Whether it is around our home, around the block, around the city, or around the country—movement drives us. As cities across the country have grown, our movement patterns and strategies have changed. Before the age of “white flight”, when Whites moved out of inner cities as Black people desired to “integrate”. This ended up forcing a sort of reactionary, racist expansion of the typical American city into suburbs, and further along into exurbs—suburbs that push further and further into previously undeveloped or unpopular tracts or even barren deserts.
Center stage for the discourse on environmental effect, affect, and change brought about by public transport. At the moment, our current pause in getting around, brought about by the so-called “invisible enemy” of Covid-19, enables us to take a critical and conversational look at photos that, quite literally, move us.
In this study, each photo will be relating to a certain topic—public transit, private transit, or empty space in either—source(s) will be presented at the bottom of each photo and inside a self-contained bibliography for further reading. The goal of this project is to inspire the viewer to think critically about their own choices while they move around, and read further into environmental affect and effect—so instead of a strictly academic look, I am presenting a conversation with the reader/viewer—so we can engage in the sort of discourse that one would have with a friend or confidant—someone to navigate these strange times together and someone who is on the same level.
