What I Got Wrong — And What I Still Stand By — About My Jarrett Walker/RTD Story

I want to thank everyone who criticized my story about my attempt to interview Jarrett Walker, whose firm has a $3.5 million contract with RTD.

I’ve had some time to reflect on that criticism, including criticism from people with experience in public-sector consulting and transportation. Some of it changed my mind. Some of it didn’t.

Here’s where I think the criticism was right and where I should have handled the story differently.

What I got wrong

1. The headline was too sensational for the reporting underneath it.

The headline — “I Asked to Interview RTD’s $3.5 Million Transit Consultant. Here’s What Happened.” — framed the story in a way that suggested there was going to be a more dramatic revelation than the reporting ultimately supported.

The actual story was about an interview request, RTD’s decision to defer access until later in the engagement process, and my questions about that timing.

There wasn’t a smoking gun at the end of it.

The headline should have reflected the narrower reality of what I actually found instead of trying to maximize intrigue.

2. I should have paraphrased the RTD communications exchange rather than publishing screenshots of the entire back-and-forth.

The emails were relevant because they established the timeline and RTD’s position. But I did not need to turn routine reporter-PIO correspondence into an exhibit.

Publishing the screenshots made the piece more adversarial than the underlying facts required. It also created the impression that RTD communications staff themselves were the subject of the story when my actual interest was the consultant and the project.

That was poor judgment on my part.

A better version would have accurately summarized RTD’s response, quoted the portions that were genuinely important and moved on. That would have preserved the substance without unnecessarily escalating what was ultimately a routine professional exchange.

I plan to apologize to RTD communications staff for that part specifically.

That doesn’t mean I will never publish correspondence with a public agency. There are circumstances where the correspondence itself is newsworthy and where showing readers the underlying record serves an important public purpose.

I just don’t think reproducing the entire exchange added enough public value in this instance to justify the adversarial tone it created.

3. There was no smoking gun here, and I should have provided more context about how normal this process is.

RTD is not doing something inherently unusual by briefing stakeholders before broader public engagement or by coordinating media access around a larger communications and engagement plan.

Several people with experience in public-sector consulting pointed that out, and I think that criticism is fair.

The chronology of my story — I asked for an interview, RTD said interviews would come later, and then I learned about an earlier stakeholder briefing — made that sequence sound more suspicious than it necessarily was.

RTD subsequently explained that the August briefing is intended for key stakeholders ahead of broader public engagement beginning in September. That distinction matters.

I should have done more to explain that this kind of sequencing can be a normal part of a major public consulting project.

There was no evidence that RTD was hiding the project, suppressing information or doing anything improper.

I also respect the criticism that RTD has established a process for rolling out stakeholder, public and media engagement, and that I should have better understood that process before framing the timing itself as significant.

What I still stand by

1. More than 10,000 people watched the video version of this story across platforms.

That’s more than 10,000 people watching a story about public procurement, a consulting contract and transit planning on platforms typically reserved for dances, recipes and fart videos.

Many of those people may not have known what the Comprehensive Operations Analysis was. They may not have known who Jarrett Walker was. They may not have known RTD was spending $3.5 million on this work.

Now more of them do.

Whatever I think about some of my editorial decisions in presenting the story, I think getting thousands of people to pay attention to a major publicly funded planning process is a win for public awareness and transparency.

2. I will respect RTD’s process on this story going forward. I can also continue to disagree with it.

Those two things can be held at once.

RTD has explained that it considers the August stakeholder briefing separate from the broader public engagement phase and that media access will come later in the process.

I understand that explanation better now than I did when I began reporting this story. I will respect that process going forward.

But respecting an institution’s process does not require agreeing with every part of it.

I still disagree with waiting to make the consultant available given how prominently RTD leadership and people throughout Colorado’s transportation community are already discussing the Comprehensive Operations Analysis.

I can disagree with that decision without treating the decision as evidence of wrongdoing.

3. And frankly, this doesn’t have to be about giving me the interview.

I’m building an independent publication. Call me a journalist, a blogger, or some guy with a website. I understand that RTD may not look at Thompson’s Colorado the same way it looks at larger, established news organizations.

Fine.

Then have Jarrett Walker sit down with somebody.

Have him talk with Kyle Clark. Have him talk with CPR. Have him talk with The Denver Post, Denver7 or another journalist who will spend some time asking substantive questions about his philosophy and what it could mean for transit riders in Colorado.

Have someone have that discussion with him and put his face on camera in our market.

Not everyone has the time — or inclination — to read Human Transit. They do have time to watch a two-minute television package, a short digital interview, a podcast episode or a concise explainer that introduces them to the person and the ideas behind this project. I know he was on Strong Towns recently, but I still think a Front Range-specific line of questioning on his ideas has tremendous public value.

A book can explain Walker’s general philosophy. A journalist can ask him what that philosophy means here, now, for RTD.

My larger point was never that I personally am entitled to 30 minutes with Jarrett Walker.

I want Colorado riders to hear from him while this work is underway.

Some people have challenged the premise of my original story altogether. Essentially: Why was the fact that RTD deferred an interview a story in the first place?

I respect that criticism. I’ve thought seriously about it.

I still disagree.

I don’t think this is just any ordinary consulting contract.

RTD is spending $3.5 million on a comprehensive operational analysis that its own leadership is already discussing in connection with future service decisions. The work touches fundamental questions about frequency, coverage, route design and how limited transit resources should be distributed across the region.

That does not mean the contract is improper.

It does not mean RTD is mishandling the project.

It means the project is consequential.

And I still believe consequential public projects deserve scrutiny while they are unfolding, not only after all of the decisions have been made.

That’s the part of the original premise I stand by.

The bigger lesson for me is that there is a difference between being persistent and being unnecessarily adversarial.

I want Thompson’s Colorado to ask difficult questions. I want to file records requests when records are necessary. I want to push public institutions for answers when I think those answers matter.

I also want to build working relationships that allow me to report on those institutions for years rather than treating every disagreement as a confrontation.

On this story, I think the underlying question was legitimate.

I think some of the framing and execution were not as disciplined as they should have been.

Both can be true.

And I appreciate the people who challenged me seriously enough to make me think harder about the difference.