PhilipTheBucket

Philadelphia’s transit system plunged into crisis on August 24, when the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority (SEPTA) slashed bus, trolley, subway, and Regional Rail service by 20%. SEPTA eliminated 32 bus routes, shortened 16 more, and reduced the frequency of other bus and train lines. The crisis occurred as a result of state lawmakers failing to close a USD 213 million budget gap. The funding standoff left the city’s 746,500 SEPTA riders stranded and pushed the nation’s sixth-largest transit agency toward what officials call a “death spiral” – which has deeply impacted the disproportionately Black and lower-income SEPTA ridership. Nearly three-quarters of Philadelphia transit riders don’t own a car; more than half are Black, and nearly half earn under USD 30,000 a year.

Cuts to public transit in Philadelphia have forced commuters to double their commute time, says longtime Philly-based organizer Talia Giles. In the process of interviewing Philly residents following SEPTA cuts, Giles said, “one of the people that we spoke to was a student, and she said that she’s lucky now if she makes it home within 45 minutes. But originally her commute was 20.”

But amid this crisis, as students and workers struggled to get to their destinations, a sports betting company stepped in to fill in the gaps to make sure that people could get to the first football game of the season on September 4. FanDuel, an online gambling company, pledged USD 80,000 to keep trains running on the Broad Street Line for the Philadelphia Eagles’ home opener. 

Transit across the country faces similar crisis

What led to this mass transit crisis? A huge boost in funds from the federal government to SEPTA during the pandemic has since been exhausted.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, aid was distributed by the US government to transit systems of major cities. Federal COVID relief funds provided to SEPTA amounted to about USD 1.5 billion, but this money was exhausted by June 2024. SEPTA never recovered its pre-pandemic ridership, and this, combined with the end of federal relief funds, contributed to the budget crisis that has raised new questions about the federal government’s role in supporting transit systems in major cities.

In Philadelphia, the lack of federal aid for SEPTA was exacerbated by the fact that unlike New York or Los Angeles, Philadelphia lacks a dedicated regional tax to fund transit.

Other transit systems which could face similar budget challenges with the end of federal COVID relief include the public transit in Chicago, Dallas, Portland, and San Francisco. For example, Chicago transit faces a USD 771 million budget deficit.

Service returns, but at a cost

On September 4, days after the service reductions went into place across Philadelphia, a Pennsylvania court ordered SEPTA to halt all planned service cuts, including eliminations of bus routes, Regional Rail lines, station closures, and curfews, and to immediately restore any services that had been reduced or eliminated. On Monday, September 8, Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro approved SEPTA’s request to redirect up to USD 394 million in capital assistance funds initially earmarked for infrastructure, to maintain and restore daily operations. This funding shift is expected to stave off further cuts for approximately two years.

Despite the restored service, SEPTA plans to implement a 21.5% fare hike, from USD 2.50 to 2.90, effective September 14. Despite the cuts to service, Giles claims that “we’ve also seen increased police presence and then increased fines and arrests” for fare evasion.

Philadelphia is labeled as the “poorest big city” in the US, with the highest poverty rate of any of the nation’s 10 largest cities. The SEPTA cuts hit lower income riders the hardest, a disproportionate number of whom are Black in a city with a plurality of Black residents, making up almost 40% of the city’s population. In 2023, the Transit app conducted a survey which revealed that in Philadelphia, nearly three-quarters of transit riders lack access to a car. Over half are Black, and almost half live in households making under USD 30,000 a year.

“The SEPTA crisis is a clear example of how poor and working people are so often denied basic public services,” said Walter Smolarek, a longtime Philadelphia resident and editor of Liberation News. “Even though major corporations like Comcast and Vanguard Financial are headquartered in the Philadelphia area, the city still lacks the tax revenue to meet its residents’ needs. Philadelphia is also home to about half of Pennsylvania’s Black population, and right-wing politicians from majority white areas routinely refuse to provide the city its fair share of state funding.”

