Sunday is national Transit Equity Day in honor of civil rights icon Rosa Parks.
The Maryland Transit Administration is ensuring that its commuters ride for free Feb. 4. That includes rides on local bus, light rail, metro subway, MARC Train and mobility and, where operating, commuter bus.
“Public transit belongs to everyone,” said Maryland Transportation Secretary Paul J. Wiedefeld. “As we honor the incredible legacy of Rosa Parks, the Maryland Department of Transportation strives to make our transit systems more equitable, inclusive and convenient for all Marylanders.”
“Equity is at the center of everything we do, and a core value of the Maryland Transit Administration,” said Maryland Transit Administrator Holly Arnold in a news release. “We are proud to offer free service to our riders on Transit Equity Day in recognition of that value, and to honor the courage of Rosa Parks.”
Parks, a Black seamstress from Montgomery, Alabama, etched her name in history on Dec. 1, 1955, when she defied local law and refused to give up her seat to a White passenger on a segregated public transit bus. Her subsequent arrest sparked the Montgomery Bus Boycott and legal challenges to the segregation law which was eventually ruled unconstitutional in November 1956.
