Is It Safe to Ride Tucson Buses?

TUCSON – Local news has been full of stories about assaults being committed on Tucson buses and at bus stops, including a hatchet attack at the downtown Ronstadt transit center.

The union that represents bus drivers is demanding that the city improve safety, the city has surveyed residents on their feelings about public transit, politicians from the political monopoly that has run the city for decades have parroted the party line, and progressives keep insisting that bus rides should remain free as a way to help the downtrodden.

At the same time, there is continued angst among the populace about the city’s homeless problem, about crime along the Loop bike/walk path, and about the city being a national leader in impaired pedestrians being run over by impaired drivers. It’s been a long time coming, but there is a growing recognition that drug abuse might be a major contributing factor.

Missing from all of this chatter by the provincials is how Tucson compares to other cities in crime on public transit. As such, it is not known if Tucson’s problem is better or worse and what measures other cities have taken to reduce crime. If the city has done this analysis, it has not been reported in the local media—or at least I haven’t seen it in the various local news feeds that I read every day.

I’ve given a cursory look at some other cities. It’s been cursory because I’m emotionally and intellectually spent from doing deep dives on how Tucson compares to other cities in other areas. Such comparisons are rarely made by the local establishment, thus necessitating a personal effort.

In any event, it’s a reasonable assumption that a city with high crime in general will have high crime on public transit.

How does Tucson rank in overall crime? According to Neighborhood Scout, on a scale of 1 to 100, with 1 being the worst crime rate and 100 being the best crime rate, Tucson has an abysmal score of 6. It shouldn’t be a surprise, then, that it would also have high crime on public transit.

By comparison, El Paso has a score of 20 for overall crime, although it is directly across the border from Juarez, one of the most crime-ridden cities in Mexico and in the heart of Mexico’s drug cartel territory. Some sources say that El Paso is the safest large city in Texas.

Does it follow that El Paso has low crime on public transit? The question couldn’t be answered from a quick internet search. Someone would have to download and analyze data from the National Transit Database to know for sure. However, in reviewing news stories in the El Paso media, it didn’t appear that the city has a crime problem on public transit, except for some isolated incidents.

How about San Antonio? Well, San Antonio has a higher crime rate than even Tucson. Neighborhood Scout gives it a score of 1 for overall crime, versus Tucson’s 6 and El Paso’s 20.

That doesn’t surprise me. When I lived in the barrio of the Alamo City, I had my car stolen once, my chrome wheels stolen another time, and got caught once in the middle of a gun fight between gangbangers.

As with El Paso, data couldn’t be readily found for crime on San Antonio’s public transit. However, there is a separate police force dedicated to public transit in the San Antonio metropolis, a metropolis that has a much more extensive public transportation system than metro Tucson, where almost all of the public transit is concentrated in the city and not the surrounding suburbs.

San Antonio’s separate police force goes by the name, VIA Transit Police. Here’s an excerpt from VIA’s website:

VIA Transit Police go everywhere VIA goes, covering about 98% of Bexar County with 14 member cities and unincorporated areas of the region that together span 1,208 square miles – the second-largest transit service area in Texas.

VIA Transit Police officers patrol and maintain a presence at VIA facilities, offices, transit centers, shelters, and stops, and along the routes, roads, and highways, where VIA operates.

Officers conduct pro-active checks of buses, transit facilities, bus routes, and respond to calls for security as needed.

VIA’s Bicycle Patrol travels the Downtown San Antonio area to monitor activity at and around bus stops and shelters.

Has the above worked in reducing crime on San Antonio’s public transit? I don’t know, but at least the city gets an “A” for effort.

Transit advocates claim that public transit is safer than driving, but to get to that conclusion, they include injuries and deaths from car accidents instead of just focusing on crime rates.

I’m biased on the subject. When I lived in Chicago for ten years and took public transit to work, I was terrorized by criminals and deranged people on the El but never terrorized by them when I drove my car.

Transit advocates also claim that public transit doesn’t bring crime to neighborhoods. I’m biased once again. Based on my experience growing up in a St. Louis neighborhood, I believe that public transit does indeed bring crime, as do highways. When a freeway was put through the neighborhood, crime increased significantly near the freeway exits. And when St. Louis’ extensive light-rail network was extended to the neighborhood, crime increased significantly near the light-rail stop.

In summary, more research and analysis need to be done to know how Tucson compares to other cities in crime on public transit. But the city won’t do this until its leaders shed their parochialism and hubris.

Mr. Cantoni can be reached at [email protected].