In response to SEPTA’s restoration of transit services, some riders are reacting with indignation to the upcoming fare hikes. “It’s a racket, it’s a money grab. They already knew they had the money, they had the funding. They just want people to possibly suffer who can’t afford it as is at 2.50 dollars. It wasn’t that long ago we went up to 2.50 dollars and now 2.90 dollars, it’s impossible,” said Goldie Chavous, a SEPTA rider, told FOX 29.

The post Philadelphia public transit “death spiral” is a warning for other underfunded cities across the US appeared first on Peoples Dispatch.

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Israeli airstrikes target the the Al-Rouya residential tower in Gaza City on September 7, 2025. (Screen shot of video by Abdel Qader Sabbah.)

GAZA CITY—The Israeli military is waging an all-out, aerial assault concentrated on Gaza City, targeting dozens of high-rise towers in the heart of the city and reducing them to rubble. The destruction of residential buildings and tent encampments nearby is part of its stated operation to ethnically cleanse the entire area of the nearly one million Palestinians sheltering there and force them south.

“I promised you a few days ago that we would destroy Gaza’s terror towers. This is exactly what we are doing,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a video statement from the Defense Ministry headquarters in Tel Aviv on Monday. “In the past two days, 50 of these towers have fallen. The air force brought them down. Now all of this is just an introduction, just a prelude, to the main intense operation—a ground maneuver of our forces, who are now organizing and gathering in Gaza City,” he said, adding, “And so I say to the residents of Gaza, I am taking advantage of this opportunity, and listen to me carefully: You have been warned. Get out of there!”

On Sunday, Israeli airstrikes destroyed the Al-Rouya residential tower in Tel al-Hawa, a neighborhood in southwest Gaza City. The massive blast toppled the high-rise building, sending massive plumes of smoke and ash into the air. Residents say they were barely given any warning to flee the area before the strike.

Israeli airstrikes destroy the Al-Rouya building in Gaza City on September 7, 2025. Video by Abdel Qader Sabbah.

“They threatened to target the tower about an hour ago, and then told us to evacuate. We didn’t have time to take anything,” Hayam Saad, who was living with her husband, children and other relatives in a tent encampment next to the Al-Rouya building, said as she she stood in the rubble alongside destroyed tents and shredded belongings. “I left my things as they were and ran away, with small children in tow.” Saad and her family were displaced from the eastern Gaza City neighborhood of Shujaiyya three months ago after an Israeli airstrike on their apartment that killed Saad’s daughter-in-law. “There was blood everywhere in the apartment. We couldn’t find a leg, a head, or anything. We then left the area,” she said.

“There’s nothing, as you can see. Where are we supposed to go now? Who’s going to give us tents? Who’s going to house us? We don’t know where to go,” she said. Her husband, Ahed Al-Abed Saad, said they lost their meager belongings in the attack. “We’ve come here and found nothing. No clothes, no food, no water, not even tents,” he told Drop Site. “All of this is to force people to scatter to the south. Right now, we have nothing, we’re going to sleep on the rubble.”

Ahed Al-Abed Saad standing near his tent by the rubble of the Al-Rouya building in Gaza City. September 7, 2025. (Screenshot of video by Abdel Qader Sabbah.)

Hundreds of other displaced families were sifting through the debris to try and salvage what little they could. “They didn’t give us enough time to remove the necessary items from the tents for the displaced or from inside the tower itself for some of the displaced people,” Mahmoud Naim, a 33-year-old from Beit Hanoun, told Drop Site as he stood amid the rubble of the Al-Rouya building on Sunday. “The tower was bombed in less than an hour, and the area was completely destroyed. The tents of the displaced were also destroyed. These tents housed hundreds of displaced people from various areas—from the north, from central Gaza, from Gaza City, from Beit Hanoun, Beit Lahiya, Jabalia refugee camp, Shujaiyya, Al-Tuffah, Al-Sabra, and all areas of Gaza.”

