🚌 Community Takes Action on the Bus Stop and Shuttle Line

🌟 Author’s Note

Happy May 1st to the 132 members of the Better Block Project 💪 This is the first of the now monthly Better Block updates, which you can start to expect on the 1st of each month. It’s been a very active month of activism across the Better Block Community, here is the TLDR:

• We finally met with the MTA and DOT on the Franklin Avenue Bus Stop 🚌. Residents and Better Block have created a petition to formally ask that the bus shelters be taken down for safety

• Shuttle Friends is advocating for a cleaner, safer and more beautiful space under the shuttle train 🚆. They hosted a great clean up this past month

• BetterBlockGPT now supports searching when your last street was cleaned 🧹, so you can advocate for cleaner streets on your block

For the full update dive in below ⬇️ 

🚌 Next Steps for the Bus Stop on Franklin Avenue

After many months of pushing, we finally had the meeting with MTA, DOT, Phara Souffrant Forrest’s office and Chi Osse’s office about the future of the bus stop on Franklin avenue that has caused so much pain for the neighborhood. Thanks so much to Isaiah from Phara’s office for being the driver to get this scheduled, and to Andre, Mark and Chris from the Lefferts and Brevoort Place blocks for attending in person.

The meeting went how these meetings go. There was a lot of discussion, some finger pointing and a healthy dose of “this is not my problem.” But, we took some meaningful step forward. The MTA representatives in the room did commit to fully removing the bus shelters if the residents aligned that this is what we wanted to happen. This was positive news, as before this meeting, we hadn’t had any conversation with MTA directly.

After much deliberation with residents, the blocks have created a petition to fully remove the bus shelters on Franklin Avenue to prevent the illicit activity that is happening there. Better Block is formally supporting this effort to remove these structures. The reason for this is simple: the bus shelters are no longer serving their function as a place for people to wait for public transit, and are only attracting illicit and dangerous activity for neighbors.

I hope you support the effort. This is one small step we believe will improve the safety of the area, and make for a safer neighborhood and commute for everyone who uses the area. As next steps, once the petition is finalized, it will be submitted to the MTA and we can expect the structure will be removed in a few months.

🚆 Shuttle Friends Cleaning Up Under the Shuttle Train

If we travel further down the 🚆 Shuttle Train into Crown Heights, I wanted to highlight some awesome work from two Better Block members, Jenny and Olivia, and the Shuttle Friends. Jenny, Olivia and crew have a vision to improve the space underneath the Shuttle Train that runs from Bed Stuy to Crown Heights. I have heard from so many of you individually about the pains of that beautiful train (we all have sort of a love hate relationship with it). Shuttle Friends wants to work with blocks to beautify the space to ensure it is safer, cleaner and more beautiful.

They started this by hosting an awesome clean up a few weeks ago, with many local residents walking the block and picking up trash.

The turnout was incredible, and by the end of the clean up you could eat dinner off of the beautiful streets under the Shuttle. It was truly an inspiring example of grassroots advocacy. Shuttle Friends is just getting started, so if you are interested in getting involved, I recommend connecting with Jenny (reply and I can make any intros) and joining their mailing list.

🧹 BetterBlockGPT Can Tell You When Your Street Was Cleaned

After all of this activism this month, I thought, how could BetterBlockGPT help? Well, it all comes down to trash 🗑️ . So much of the reason we care about pushing these issues forward is we really want cleaner streets!

Now, with BetterBlockGPT, you can search any block and it will return when the street was last cleaned, and how often it happens.

The next time you look at your block and see too much trash in the street, you can head to BetterBlockGPT and find out when the street was last cleaned. I hope this helps you out in one small way to advocate for a cleaner and more beautiful block.

That’s all for this month’s update. As always, if you know someone looking to make an impact in the neighborhood, forward them Better Block. We’d love to have them a part of the group.

See you next month,

David