10,000 ... and Counting

BeltLine Rail Now co-chair Matthew Rao and volunteers Beth Smith (left) and Robyn Turner deliver 10,000 signatures calling for a speedy completion of BeltLine rail to City Hall.

Feb. 4 was Transit Equity Day — the birthday of Rosa Parks, whose refusal to give up her seat on a segregated bus in 1955 sparked the Civil Rights movement. And thanks to you, we hit our goal of delivering 10,000 signatures calling for a speedy build-out of BeltLine rail to Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms' office in time for this year’s Transit Equity Day. Your support — and your timing — was impeccable.

The petition was accompanied by a document outlining the equitable transit the BeltLine could deliver, as well as the affordability it could help provide to neighborhoods where construction is still under way … if it’s done quickly. But of the 45 neighborhoods along the BeltLine, the ones where residents most depend on transit and who bear the brunt of the regressive sales taxes that fund MARTA will be among the last to see any track laid under current plans. And those plans came before an economic slump that could push that timetable back further. You can read our document here, but here’s a preview below.