NY1 reports that,

“An empty seat, a symbol of resistance, is one of the ways the MTA is honoring civil rights legend Rosa Parks Thursday. The seats directly behind city bus drivers will be left vacant to mark the 50th anniversary of her refusal to give up her place on a segregated Alabama bus, a defining moment for the civil rights movement. An empty seat, a symbol of resistance, is one of the ways the MTA is honoring civil rights legend Rosa Parks Thursday. The seats directly behind city bus drivers will be left vacant to mark the 50th anniversary of her refusal to give up her place on a segregated Alabama bus, a defining moment for the civil rights movement.”

The general problem of remembrance of Rosa Parks is that this type of successful resistance against Jim Crow laws was actually trail blazed in 1944-1945, in the deep southern state of Alaska by a half-Eskimo woman by the name of Alberta Schenck. But she was an identified activist of a much smaller ethnic group, and a democracy prefers the political benefits of glorifying and identifying with the victories of the larger group of underdogs to those of a much smaller one.
But regardless of Ms. Schenk, who admittedly only directly affected change on a state level as opposed to Ms. Parks’ direct influence nationally, it seems this idea has its supporters.

Riders NY1 spoke with Wednesday gave a thumbs up to the move.
“A very good idea. A very good idea,” said one rider. “It’s about time.

Actually, it’s a silly idea, and almost fifty years too late to matter. But more annoying is that it illuminates that the underlying problem that allowed segregation on the buses in the first place still influences the policies of the M.T.A. Not racism, but the abuse of a public utility for political ends, including, at least this December 1st, segregation. Instead of forbidding a black person to sit in a seat reserved for a white person, they are forbidding a live passenger to sit in a reserved spot for a deceased non-passenger. This seat is a spot reserved for the elderly and weak, but that person won’t be allowed to sit there solely because it is perceived as a slight to someone else’s honor. How much has the M.T.A. really learned form Ms. Parks?
It would have been more reasonable to restrict this testimony to a picture of Ms. Parks above the chosen front seat. Removing a much needed seat from utility on every bus is not solidarity, but rather groveling of the worst kind. And though a few other cities are participating in this as well, I have to admit this is absolutely the perfect time for New York to pander in this way.
For the M.T.A. is facing a showdown with the Transport Workers Union’s cunning Trinidadian-American leader, Roger Toussaint, who enjoys the backing of activist Jesse Jackson. A segregated seat for a day will possibly help counteract the racial politics underlying the negotiations between a predominantly black labor union versus a white management, or at least make a greater percentage of New York denizens reluctant to see it in those terms. And indeed, if Toussaint elects to play the race card, there is now a greater chance of backlash, and a greater opportunity for management to call foul.
This seat for Rosa is itself silly and burdensome for today’s bus riders, but it might lessen the ultimate burden to New York taxpayers. One day of one less seat per bus is nothing compared to the inconvenience of a transit strike, or four years of higher taxes to pay for excessive raises, and higher taxes still to pay for other union contracts whose negotiations are influenced and inflated by this contract, and the total budget needed to fund services.
Tomorrow’s sacrifice should not only be seen as honoring Ms. Parks and the civil rights movement, but as backdrop decorum to facilitate acceptance of fiscal restraint, a surprising and unnerving group hug copped before the grueling negotiations. We should remember how graft and appeasement of avarice led to the city’s bankruptcy before a feisty Jewish mayor greeted pedestrians on the bridges, and insisted things could be different. It is our subway and our buses. We all ride them and pay our fare and sit if there’s a seat available, regardless of race.
And we should be able to ride them for a reasonable price.