To illustrate the importance of transportation in our national life, identify a transportation-related article that appears in a local or national newspaper. Discuss the issue involved and explain why the article is newsworthy.

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

In 2012, many areas in New York City were devastated by Hurricane Sandy. An article was published on December 2, 2012 in The New York Times to illustrate the importance of transportation on society, especially facing an emergency. Transit officials said that normal train services to the Rockaways were not going to resume for several months. People still needed to go to places, especially in a city like New York, where car ownership is relatively low and many people depend on transit. The article describes the solution found for the transit agency to reduce the impacts of Hurricane Sandy in daily activities of the population of the Rockaways; a special line, the shuttle line H, started running through a stretch of the devastated area, making stops at a limited number of
stations.

This is an example of an article in a major newspaper that mainly keeps the population informed of their options for transportation after an emergency. In this case, this article also was important to show population in general a sign of progress after a tragedy; the article shows the effort of the transit agency to keep society’s daily activities as normal as possible after the hurricane.