview. But God blessed me before that final interview that I saw a couple of guys came out of high school a couple of years before me.
Speaker 5:We talked for a few minutes and I'm always looking around and paying attention to what's going on. I noticed the paperwork they had was a different color from mine. So when they went on into the testing area I asked the receptionist. I said the gentleman I was speaking to. I noticed that paperwork was a different color. I told her what color. She said they'd taken the test for operations. So when they called me in for my final interview they told me they were going to hire me as a junior's apprentice at maintenance and I don't forget. I told Mr Dean.
Speaker 5:I said well, how long would it be before I could transfer it to operations, which is driving the bus? He gave me a funny look and said it'd be six months before we talked to you about it. My mind said at 21, 22 years old, is he talking about two years Now? I would have had to seniority with the company but not in operations. So I told him I wanted to take the test for operations. So he gave me that look three times uglier than what it was the first time. And he said if you don't pass that test, you don't get to eat a job. And I never forgot that 52 years later. And what I told him? I said you got the right one. That's back to what my grandfather told me. Yeah, I told him you got the right one. He looked I took the test. My God's grace, here I am.
Speaker 3:When you started driving for Marta, did you imagine, 51 years down the line, that we'll be? Not necessarily we'll be sitting this moment now, but that you will be at this place where you're being celebrated for your unblemished driving record, which we'll get to shortly, because I am curious to know how you drove two million plus miles without accident. We'll talk about it later. Did you sit out to be like the best driver that you can be?
Speaker 5:I didn't set out to do 50 years. I set out to be the best of the best. I actually it could even share something with you when I started with Lionel Transit, and what they would tell us is that the one that did not miss any days of training back during that time we were only doing 30 or 31 days of training, not half as long as it is now. But they said the ones that didn't miss any training would get their senior numbers, get seniority. It was myself and one other gentleman out of the 18 of us, and I was the youngest one in the class Out of the 18 of us that did not miss a day. Of course they didn't do it the way they said they would, but that's all right.
Speaker 5:I pulled a number which was 1480 and a guy knocked it out of my hand. He was older than I was and I've always been mature for my age, so I don't go through drama. You know I figured whatever it is, it's what I got a plan for. So when he knocked that number out of my hand which was 1480, I pulled 1483. That was my after my cadet number. That was my first operator number. 1480 has been gone for 50 years. Let's say I should have been gone for 49 years. 1483 is number one cause. It's all by God's grace. The justice show how things work. But to back up to the other part of the question, when we graduated I told my classmates I was gonna be number one one day. I had no idea how true it was gonna be. I've been blessed to be number one almost 12 years long as anyone ever to have been at number one stage.
Speaker 3:What kind of spirit do you have to put in you to be successful? Like not just a public transit worker, but just a public service? Like what kind of spirit you gotta have to be the?
Speaker 5:best service, the spirit I would say.
Speaker 5:First of all you got to be humble, you got to like what you do, you got to put yourself in a certain mindset and realize, especially in transportation, as a frontline troop and operator, I have to keep the mindset that people count on me.
Speaker 5:We got a bigger percentage, so quite a few percentage of people that ride the public transportation that really don't have to. They may have a couple of vehicles and they choose to or that more convenient for you, but more so than not, most of the people that ride the system needs the system. So you have to keep that mindset. People count on us to get them to the doctor, to the grocery store, to work, to school, to house, to appointments, and I can say we carry the most valuable cargo in this human life. And this is something that I cannot say often enough because I have seen accidents. I've been blessed not to have an accident and in the whole my tenure that was my fault. Now I've had people hit me, but I've also been blessed to react in a certain manner that saved people lives and saved mine.
Speaker 3:How is your hand that coordinates?
Speaker 5:I played a little football. I coached football and baseball. My brother played, you name it, we played it.
Speaker 3:I've been in the marsh out since I was six years old Can you drive as much as you do to not have an accident. That's obviously a guy's greatest, but it's also a lot of skill on your part too.