Israeli leaders have openly bragged about destroying Gaza City as part of a campaign to force out all of the Palestinians living there, as they have in other cities like Beit Hanoun, Rafah, and elsewhere.

The Israeli military first announced the intentional targeting of multiple high rises as part of its assault on Gaza City on Friday, claiming without offering any evidence that they were being used by Hamas fighters. The Israeli military only circulated a video showing the Mushtaha Tower, a 16-story building in a densely crowded western area of the city, with a graphic rendering of a supposed camera on the top of the building as “proof.” In the following days, they destroyed at least 50 buildings.

On Monday, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz posted on X: “A mighty hurricane will hit the skies of Gaza City today, and the roofs of the terror towers will shake. This is a final warning to the murderers and rapists of Hamas in Gaza and in the luxury hotels abroad: Release the hostages and lay down your weapons - or Gaza will be destroyed, and you will be annihilated.”

The Israeli targeting of the Mushtaha Tower on Friday also destroyed a mass tent encampment next to the building, where hundreds of displaced Palestinians had fled from neighborhoods in the northern and eastern parts of the city as the Israeli military invaded.

Um Samir al-Ajlouni, who was displaced from the Zaytoun neighborhood, was sitting in front of her tent near the Mushtaha Tower on Friday when everyone around began shouting that the Israelis were about to bomb the building. Less than half an hour later, the massive structure was reduced to rubble. “When I returned to my tent, I found nothing. The tent was leveled to the ground, and our family’s belongings were scattered and lost. Even the bread I was preparing for my children, I couldn’t find,” al-Ajlouni told Drop Site. She said she thought of trying to go south in a desperate attempt to seek shelter but she couldn’t afford it. “I don’t have any money to pay for transport, and my tent was completely destroyed, so I no longer have any shelter,” she said. “We will have to walk on foot for a long distance… we have no other option. The tent we used to live in cost 200 shekels ($60), and today its price has risen to 4,000 shekels ($1,200), an amount most families cannot afford.”

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A girl sits among the wreckage of her family’s tent after Israeli airstrikes destroyed the nearby al-Rouya building in Gaza City. September 7, 2025. (Screenshot of video by Abdel Qader Sabbah.)

Civil Defense spokesman Mahmoud Bassal confirmed the offensive on Gaza City that began last month is the most violent attack on the city since Israel broke the ceasefire on March 18 and resumed its genocidal scorched earth campaign.

“Over the past two days alone, at least 50 residential buildings have been completely destroyed and 100 others were partially damaged that were housing thousands of displaced people,” Bassal told Drop Site. “The strikes also targeted mosques and playgrounds and led to the destruction of more than 200 tents belonging to displaced people living near the targeted buildings.” Bassal added that Civil Defense teams are trying to respond to multiple distress calls reporting people trapped under the rubble. “In not all cases do residents have a chance to escape. Most of the strikes that targeted buildings were carried out without evacuation warnings, causing the martyrdom of the residents.”

Among dozens of Palestinians killed on Monday was Osama Balousha, a photojournalist who was killed in an Israeli airstrike that targeted his home in the Sheikh Radwan neighborhoods of Gaza City, bringing the number of journalists killed to nearly 250, according to Gaza’s government media office.

In addition to housing hundreds of families, many of Gaza’s high-rise buildings were home to businesses and recreational centers. “This tower is not just a building, as you can see, it’s not just floors stacked on top of each other. These are memories. The tower is the days we have lived. I used to train and spend my days at the gym here,” Maher Haboush, a fitness coach who used to train at Oxygen Club, a well-known gym inside the Al-Rouya building, told Drop Site as he stood amid the rubble on Sunday. “There are no friends left, no money left, and nothing to remember. Even the memories, they are taking them away from us.”

Sharif Abdel Kouddous and Jawa Ahmad contributed to this report.

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