Traveling Forward in Jerusalem | The Jerusalem Intercultural Center

“Traveling Forward” Meets with the Mayor

In recent months, during and in spite of the coronavirus pandemic, the Traveling Forward in Jerusalem forum, a large and growing group of Jewish (secular and Haredi) and Arab residents, has been working to promote initiatives to improve public transportation in Jerusalem. (You can read about the first, kick-off conference here.) The group consists of residents as well as professionals, who work together to develop different channels to solve problems and improve public transportation. We serve as mentors and catalysts to the group, providing the structure and infrastructure, together with and vis-a-vis the Municipality, to create a real partnership between residents, professionals and the municipality.

Public transportation in in Jerusalem (photo credit here)

In July, a meeting of activists in the Traveling Forward in Jerusalem held a meeting with Jerusalem Mayor, Moshe Lion. There were some 30 residents, Mayor Lion, transportation portfolio holder David Zohar, and representatives of the master plan for transportation.

During the meeting, four residents presented public transportation issues. Afterward, the discussion was opened up to the other participants.

The main issue raised at the meeting is the need and the residents’ desire to establish a Public Transportation Committee, to be headed by the Mayor. This committee would enable residents, professionals and council members to work together to brainstorm, plan and promote public transportation in Jerusalem. The purpose of the committee would be to advance the different issues that concern residents and professionals, and create a process of joint work that would enable both professionals and residents to improve different aspects of public transportation in the city.

The Mayor noted that while he wanted to establish a Working Committee, he felt it was too early, especially when the city and entire country are dealing with coronavirus crisis. To work up to the establishment of the committee, it was decided to establish a Learning Committee for Public Transportation, which will study the issues and potential planning processes and solutions. The Learning Committee will include residents, professionals, and City Council members David Zohar and Laura Wharton, and it is hoped that a working committee, led by Mayor Lion, will be established in the coming months. The first meeting of the Learning Committee members will take place in early September, and all members of the Travelers Forward in Jerusalem initiative group will be invited. They will decide together what the committee will concentrate on, what and how they will learn from the field in preparing to move forward.

And, of course, many thanks to the Jerusalem Foundation, the Natan Fund and the U.S. Embassy Jerusalem, Tel Aviv Branch Office and U.S. Consulate General Jerusalem for helping us to advance tolerance and cross-cultural activism in Jerusalem.

Naomi Roff2020-09-11T04:59:50+00:00August 1st, 2020|Blog, Promoting Tolerance in Jerusalem, Traveling Forward in Jerusalem|

Traveling Forward in Jerusalem Kickoff Conference – Moving Multicultural Activism Online

As part of our work in advancing the Jerusalem Covenant in Jerusalem, we’re advancing a number of multi-cultural initiatives to improve everyday life in Jerusalem, including, and especially public transportation.

Public transportation in Jerusalem, event invitation

In ‘normal’ times, is an issue that severely affects all – Arabs, Haredi Jews, secular and religious Jews. Each community has their own unique challenges, but it is a problem that is common to all.

For weeks we’d been planning a major conference for Jewish (religious / secular and Haredi) and Arab activists to come together for a conference on public transportation, which was set to take place on March 23. And then the COVID-19 crisis broke out, and mass gatherings were banned. So we took the conference online.

The conference went online, to Zoom

The meeting was attended by 90 people, including residents and professionals, Arabs and Jews, ultra-Orthodox and non-ultra-Orthodox, adults and young people, residents of Jerusalem from all neighborhoods and city council members. The participants were highly diverse, but their common goal was one – coming together to bring about better public transportation for all Jerusalemites. The fact that many of the initiatives raised were common among the different communities only reinforced the need for such intercultural work, and that this process is the right thing to do. We’ve called this initiative, Traveling Forward in Jerusalem.

Traveling Forward in Jerusalem seeks to create a group of residents and professionals – from all Jerusalem communities – who will work together, and who believe that together, and together with the Ministry of Transportation’s Master Plan for Transportation, these processes will make public transportation more accessible, and more adapted to residents’ needs. We aim to create a situation where residents and Jerusalem professionals influence the state of public transport in the city.

During the meeting, different ideas for discussion and action were raised. Among the initiatives that came up were: Developing an application to help operate public transportation more effectively, access to information for residents, a transport committee in East Jerusalem and more. From here, smaller action teams will focus on specific topics and initiatives. We will mentor and support the teams, and together we will work to promote and develop better public transport in Jerusalem.

It was amazing to see people’s willingness to get involved and discuss public transport in the city, even at a complex time like this, when all efforts are focused on the coronavirus. The responses from the participants were very positive, and the meeting seemed to exceed all expectations. We believe this is the first step in a long and meaningful process in our work in the city.

Here’s a short video (in Hebrew) that shows some of the issues discussed:

Naomi Roff2020-05-16T07:32:37+00:00March 30th, 2020|Blog, Effective Activism, Promoting Tolerance in Jerusalem, Traveling Forward in Jerusalem|