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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsDetroiters Without Cars Seek Jobs in Vain as City Shrinks
Feb. 18 (Bloomberg)-- The predawn buses that Detroiter Greg Rich rode 20 miles to a suburban auto-parts plant were late so often he was fired in January.
The 27-year-old high-school graduate has no car and spent a year job-hunting before he took the $7.40-an-hour position that lasted only seven months. He said Detroit has no jobs for him and those in suburbs are unreachable.
Im very frustrated, Rich said in a phone interview during another day of searching the Internet for employment. The jobs now arent even in Michigan. Im looking for work in Atlanta. I have friends in Colorado who tell me, Youve got to move. Theres nothing there.
Detroit had the lowest rate of adults working or looking for employment in a 2012 federal survey. Merely getting to a job when it exists can be an insurmountable challenge in community built for cars whose footprint is big enough to encompass Boston, San Francisco and Manhattan. Twenty-six percent of the households in the insolvent former capital of auto manufacturing lacked a vehicle, compared with 9 percent nationally, according to a 2013 study by the Ann Arbor, Michigan-based Transportation Research Institute.
Everything starts with a job, Mayor Mike Duggan said in a phone interview. We need jobs in the city and we need to be able to transport people to where the jobs are.
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http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-02-18/detroiters-without-cars-seek-jobs-in-vain-amid-depopulated-city.html
SheilaT
(23,156 posts)In many cities the public transportation is not geared to those who must work shiftwork. The routes often do not do a sensible job of connecting residential areas with the work areas. It's been that way as long as I've been paying attention, which is nearly fifty years now. Not sure if it's getting worse, but it's certainly there.
MisterP
(23,730 posts)especially since LA built its first rail through the Rodney King zone to crack its total isolation: it's now the most-ridden line in the US (which is a problem, since people keep trying to dodge the crossing gates...)