24 Hours on Miami Buses

Douglas Hanks reports on how it went when two 20-something transit advocates, Azhar Chougle and Richard Hankins, tried to ride the buses of Miami-Dade County for 24 hours straight.

"The nonprofit is trying to champion modest improvements for the county’s bus system at a time when elected leaders are focusing on far pricier expansion projects, including a new rail line in North Dade," according to Hanks.

"The group’s latest bid to draw attention to the $228 million-a-year bus system was Friday’s marathon, a criss-cross of the county’s 96 bus routes that included brief ride-alongs with a few politicians," explains Hanks.

"Along with the exposure, the Transit Alliance’s bus marathon seeks to build the case for a redesign of the entire system to eliminate poorly used routes and beef up popular ones," adds Hanks. Transit Alliance Miami is underway with a $500,000 Better Bus project, with $250,000 in funding aiding the cause.

The rip saw high and lows, with Hanks documenting those and the other anecdotes from conversation with transit riders along the way in the 24-hour experiment.