Issue: Twitter Users Hate Public Transportation

Date: Feb 20, 2015 

Riding the bus is no bed of roses. And Twitter users across the nation have made it be known that their hometown buses and light-rail systems suck. 

A team led by Lisa Schweitzer, associate professor at the USC Price School of Public Policy, analyzed 64,000 tweets to come up with a look at how well public transportation ranks with the social media generation. The results were published in the Journal of the American Planning Association. 

The bad news: The Washington, D.C. Metro, Boston (MBTA), Philadelphia (SEPTA) and Chicago (CTA) public transit systems got dismal tweets. A few of these systems ranked lower on Twitter than the IRS, according to USC's analysis. 

"Negative and racist comments about transit patrons are a larger part of the negative comments about transit, much more so than parks, airlines or other services," Schweitzer said. "Otherwise, commenters appear on balance to say equally happy and unhappy things about public transit and airline service."

(Read the rest.)  

-cw

CityWatch

Vol 13 Issue 15

Pub: Feb 20, 2015