Eighty-three percent of people who answered a Fox 17 News online survey said they do not feel safe on Metro Nashville’s WeGo public buses.
Fox 17 posted the survey to X after a recent string of violent incidents at WeGo locations in Nashville and criticism of Mayor Freddie O’Connell’s efforts to invest in the city’s public buses.
Do you feel safe taking Nashville Metro's WeGo public buses?
— FoxNashville (@FOXNashville) May 25, 2024
Though the Fox 17 survey was conducted by a local news outlet and received more than 400 responses, it was conducted online via the social media platform X, meaning it is not scientifically rigorous or statistically significant. The survey does not necessarily depict an accurate snapshot of Nashville public opinion.
“You like playing Russian roulette?” one commenter said in response to the poll.
“There’s only like 12 people who ride,” said another. “100% of the population pays for it & 1% rides. For a beautiful city like Nashville it is a football bat – wrong tool.”
Fox 17 posted the poll after a man was shot three times at a WeGo bus stop in Nashville on Friday, the third such violent crime related to the bus system over the course of 10 days, The Tennessee Star previously reported. The shooting reportedly happened after an argument between the alleged shooter and the victim.
Metro Nashville Police Department said the victim is in stable condition.
Before that on May 20, a woman allegedly stabbed a Nashville bus driver with a kitchen knife, causing the bus driver to sustain hand injuries before the woman was arrested by police.
Before that on May 16, MNPD arrested Kenneth Johnston for allegedly shooting an 18-year-old “on the steps of the WeGo building at Rep John Lewis Way [and] MLK Jr. Blvd,” MNPD posted to X.
BREAKING: Convicted felon Kenneth Johnson, 31, is in custody for the 5:50 p.m. shooting of an 18 yr old man on the steps of the WeGo building at Rep John Lewis Way & MLK Jr Blvd. Johnson dropped his gun after an MNPD officer working at the bus station ordered him to. pic.twitter.com/P2z8ZkGz2x
— Metro Nashville PD (@MNPDNashville) May 17, 2024
“A drug motive is under investigation,” MNPD said in a follow-up post. “Apparent cocaine & marijuana were recovered. The 18-year-old victim also had a gun and fired. He is in critical-stable condition. Johnson will be charged with felonies related to the shooting later tonight.”
In response to the shooting, O’Connell requested a full safety review of WeGo, The Star previously reported. All the while, O’Connell is pushing his Choose How You Move initiative, a $6.93 billion public transportation plan to be funded by a half-cent sales tax increase that Nashvillians will vote for or against on November 5.
Through Choose How You Move, O’Connell aims to provide 24/7 public transportation and Bus Rapid Transit, a kind of bus system meant to imitate rail service.
“The crime is awful,” Nashville Tea Party Founder Ben Cunningham said about Nashville’s public transportation on an episode of The Michael Patrick Leahy Show. “It’s here in Nashville and it’s all on bus transits… Transit, in general, has been plagued by crime for a long time and that’s why, of course, the transit ridership is way down and is not going to come back.”
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Matthew Giffin is a reporter at The Tennessee Star and The Star News Network. Follow Matthew on X/Twitter.
Photo “Nashville’s WeGo Bus” by WeGo Public Transit.
