One of the things I loved most about Tucson was its downtown bus shelters. In the 1998 the city green-lighted a number of projects that made waiting for the bus a great art experience as well as a pain in the butt. From the ornate Victorian Rose shelter at the east side of the courthouse to the bizarre cherubim upholding a sheet to cover the bench shaped like an old car across the street from the Greyhound station, even finding the shelters was a swell exercise.
Thinking of them longingly, then, I searched the web to find other great examples of bus shelter art.
Portland, OR has a hot idea in this area. Because graffiti artists love nothing better than a blank wall to tag, and scratching glass shelter sides is apparently a thrill, the city began taking badly destroyed glass panels from various shelters and sandblasting them with art instead. According to sources, it costs about $20 per to do it and each piece is not only beautiful, but useful as well.
And on University Avenue in St. Paul, MN, a shelter of two giant steel oak leaves shades passengers as they wait for the bus there. The city, it seems, was concerned about the bland appearance of the street and rounded up a few artists to spiffy up the transit stops.
There’s plenty of transit art to be found in most cities, especially in subways, but these are my favorite types, because everyone can see ‘em and use ‘em and make ‘em their own without even paying the cost of a ticket.
(Photo from publicartonline.org website)
10:59:16 AM 
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