The Urban Blog

Some Musings on Reno Regional Transit

It was great seeing Aisha @ EcoStreets talk a little bit about the BRT / Light Rail plans that have been getting a little discussion in the media sphere lately.  Whenever this topic comes up I feel compelled to noodle on what shape and form an ideal Reno regional transit system would look like.

The Urban Blog’s 2009 Concept for Regional Transit in the Reno area
Note:  This drawing is not a detailed plan for every street the route would run down or what technology it would use.  It is intended to paint broadly the important regional destinations that would need to be served by public transit.  Liberty has been taken with cardinal directions in particular.

Fundamental to this concept is the idea that a majority of the important regional destinations be considered and served and they fall into the following categories:

Transportation Hubs, Residential Hubs, Jobs Hubs, Destinations, Mixed Use Areas

It’s been encouraging to see that RTC Washoe’s plans for the BRT / potential Eventual LRT system they’re planning include feeder routes called RTC LOCAL to feed the RTC RAPID system they want to build.  That’s encouraging because whenever I think about this problem, I end up coming back to the need to tie this 40 x 40 mile metro area together with transit that gets people where they actually need to go, from not far from where they’re starting.  This means they’ll need vehicles that will take them the long haul, but it needs not to be a hassle to get to that vehicle.

However, if you get to the luxury of considering what I just mentioned, it means you have a workable system.  And I think a workable system means a system with a design that appears to the educated observer as something that would work in real life.

With that, I propose the above transit corridors- their destinations to be the ones that are most important to cover in the three county area that is represented above.

Now might be the best time yet to imagine such a thing, so if you’ve had notions of a regional transportation system that would serve the tri-county area ideally, please let me know what you think.  If I were in charge, this is the system I’d build.  How about you?  Comment here, link to your blog, etc.  Enjoy!

Seattle: State Legislature Transit Mess

Just when Puget Sound area residents thought they had spoken once and for all about how highly they prioritize getting a regional light rail network built, along comes the state Legislature in a year of down revenues to use procedural tricks to potentially delay a recently-approved expansion for up to 4 years over a fraction of its funding.

This is going to be an exciting year for Seattle, when Link Light Rail opens up from downtown to the airport by the end of the year.  The initial segment, from downtown to just near the airport, will open up in July.  Light rail service is a welcome addition to the Seattle area.

Link Light Rail Initial Segment Map.  University Link to open 2016

In November, voters approved a second and third line – one linking the University of Washington with Northgate Mall to the north, and one linking downtown to Bellevue and Redmond across Lake Washington on the I-90 bridge.

The I-90 bridge crosses affluent Mercer Island, which has always been a point of contention for transportation projects linking Seattle and the Eastside.  I-90 includes “Express Lanes” – dedicated lanes in the middle of the freeway which are reversed to assist with the heaviest traffic direction in the morning and evening commutes by handling buses and carpools.  Or, at least the morning and evening commutes ca. so long ago nobody remembers.  One perk Islanders get, however, is that they get to use the express lanes even if they’re not a carpool.  It’s the price the rest of us paid I guess, for being able to cross the northern tip of their fair hamlet.

The Express Lanes are the key to the light rail project.  Remove the cars from those lanes, and run trains on them instead and all of a sudden you have just cost effectively done a large chunk of the work required to get light rail linking the two halves of the region’s economic engine.

The clincher here is that in order to turn the Express Lanes over to trains, the HOV capacity has to be moved to the main roadway.  Most of that project is done.  All that’s missing is $24 million in funding the state agreed to dedicate to the project, which Sound Transit is also contributing to.  Several key lawmakers in the state Leg are currently working to thwart that $24 million in funding – and calling for new studies – and bending over backward to find any tortured logic they can that will justify stalling this project.

The money, of course, is being diverted to more highway projects around the state.

It seems like decades following Robert Moses’ exit from road building and transit starving for the purposes of expanding the road network, transit is still quite vulnerable to being held hostage by its opponents – even in the face of overwhelming voter support.

This must stop.  Seattle Transit Blog has called for citizens to write their legislators and I for one am joining the chorus.  Here are some key email addresses (lifted right from STB’s pages):

Rep. Judy Clibborn - Chair of House Transportation Committee: clibborn.judy@leg.wa.gov

Rep. Marko Liias - Vice Chair of House Transportation Committee: liias.marko@leg.wa.gov

Rep. Frank Chopp - Speaker of the House: chopp.frank@leg.wa.gov

Senator Mary Haugen - Chair of Senate Transportation Committee: haugen.marymargaret@leg.wa.gov

Senator Chris Marr - Vice Chair of Senate Transportation Committee: marr.chris@leg.wa.gov

Senator Fred Jarrett - Member of Senate Transportation Committee: jarrett.fred@leg.wa.gov

More great info on this, of course, can be found at Seattle Transit Blog, and once in a while SLOG even writes about it. 

Stimulus Funding and Transit Budgets

In my recent spate of transit related yammering, I’ve been talking a lot about some of what I consider “basic” elements in the operation of a transit system, things like:  Revenue Per Customer (and measuring customers as customers), deferring new facilities in lieu of operations funding, and of course over time it’s been more efficient routing and more frequent service.

The bottom line is transit systems cost money.  The funding source for transit operations in a lot of places is drying up as so many places are dependent on sales tax revenue to fund the necessary public subsidy for transit.

