Houston TX - The Metropolitan Transit Authority of Harris County (Metro) has reintroduced its Adopt-A-Stop and Adopt-A-Shelter program according to a Houston Chronicle story.
The main focus of this program is to allow businesses and community groups that want to help do their part to control crime and improve transit to become involved. The volunteers are the watchdogs of their adopted stop or shelter and are given numbers to report crime, vandalism or other incidents including just plain lack of maintenance of a shelter or stop by Metro.
The program is a very low cost method to help improve the safety of the area as well as helping to keep Metro notified of problems at a particular stop or shelter that need attention. By getting the community involved, it helps both police and Metro out through giving both agencies many more eyes and ears.
A low cost program such as this is something that transit systems should be doing everywhere. It helps build awareness of the transit system as well helps give the transit system that positive image which so many operations across the country are willing to spend millions of our tax dollars on. The big plus is that it also helps put more eyes and ears out to help police reduce crime.
This is one of the few times you will read or hear this writer say anything along these lines: While the Adopt-A-Stop program does cost some money to administer and run, the overall benefits to the transit system and the community far outweigh the small cost of the program to taxpayers.
A Laurel goes out to the Houston Metro for putting this program back in place as well as one to Dimitrios Fetokakis who's phone call about problems at one of the Metro's stops and willing first volunteer in the program was the catalyst for Metro to reintroduce the program.
No comments:
Post a Comment