SEPTA travelers who rely on the bus continue to ride despite recent shootings: ‘What are you gonna do?’
Whatever emotions commuters had after the fourth shooting near a SEPTA bus in a week, they still had to get to work.
After a shooting left eight teenage students injured in Northeast Philadelphia — the fourth shooting near a SEPTA bus this week — some commuters were shocked and saddened, while others were unsurprised at what they saw as festering lawlessness.
But whatever they felt, they still had to get to work.
At SEPTA bus terminals in Center City and in Burholme, the site of the Wednesday afternoon shooting, public transit riders told The Inquirer that they relied on the city’s network of buses and trains and wouldn’t stop riding, even as some were skeptical of pledges from Philadelphia officials that promised to keep passengers safe.
“What are you gonna do? You can’t just stay in your house like a hermit,” said Dana Meeks while waiting for a SEPTA bus in Burholme on Thursday morning. “Or you won’t be in your house, because you’ve got to get money. You’re between a rock and a hard place.”
The 61-year-old from Olney was waiting for his ride at the “Five Points” intersection near Cottman and Rising Sun Avenues, which was flush with traffic less than a day after three gunmen exited a stolen Hyundai Sonata and opened fire at the group of teenagers, striking two SEPTA buses in the process.
» READ MORE: Eight students were shot near a SEPTA bus in Northeast Philly. Here’s what we know.
One teen was critically injured. No bus passengers were struck, but one bus took five bullets to its windows, dotting the vehicle from front to back.
Police Commissioner Kevin Bethel, Mayor Cherelle L. Parker, and District Attorney Larry Krasner all visited the intersection during a downpour in the hours after the shooting; the officials vowed to do everything in their powers to apprehend the suspects, make public transit riders safe, and combat the city’s ongoing gun violence crisis.
Riders like Meeks were less hopeful that a solution was imminent.
“It’s the guns, they’re rampant,” said Meeks, who uses SEPTA to ferry his young grandson to and from school. “Guns are so accessible, and that’s the problem. The cops can’t be everywhere.”
SEPTA riders in Center City were similarly concerned.
Though nearly 10 miles from Burholme, riders near North Broad Street and John F. Kennedy Boulevard had several recent incidents stoking their worries.
On Sunday, a 27-year-old man was shot and killed while exiting a Route 59 bus at Oxford Circle, and on Monday, a 17-year-old was fatally shot boarding a Route 6 bus leaving Imhotep Institute Charter High School in Ogontz.
Then, on Tuesday night, near Snyder Avenue near Broad Street, a suspect stepped off a Route 79 bus and fired a gun through the bus’s door, fatally striking a 37-year-old passenger in the chest.
“You never know when you’re gonna walk up to the door, what you’re gonna walk into,” said 27-year-old Dominique Thomas in Center City. Thomas, who has three children, said she relies on SEPTA to get to a career development program.
The mother said she felt safer in Philadelphia when she was younger.
“Now with our kids coming up, it’s not safe at all. It’s always a problem, it’s always a crime, somebody getting robbed, something happening.”
On a bus that traveled along Market Street, Mel Seligsohn, 85, said the recent shootings made him feel “sick” and “disturbed,” even as he continued to ride.
“I have friends who won’t come in town anymore because of this sort of feeling that the city is out of control,” Seligsohn said.
For others, like Patricia Fields in Burholme, the shooting disrupted daily life.
Fields was riding a Route 18 bus around two blocks from the scene when over 30 shots rang out, according to police estimates.
“They were in shock,” Fields said of her fellow riders, who were told to exit the bus at St. Vincent Street. “It was pretty much a solemn silence. It was eerie.”
But Fields was relatively unfazed by the incident, saying she normally feels safe on SEPTA buses because most of the shootings, she believes, are targeted at individuals involved in conflicts, not at random people.
Fields said she has faith in Parker, who vowed to combat gun violence during her rain-soaked appearance at the intersection. Parker ran a mayoral campaign promising to be tough on crime and support “constitutional” stop-and-frisk policies.
“She has it under control, and it will get better,” Fields said.
When asked about stop-and-frisk, the policy allowing police officers to search civilians based on suspicion of a crime, Bethel abruptly stopped the news conference. It was unclear whether Parker and her administration would support using the National Guard to police public transit, a policy recently enacted by New York’s governor.
Transit riders aren’t the only Philadelphians on edge.
The drivers who pilot SEPTA buses through the city are shaken after the vehicles were involved in four straight days of shootings, according to the leader of the union that represents them.
“They’re out there by themselves,” Brian Pollitt, president of Transport Workers Union Local 234, said Thursday.
For at least four years, the union has been speaking up about escalating assaults on operators of buses and trolleys, asking SEPTA management to do more to protect them.
Pollitt supports bringing in the National Guard, but Gov. Josh Shapiro, who would have to sign off on the force’s deployment, has said that he doesn’t want to do that.
» READ MORE: New York is tapping the National Guard to combat crime on its subways. Here’s why Philly isn’t doing the same.
SEPTA has taken some steps to boost safety for drivers, including the construction of bulletproof glass compartments around driver sections.
But those structures are still in the design phase. Meanwhile, some older union members are talking about retiring soon, while some younger operators say they are considering other jobs, according to Pollitt.
For those like Christina, a Burholme resident who did not want her last name used over fear for her safety, the violence is met with downtrodden resignation.
Christina was in her apartment overlooking the Five Points intersection when she heard the gunfire. Looking out her window in disbelief, she saw the injured bodies of the teens laying by the road.
She reacted with resignation.
“This is just normal,” Christina said.
Staff writer Thomas Fitzgerald contributed to this article.