Whom does New York City’s transit system serve?

A study of 66 million GPS mobility records shows that racial minorities are not as well served by transit as white New Yorkers. Yong Li and colleagues mapped the number of job sites, banks, healthcare facilities, parks, and schools that could be reached in an hour or less via buses and trains from a particular neighborhood. The authors found that white-majority neighborhoods consistently demonstrate higher accessibility compared to predominantly Hispanic and Black neighborhoods. The result is that many ethnic minorities face longer travel to essential services, lower access to job opportunities, and are more isolated in their neighborhoods. Compared to the white population, Black people have a 1%, 5%, 8%, and 7% longer travel distance to banks, healthcare facilities, parks, and schools, respectively. Today’s transit network exacerbates residential segregation by up to 27% relative to an equitable scenario in which all residents had identical accessibility. The minority disadvantage in transit has increased since 2014, as transit improvements have disproportionately benefited white neighborhoods. A simulation suggests that speeding up buses by 10% in areas with high concentrations of public housing and ethnic minorities, or constructing new subway lines, could reduce the accessibility gap by up to 49.8%. According to the authors, future planning for sustainable transit networks should prioritize social inclusiveness as a core guiding principle.