OPINION

What big cities can learn from the rural US about public transit

Grappling with bare-bones transportation networks, rural communities are implementing new transit innovations, a trend that federal infrastructure dollars could accelerate.

Published April 6, 2022
By Scott James Matheson and Sam Couvillon

Scott James Matheson is the mayor of Valdosta, Georgia, and Sam Couvillon is the mayor of Gainesville, Georgia.

It was splashed across headlines throughout 2020: Billions in additional federal funding is needed to keep the country’s public transportation systems afloat in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, with cities like Los Angeles, San Francisco, and (most notably) New York getting all of the focus. The federal government did stave off many of the severe cuts that were feared with the passage of the American Rescue Plan Act, but those funds are finite.

These investments are critical, but public transportation also exists outside of major urban metro areas, and mobility issues in rural communities are equally as important. Good public transportation in any city is a lifeline for accessing jobs, healthcare and education. While some assume everyone in rural America owns a car, most counties with high rates of zero-car households are actually rural ones. And for those who do own cars, car ownership is too often a massive expense.

As we watch urban areas grapple with slashing public transit services, rural residents and transit leaders are all too familiar with how bare-bones transportation networks can really be. In fact, most rural areas have been cut off from access to effective public transportation for years. But that is starting to change thanks to new transit innovations that rural communities are putting in place, a welcome trend that federal infrastructure dollars could accelerate.

Public transit has always looked different in communities like ours. While subways and large fixed-route bus systems might work well in Atlanta, those aren’t solutions that work well in rural Georgia. Over the last few decades, many rural communities have turned to dial-a-ride systems, in which riders can book rides by phone. As too many rural residents know, those services are rarely convenient or efficient: Rides typically have to be booked days or weeks in advance, pickup and drop-off times are unreliable, scheduling and routing are often done by hand, and these services are expensive for what they provide. It’s no surprise that many rural communities don’t even try to provide public transportation.

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