BOSTON — “Massachusetts residents live should not determine their mobility. People living in Regional Transit Authority (RTA) communities deserve access to robust transit that gets them where they need to go to live healthy and full lives,” said Alexis Walls, Assistant Campaign Director at MPHA. Community members along with MPHA, Transportation for Massachusetts, and other members of the RTA Advocates Coalition will present testimony at the Joint Committee on Transportation Public Hearing in support of the RTA Advancement Bill (H.3272/S.2277) on Wednesday, January 24.

Passage of the RTA Advancement Bill will codify a commitment of public funding into the regional transit system in Massachusetts as called for in the passage of the 2022 Fair Share Ballot Initiative; establish an RTA Fund in statute, mirroring the MBTA Fund; increase collaboration between RTAs, community stakeholders and state policymakers; and end the use of an outdated performance metric that incentivizes inequitable fare policies. For the 55% of Massachusetts residents who live outside the MBTA bus and subway service area, limited public transit negatively impacts access to employment, housing, food, and health care among other fundamental building blocks of good health. This is especially true for the low-income, older adults, and people with disabilities who are the primary users of RTAs.