Sometimes a newspaper article comes up that really drives a point home. Such an article is in today's PI:

Council makes threats over bus cuts 
Plan disproportionately hurts Seattle, they say 

Tuesday, June 13, 2000

By KERY MURAKAMI 
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER 




Facing major bus cuts, Seattle City Council members are turning to what politicians often do when there's not much else they can do: make idle threats.

City Council members grousing about disproportionate cuts Seattle riders are facing from the King County Council said yesterday they might go to court, start their own bus system, or even put up tolls and raise parking taxes to get back at suburban officials.

The threats, however, illustrate more the frustration on the council than what might actually happen.

A toll or a parking tax, or a Seattle bus system would require the approval of the state Legislature.

The dispute stems from a debate over how the county should cut $100 million from Metro after I-695.

A majority of County Council members, who represent the suburbs, say their want to cut about a third of the bus service from each area of the county.

But Seattle has more buses than any place else, so the city's riders would be hit the hardest.

City Council President Margaret Pageler noted that city buses are more heavily used than those in the suburbs.

So the county's solution, she said, would mean cutting full buses in Seattle, while preserving half-empty buses in Bellevue.

"There's something wrong with this picture," Pageler said.

"Absolutely," said Councilwoman Heidi Wills.

"Right on," said Councilman Peter Steinbrueck.

Instead, City Council members want the county to cut buses based on usage. But that would disproportionately hurt the suburbs, and a majority of County Council members represent the suburbs.

"We don't have the votes," Councilman Jim Compton said. "We're trying to prevail using moral arguments. They shouldn't whack the city of Seattle."

So with little else they can do, Pageler proposed researching whether the city has any legal options.

City Council transportation committee chairman Richard McIver suggested the city tell Metro to take a hike and start its own bus service. And City Councilman Nick Licata said the city should try to find money to make up the bus cuts.

"Tolls and parking taxes," he said.

County Council transportation chairman Rob McKenna, R-Newport Hills, doesn't take the threats seriously.

"It's ludicrous," he said. "Seattle's economy rests on people from the Eastside coming into the city to work."

Now the reality, as I see it, is that Seattle is correct. I don't often see them being correct, so such an assertion is really unusual for me, but in this case I think they are right.

In an effort to expand transit, it has been pushed way out of its niche. In Seattle, transit is reasonably cost-effective. The farther out in the county you get (generally speaking) the lower the load factors and the higher the costs relative to fares brought in. A recent newspaper article indicated the average subsidy for Sound Transit was over $5 per ride, whereas many downtown runs actually break even or better.

And this is the natural result of pushing a system outside of the niche of cost-effectiveness. The same 60 passenger bus that is carrying 20 people in downtown Seattle may only carry 6 out in the hinterlands of King County.

So Anirudh, if you had to make marginal cuts in this system, where would you make them? Equitably by region (permitting the efficient and the inefficient systems to suffer equally) but preserving the political consensus for transit, or inequitably according to cost-effectiveness (which will be totally driven by the demographics) which will decrease support for Metro throughout the suburbs that are increasingly becoming the county's dominant political areas?

The fact that it is such a Hob's choice for the politicians is clear evidence that transit, as a concept, has already been expanded far outside of its economic niche.

It's STILL the demographics! the craigster

-- (craigcar@crosswinds.net), June 13, 2000

Answers

If it was up to me, as I've said many times before, I would cut the routes with the lowest ridership - mostly in the suburbs - and increase service in the dense city districts where I know for a fact that there is plenty of untapped demand for service, enough to make it cost-effective.

You might pose the question to Mark, who was defending the policy of funding buses equally in the dense city districts and the less dense suburbs, even though that policy was made by the suburbs for political, not economic reasons.

Is a funding cut going to force them to cut only the least productive routes? If transit was privately operated, it probably would. As it is, I don't think it will. Like any other democratically run organization, the service is biased towards the people who make the most noise; and the very same people who got bus service by making a noise in the past will continue to make at least as much noise as before. It is much more likely that the people in charge will do what's easiest: simply cut all service equally. The effect will be to marginally help suburban and rural WA, while seriously screwing over Seattle and the other cities. The special interests backing I- 745 know this, of course. They are counting on it.

