We recently started playing the license plate game with our son Gus. On each trip we take by car, we try to spot as many license plates from different states as possible. It’s great for keeping him engaged, and it helps hone his observation skills.

Gus’ pre-K is located on the other side of Providence from where we live. He goes there every weekday, and most days we have to drive him. We don’t see too many out-of-state plates on our side of town, but as we climb College Hill toward the East Side, on-street parking becomes much more prevalent, and the license plate game gets more interesting.

“Daddy, I saw Pennsylvania! And New Jersey! And Maine!”

The 3.5-mile trip takes around 15 minutes by car. We used to try to take the bus more often, because even though it was a 45-minute ride each way, we got to spend more time together and avoid the stresses of driving. Unfortunately, in September of 2025, Governor Dan McKee slashed RIPTA’s budget and made bus service throughout Rhode Island significantly worse. Now the trip to school would take at least an hour each way by bus, and there’s just no way we can make that work.

“New Hampshire! Ohio! Vermont!”

As we round the corner onto Hope Street, we pass the campus of the Moses Brown School. Driving-age students at Moses Brown were recently surprised to find parking tickets on their cars after the City of Providence implemented parking restrictions along a nearby street. In defending the action, Mayor Brett Smiley lamented that “a disproportionate share of those students drive themselves to school and clog the neighborhood streets.”

The faculty and staff at the nearby Wheeler School also contribute to the lack of available parking along Hope and its cross streets. Rumor has it that administrators from both schools met with candidates in the recent City Council Ward 2 special election, to stress their perceived need for more on-street parking. Despite those efforts, the majority of candidates expressed support for safe streets improvements, even if it meant reallocating space for private vehicles.

“Maryland! Tennessee! Florida!”

And then we come to Brown University. Per a 2012 Memorandum of Agreement between Brown and the City of Providence, the university licenses hundreds of on-street parking spaces from the city, which they then reserve for permitted use by faculty and staff. This private allocation of public space supplements the dozens of off-street parking facilities scattered throughout campus. Even still, it barely covers the needs of faculty and staff, so most students are on their own to find metered on-street parking.

“California! Arizona! Minnesota!”

Why do students from faraway places need to bring their cars to Providence and drive to their classes? Likely for the same reason that I need to drive my son to pre-K – bus service in Rhode Island isn’t funded well enough, and it lacks sufficient route coverage to meet our mobility needs. It’s frustrating that, despite Brown’s campus having some of the best bus service in the state, most trips still require driving and parking a private vehicle.

Having been born and raised here, I know that lifelong Rhode Islanders tend to see car dependence as an immutable fact of life. Frankly, it’s the only life most of us have known. But the younger generation is increasingly uninterested in the financial burden of car ownership. If given viable alternatives, today’s students could serve as the catalysts for a sorely-needed generational change in urban mobility.

Given the RIPTA budget cuts, and Mayor Smiley’s stubborn backsliding on safe streets infrastructure, it’s easy to be cynical about the likelihood of making that change happen. But I am encouraged by the advocacy of the Providence Streets Coalition, whose recent endorsement in the Ward 2 election helped elect the most progressive candidate for safe streets, Jill Davidson. We still have a ways to go at the state level to right the wrongs of McKee’s short-sighted thinking on the value of RIPTA. But it’s not too late to help the next generation break the cycle of car dependency.

Just think of how much more parking there would be.