"The reality is free transit is working. We are seeing massive transit improvements in Boston, Merrimack Valley, and Worcester— these systems are bucking the trends of downward transit ridership that was happening before the pandemic," Thompson said.

“We are not looking for perfection, we are looking for people who will be engaged,” said Stacy Thompson, executive director of Livable Streets, a local transportation advocacy group. “If people the Healey administration is appointing do the work we assume they will do, in a year or two the T will feel different to the riding public.”

Stacy Thompson, Executive Director of “Livable Streets”, a group which advocates for equitable transportation solutions, talks about the MBTA possibly shutting down the Blue Line for repairs every night for a month.

Stacy Thompson, the executive director of LivableStreets Alliance, an advocacy organization dedicated to making city streets more pedestrian-friendly, joined Errol Louis on “Inside City Hall” Thursday to talk about some of the lessons that could be learned from Boston.

“I don’t think transit is dead,” she said. “I think we need to meet the reality of where a thriving global city should be, which is moving 24 hours a day, seven days a week, in different directions for different reasons.”

Stacy Thompson, the executive director of LivableStreets Alliance, said the T must balance both near-term safety and maintenance, while also working on expansion.

“Things like expansion and resiliency are not extras, or nice to have. They should be considered core to the viability of the system,” Thompson said.

“We need to hire enough bus operators that, by September, we’re running more service,” Thompson said. “It’s that simple.”

“At this moment, I think riders really want someone who will help make sure the T just moves, just truly shows up on time, gets them to where they need to go,” Thompson said. “And I think that Philip Eng's general skills align with that desire.”

“Whether it’s with the company working on our fare collection system, the company making the new Red and Orange Line trains, if you don’t have enough oversight and consistent management, things like this are more likely to happen. There is an emerging pattern,” she said, though she cautioned that she does not know enough about the Pigsley case to say if lax oversight played a role.

Similarly, raised crosswalks reduce vehicle speeds by functioning as a type of speed bump, said Stacy Thompson, executive director of LivableStreets, a transportation advocacy organization. “It’s the ideal condition,” Thompson said. “It forces the car to slow down, otherwise they’ll bottom out.”

“Go with the transparency route, let people know what you’re doing. There’s a real value in marketing to help simplify really complex things,” Stacy Thompson of LiveableStreets Alliance said.