Look at what happened after I-695. Metro staff began with a 6% service cut. I thought it was a good thing, as they cut the service with the lowest ridership. But the people whose routes were canceled made such a big noise to their councilmembers that within a couple of months, ALL the canceled routes came back!!

This is a classic example of the inconsistencies that result when policies are not made by the same set of people. First the suburbs complain, "Hey! Seattle's getting too much of the county transit budget! We want it too!" and start overspending on transit in the suburbs. Then the special interests start yelling, "Look! We're spending too much on buses and no-one's riding them!" and cut ALL transit funding, including Seattle. I've heard several long-time residents of Seattle, and some Metro employees, complain about how the bus service suffered when Metro merged with King County.

"The fact that it is such a Hob's choice for the politicians is clear evidence that transit, as a concept, has already been expanded far outside of its economic niche."

I agree. Who do you think is to blame for that? Better evidence, though, is data such as the surprising numbers you posted about energy efficiency of cars vs. buses. (Speaking of which, that was nation-wide data, and left a number of questions open. It would be useful to have some data specific to WA. If you've already posted WA- specific data, please point me to the thread.)

-- Anirudh Sahni (anirudhsahni@hotmail.com), June 14, 2000.

"If you've already posted WA- specific data, please point me to the thread" Best I could come up with was the data Metro put out when they initially announced the cuts in the suburbs. The routes that were affected were said to carry about 6 passengers per HOUR. Since the average passenger rides about 20 minutes, that meant that the USUAL load for these buses was a driver and 2 pax. If that is truly the case, you have a 30 ton bus doing a job that could be done (much more efficiently)by a Ford Taurus.

But if you look at subsidies (operating costs in comparison to fares) Washington is clearly higher than the national average which would imply (but certainly not prove) that transit in Washington was even less energy efficient than it was nationally.

If you look back through my postings, Anirudh, I have consistently recommended that people look past the rhetoric and the assumptions and the anecdotes, and just look at the facts. Most of the numbers are posted on the net. And when you crank the numbers, transit is not the panacea of low polluting time saving efficiency that its advocates claim. The numbers just aren't there.

the craigster

-- (craigcar@crosswinds.net), June 14, 2000.

to Craig: My philosophy is: "From each according to their ability; to each according to their performance".

So, I would lump the bus routes into different categories: 1) bus routes serving low income people; 2) bus routes serving the surburbs; 3) etc.

Within each category, I would recommend eliminating the low ridership routes and/or high-cost routes. If all of a category had the same level of ridership and the same operating costs, I would recommend raising the fares, and then see how the rideship levels change.

But, it is reasonable to make the cuts be similar across the region, since the suburbs are paying sales taxes, too. A particular region should get funding in proportion to how much the middle and lower classes pay in sales tax. I'm assuming the "rich" don't care about bus service. Of course, considering housing prices in Seattle, everyone in Seattle is "rich". Go figure.

-- Matthew M. Warren (mattinsky@msn.com), June 14, 2000.

"I have consistently recommended that people look past the rhetoric and the assumptions and the anecdotes, and just look at the facts."

I definitely agree. I meant this question seriously, though: Who is to blame for transit being expanded outside its economic niche? If we have a real answer to that we have a hope of finding a genuine solution, as opposed to these initiatives.

-- Anirudh Sahni (anirudhsahni@hotmail.com), June 14, 2000.

Check out this article from the P-I http://www.seattlep-i.com/local/hyak05.shtml

According to this article there are plans to expand capacity for a facility that carries 25,000 vehicles per day at a cost estimate of $200m to $300million dollars. What money is being used to fund this? Gas Tax money? MY GAS TAX MONEY? Maybe they should raise the TOLL for using the pass. Something that would cover at least the snow removal and maintenance. That's where the "MARKET DRIVEN" philosophy appears to take a vacation when it comes to road building. There are no TRANSIT routes over the pass. Roads are build with monies raised by taxpayers who may never use them. Something bought with other taxpayers dollars is called a SUBSIDY.

