End of SEPTA strike allows some regular users to reclaim their lives
The SEPTA strike left 21-year-old Avery Johnson reeling last week. On Thursday, she was fired from her new job as a package handler for UPS.
/arc-anglerfish-arc2-prod-pmn.s3.amazonaws.com/public/GZEINWFYW5FJDFQ6MKMGOO6FEU.jpg)
The SEPTA strike left 21-year-old Avery Johnson reeling last week.
On Thursday, she was fired from her new job as a package handler for UPS.
"I was in my probationary period. I could miss no days," she said Monday evening as she sat on the steps outside the Market-Frankford Line entrance at 15th Street, counting change for a ride home to West Philadelphia.
In ways inconvenient or profound, the six-day strike disrupted the lives of hundreds of thousands of people who rely on public transportation in the city.
Johnson said she was fed up with the transit agency and vowed to get a car. "I'm not dealing with this anymore," she said.
Jermone Harley, 24, was lucky he didn't get fired from his job at an Amazon warehouse in New Jersey.
"I missed work all week," he said as he waited for a NJ Transit bus on Market Street on the east side of City Hall.
Harley needs to take a bus from his home in Southwest Philadelphia to the Market-Frankford Line to get to his NJ Transit bus stop.
He estimated it would take three to four hours to walk to the bus stop. On top of his 10-hour work shifts, that was too much.
"I didn't want to be burned out," he said.
Lazarus Coleman, 34, was able to drive to work in Center City from his home in Wynnefield, but it didn't make his life easier.
Instead of paying a small fortune parking in a nearby garage, Coleman parked by Washington Avenue in South Philadelphia and walked nearly a half-hour each way.
As a social worker, he needed to visit clients in South Philadelphia. So each visit required him to walk all the way back to his car.
When he heard the strike was over, "I was elated," he said as he waited for a bus at 15th and Market Streets to get back to his car.
On Tuesday, the car will stay home and he will be back on the El, he said.
Kate McCandless, 23, of Fishtown, counted the exact time it took her to walk home from her job at an engineering firm in Center City.
"Fifty-three minutes," she said as she waited in line to buy tokens at the SEPTA store in the concourse connecting the subway to Suburban Station.
To get to work, she took the ride-sharing service Uber in the morning.
How much did it cost her?
"On a good day, 13 [dollars]. Most of the time, 19," she said.
So how did McCandless feel when she found out the strike was done?
"Ecstatic," she said.
215-854-5983 @RobertMoran215