America’s Sorriest Bus Stop: Kansas City vs. DC

To see how little respect bus riders get from public officials, just take a look at the sorry condition of America’s bus stops. To make riding the bus a comfortable and dignified experience, we need to do better.

Readers submitted 16 forlorn waiting areas for Streetsblog’s “Sorriest Bus Stop in America” competition. Earlier this week, Silver Spring, Maryland, knocked off New Castle, Delaware, to move on to the second round.

Today’s matchup pits a sports stadium bus stop against a national park bus stop. Which is worse?

Kansas City

Brian Curran submitted this invisible bus stop. He writes:

This stop is in Kansas City near Kaufmann Stadium, where the Royals play. It’s located on the side of a multi-lane highway with no crosswalks nearby, and no place other than a vast grassy area to wait for the bus. There is no signage indicating exactly where the stop is either. An adventurous way to get to and from a Royals game!

The bus system in KC is run by the Kansas City Area Transportation Authority, which is run by a board comprised of appointed members from both Missouri and Kansas.

We need an overhead view and another layer of information to even see where the bus stops. Note the dirt paths to the parking lot, presumably marking where people have walked between the stadium and the bus.

Agencies in charge: Missouri DOT, KCATA

Washington, DC

Submitter Jacob Mason says of this bus stop:

From DC, this bus stop adjacent to Fort Circle Park has no sidewalk, no crosswalk, and even though you can literally see the many houses on the other side of this linear park, there is no path to cross the park. When it rains, bus riders stand or walk in the mud to get here. This land belongs to the National Park Service, which for decades has neglected to build sidewalks on streets within and adjacent to its parks in DC. Despite all this neglect of pedestrians, someone paid a good deal of money to build a concrete bus pad to make sure that the pavement doesn’t get messed up from buses stopping there.

Agency in charge: National Park Service.

Here’s a map of all our contestants so far, with today’s matchup in green.