The Battle Over Kennedy Plaza: Coalition Opposes Moving RIPTA Hub to 195 Land

The Battle Over Kennedy Plaza: Coalition Opposes Moving RIPTA Hub to 195 Land

In a statement issued on Wednesday, the "Kennedy Plaza Resilience Coalition" announced its opposition to moving the RIPTA transportation hub from its current location in central downtown Providence. 

The Coalition “opposes the proposal to move the state's central bus hub to Parcel 35 of I-195 land, in a remote location by the highway. The location simply isn’t workable. A hub must be located in the central downtown area to be usable for riders, which Kennedy Plaza already accomplishes without the need for heavy spending. Furthermore, the state will not meet its climate and transit goals without a focus on the Transit Master Plan, which this boondoggle detracts from.”

The new location abuts East Franklin Street, which runs parallel to I-95.

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The condition of Kennedy Plaza has been a major controversy in recent years due to crime and open drug dealing.

In August, Providence Police made major drug arrests. Then, in September, there were brawls in Kennedy Plaza with multiple arrests.

 

Too Far From Businesses and Services

The Coalition says, “This location is far from downtown Providence, too far away from many passengers to walk easily. Riders who use wheelchairs and walkers or push strollers will have to go uphill from Kennedy Plaza to the Parcel 35 location.”

“Rerouting buses to Parcel 35 will be awkward at best and the detours needed to serve that location will add to trip times. There are also a number of one-way streets in the area. At a time when Rhode Island is attempting to lower its carbon emissions to combat climate change, we shouldn’t be building a hub that will decrease ridership rather than increase it,” said the Coalition.

 

 

“Kennedy Plaza, on the other hand, is close to where most bus riders traveling to the city center want to be. It is within steps of City Hall, the post office, banks, restaurants, and cafes, and it is only a few blocks from Providence Place Mall, URI-Providence, Providence Public Library, and other places people commonly travel to,” said the group.

“According to RIPTA, 11,000 out of 15,000 daily riders terminate their trips at Kennedy Plaza.1 Any hub that is built must be in the central downtown area so these passengers can get where they want to go without a transfer. Although the hub relocation is being promoted as “transit-oriented development”, it is not: in actuality it does more to break up our state’s best example of transit-oriented development at Kennedy Plaza, pushing transit further away from riders’ most central destination,” added the Coalition.