-- Jim Cusick (jc.cusick@gte.net), June 14, 2000.

"Who is to blame for transit being expanded outside its economic niche?"

It's unreasonable to look for anyone to blame. Precisely, you can blame no one. Organizations are like a flock of deer. Without some sort of predator, deer will expand to a point where the habitat can't sustain growth any longer. The end result: the entire flock is less vigorous. FWIW, I-695 is analagous to the re-introduction of wolves to Yosemite. It causes apprehension at first, but the political ecosystem will adapt.

Put less esoterically, transit grew because organizations grow. Organizations grow because that's what they do.

Finally, this seemed like an appropriate place for a haiku:

deer in the headlights transit's Nietzschean bargain bucks, dough and the heat

-- Brad (knotwell@my-deja.com), June 14, 2000.

"Who is to blame for transit being expanded outside its economic niche?"

IMHO, a number of groups:
1. Those who really do derive personal benefit from it.
This includes those unable to drive for physical reasons. I am personally very sympathetic to this group. According to studies, those who are visually impaired will frequently make their housing decisions based upon availability of public transit. Those who are orthopedically impaired generally need Demand-Response services, being even less willing (or able) than the average person to get themselves down to the bus stop. Those who are administratively disqualified from driving for physical reasons (recently diagnosed or poorly controlled seizure disorders and poorly controlled diabetes mellitus) also support transit at least until they can requalify for their licenses. Typically, they will not base housing decisions on transit availaility, because they regard their inability to drive as temporary. Those who are unable to drive for administative reasons (DUI/DWI, excessive moving violations, for the most part) appear to regard public transit as a "right" since society has "deprived them " of their "right" to drive a vehicle. A few (very few) simply have the right demographics. Their home and worksite are both reasonably close to a transit route, and the transit route is reasonably direct (or at least reasonably quick).
2. Some individuals support it because they (usually erroneously) believe it will help the environment. I say usually erroneously because they base their assumptions on the theoretical advantages of full buses and ignore the demographic realities. As you have noted, there is no energy advantage per passenger mile for transit, despite a theoretical HUGE advantage if the buses were operating at capacity. Other factors such as deadheading (bus barn to start or finish of route) low load factors on reverse commute routes, etc., will always stop transit from hitting its theoretical maximum. Additionally, if you look at trends, the autos are getting cleaner all the time, and at a greater rate of improvement than bus transit. That's a matter of how much investment you can afford to make in large scale production versus small scale production. Buses simply aren't made in anywhere near the numbers that autos are, and the amount of R&D that can be done (without driving the unit cost through the roof) is small. The government has several times mandated decreases in pollution for transit buses that just plain turned out to be unobtainable, at least without switching fuels to natural gas or propane. Attempting to meet these standards has contributed to a number of manufacturers going out of the bus business.
3. Those who support transit in the (rather forlorn) hope that other people will use it, and they will be able to drive with less congestion. This is the largest group of transit supporters in many reports, and is another testament to the fact that the public schools don't teach either mathematics or logical thinking particularly well.
4. A number really do believe the propaganda from the pro-transit crowd that there are increasing numbers of transit dependent (there are not, the number is shrinking) and that these people want more conventional transit (they don't, they'd rather have their friends who do have cars take them places, use demand response, or get autos of their own).
5. A fair number of individuals make a pretty fair living providing transit services. As was recently posted, cutting back 140 FTEs is going to save Metro $14 Million. That's a pretty good wage scale, and even average drivers are getting well above the wage they'd get from private industry, parlaying their union political contributions and activism into real clout with the politicians. Over half of transit operating costs are wages. This creates a constituency for expanding transit outsied of its economic niche.

The bottom line is that it requires something like 695 to even make anyone pay attention to the issue. All of the institutional defaults are for it to grow like a cancer until it dominates expenditures, which if you look at King Count government is certainly the case. the craigster


-- (craigcar@crosswinds.net), June 14, 2000.