Speaker 5:Well, I appreciate that it takes skill. When the new class is coming, I'm blessed to speak to them while they steal cadets, and I always tell everybody the same thing, because that's why I feel about it. So, welcome to the family, welcome to the best of the best. And they look at me. I said that's not being arrogant, that's being real with you Because yes, because you to do this and do what we do on a daily basis, you got to be the best of the best. We have people lives in our hands each and every day.
Speaker 5:You know I spoke earlier about I've been blessed to have perfect attendance most of my tenure here. There have been times I won 100%, but I would always make sure I was in control and if I thought I was in a situation where I was too weak to do my job and do it safely, I wouldn't do it, I wouldn't show up. But I've been blessed that he gave me that inner spirit to adjust the situation according to the old military term Just act according to the situation and adjust it as it goes. So, but a lot of heads I think had to do with the Marchards and the sports that we play coming up.
Speaker 3:You mentioned your wife many times and I said I got to say when I first reached out to you, your wife's voice was the first voice I heard and I immediately sensed your togetherness, your closeness, talk about your marriage. What was your wife meaning?
Speaker 5:My wife's name is Teresa Maria Dumas. She's not on my right, in my left hand, she's my soul. I always refer to her as my Queen of Queens. Everybody at Mata knows that how I refer to her, because that's what she is.
Speaker 5:As long as we've been together 46 years she gets up with me when I was working every morning two, two-thirty in the morning, gets my lunch and my breakfast ready. I don't eat breakfast early in the morning but she's gonna make sure my coffee on my tea, whatever she allowed me to drink that day. Or she said I was drinking too much coffee so she cut some of the back of the tea so I can have coffee maybe a couple of days a week. But she would get up and fix my, prepare me and help me get out to work each and every day and she still had to go to work herself late on. The routine is when I get to work I let her know I made it and vice versa. You just don't find people with that kind of spirit and that kind of soul every day. We made an agreement that we were gonna always have each other six Now. I'm not the best person in the world and if it up with me. She's real special, but I strive on taking care of my own.
Speaker 3:From reminiscing on dope ancestral legacies of the poor man Porter to learning about transportation solutions, to talking to a real city legend, this episode has been fun. Every time I do a deep dive into Atlanta, whether through reading or interviewing people, I come away amazed at the level of resilience, soul and craft that people here display. So here's the deal A great city has to provide viable choices for all of its striving citizens and help for its citizens who is unable to help themselves. At this point in my life, I am, admittedly, a suburban night Currently on the outskirts, and I love it here. For me, my car is perfectly suitable. I have a whole family and we have loved ones in the city.
Speaker 3:Relying on public transit on the daily isn't attractive for me, but parking is a pain and when I look over to see other drivers I'm often seeing phone in hand, which does not bode well for the public safety. And there is copious evidence that suggests that riding in a train or bus is far safer than in a sedan or SUV. So I understand the need for an optimized public transit system. I understand why some would like none other than to ditch their ride and hop on a rail or bus, and the real is. Atlanta is limited in its options for one to pursue that route. An adequate public transit is a liability for any city seeking to be the best it can be. But one thing we didn't touch on much in this episode that affects how we perceive public transit is crime. If you haven't heard, atlanta has been grappling with that perception for a couple of generations now, but recent statistics indicate it is on its way down. At least murders are. Is this true? Anecdotally? Perhaps the next time we meet we'll address that. Until then, y'all stay fine.
Speaker 3:I truly appreciate the guests on this show, dr Chris Vitakovsky and the heroic Koy Dumis, who are both so gracious with their time. Many thanks to Maydale, ray and Wynn on the track for lacing us with the SuperSonics One time. For Culture Collective for the robust brand support To the many sources I've relied upon Darren Givens of Thread ATL, dan Emmerglock, smart Growth, atlanta Magazine. The scholarship is set. And to you, supporters and partakers of this podcast, keep being amazing and, as always, do everything you can to prohibit yourself from being a hater. All love y'all Until next time, emtionorg. That's it, thank you. Bye you.
