Please Help the MBTA by Donating $300 Million and Your Soul
“The MBTA is outmoded, unsafe and incapable of withstanding the rigors of New England winters.”
Amen! cheered the entire city of Boston after reading the first line of this GoFundMe. Janssen McCormick is a resident of our fair city who, like everyone, has had enough of the MBTA delays wreaking havoc on commuters, residents, and crying babies alike. So he’s asking the public to help modernize Boston’s transit with out-of-pocket contributions.
All McCormick wants is a little city unity, some hard work and determination, $300 million, and your soul. He’d take $30 billion if he could raise it, but GoFundMe caps out at $300 million. All in all, it’s a bold, bold move. And as of 5:21 p.m. on Friday evening, the GoFundMe has $10 in donations.
The first donor, Harmony Wu, contributed her $5 with a message claiming, “$5—my yearly share of the repealed indexing of the gas tax.”
If these facts are not enough incentives, the Donor Rewards might persuade you:
$50: a homeless man will scream your name on an Orange line car for 45 minutes during rush hour.
$200: you are given carte blanche to forcibly remove backpacks from passengers and throw them into the pit between platforms from the hours of 6am-9am and 3pm-7pm.
…
$3,000,000,000: A light rail replacement for the Washington Street Elev-ahahahahahahahahahaha you fell for it.
$30,000,000,000: A transit system barely adequate for the needs of a 21st century global city.
In all seriousness, though this attempt at crowdsourcing is quite amusing, it just makes the MBTA’s problems more apparent, upsetting, and tragic. Jokes aside, a $300 million goal may not be realistic, but it certainly puts many issues into perspective.