Despite everything I’ve said about transit fares covering more of the costs of a system’s operation, I have not argued nor will I for the elimination of subsidies for the ongoing operation of a public transit system.  Far from being money down the drain, when public money goes into operating a decent public transit service, the tertiary benefits make it worthwhile.

I’ve been not using my car lately.  I live 10 blocks from an express bus that takes me straight from the middle of the city to suburbs 12 miles away in 35 minutes.  This bus runs from early in the morning until late at night, every 30 minutes except for one run, except on weekend days where several evening departures run hourly as well. 

This bus is reliable, clean, comfortable, and quiet except when the accordion section hasn’t been oiled, and has wi-fi.  Thanks to the network of local feeder buses, which don’t have terrible schedules, it is possible to go to and from work virtually any time of day or night on any day.

If you think about the potential lack of productivity which might be suffered by the economy as a whole when people’s cars don’t work, to me that sort of outweighs how annoying it is to be stuck in traffic trying to just do basic necessities of life.  A regularly scheduled vehicle that moves along it would seem to me to be a basic component of any arterial route.

The new administration in Washington seems to get this to a certain point:  there is money in the recently passed stimulus legislation for public transit service improvements.  Sadly, according to Derek Morse, interim director of the Washoe County RTC, none of the money can be used to fund operations.  In a recent Reno-Gazette Journal article, he said “"The biggest misfortune in my mind is the lack of flexibility to use those funds for operations.“  [Only a few state transportation priorities to get stimulus money, ANJEANETTE DAMON 2/18/2009]

I’ve argued here before:  Spend the $37 million that would be spent on the wrong location, wrong facility new transit center on service improvements and a smaller-scale transit hub located on the couple of blocks of covered train trench in downtown Reno. 

One thing stands in the middle of that plan, however, which is a similar thing to what the RTC chairman alluded to in the RGJ:  the transit center project I don’t like is 80/20 FTA Grant/local money.  $30mil of the funding isn’t local, it’s from a federal transit grant and that grant is probably all about facilities and not at all about vehicle service operation.

So, while it’s admirable that the administration’s plan includes funding for new transit service facilities, it’s unfortunate indeed that it does not offer a band-aid for local transit operations budgets which are suffering as a result of down economic trends.

To that I would add that it is also the unfortunate that the voters in this instance decided not to raise the sales tax a fraction of a percent to offset the loss in funding.

Reno: But Then What About The Transit Center?

There’s more in my brain about this bus situation in Reno, as there always is.  Here’s the gist of my argument:  the 4th Street Station transit center project is and has always been not the best idea.  Now one thing it is, it is an idea.  And it’s certainly not the worst idea.

Anyway, there still needs to be a transit center.  Reno still requires a place downtown where buses can congregate, and though I suspect buses can continue to use the existing CitiCenter facility for a while until the economy improves (and I get the inkling the ballpark district developers aren’t chomping at the bit to turn shovels just yet). 

Still, we probably all want the ballpark developers to feel like the deal they signed onto is the deal they’re getting.  And we all want to see the ballpark district develop.  And at some point, CitiCenter will in fact every single day be terribly inadequate, which I’m sure it already is at times.

So what to do?  Well, let’s start by addressing the fundamental issue:  ain’t no money in the operating budget.  6.7Mil in the hole.  Man, that has got to hurt.  But the transit center is $37Mil.  So we’re looking at 1/6 the cost of the transit center.

If memory serves, the trench covers cost $10Mil per.  I’m not going to go to the place where I ask how it is that a parking lot with some bathrooms is supposed to cost 37 million dollars.  Instead I’m going to look for ways out of this current crisis while still giving Reno a transit center.

Here’s an idea:  Cover the third block of the trench between Arlington and West Streets.  Build a terminal building with facilities on the middle block.  Put up some shelters, landscaping, benches.  Get the price way below $37 million, say, $20 million.  Operate bus service for at least 2 years on the money saved.

There is 854 feet approximately of frontage for buses at CitiCenter.  If the trench plaza were opened as a transit center, there would be 1/3 of a mile, double the size of the current CitiCenter, and if the third block were covered and opened, there would be just a little under a half a mile of frontage for buses.  Add #1 stops on Virginia Street and you have a transit corridor that is roughly equivalent in frontage to the 4th Street Station.

RTC should be thinking outside the box on this one.  We already know that the ballpark developer isn’t crazy about Evans turning into a transit corridor.  A transit center in a good downtown can take many shapes and a corridor would work for Reno.  The corridor is set right in the middle of downtown.  A transit system is not just a collection of stationary facilities – it is primarily moving vehicles.  If those vehicles arrive and depart with sufficient frequency and schedule duration as to be worth riding, people will show up to board them.

More on Washoe RTC Cuts

RGJ today has more on the service cuts RTC is considering. 

From RTC’s web page about the cuts:

• Reduce peak hour frequency:
  Weekdays:  RT 1, 13, 16
  Saturday:  RT 1, 5, 13
• Reduce midday frequency:
  Weekdays:  RT 1, 6, 9, 13, 16
  Saturday:  RT 1, 5, 11, 15, 21
• Drop midday service:
  Weekdays:  RT 2s, 3CC, 57
  Saturday:  RT 25, 57
  Sunday:  RT 4, 13, 57
• Discontinue service:
  Weekdays:  RT 14A, 19
  Saturday:  RT 2s, 3CC, 14A, 19
  Sunday:  RT 2s
• Additional reductions:
  RT 3CC – drop last trip, weekdays
  RT 5 – drop last trip, Saturday
  RT 18 – drop 1 peak trip, cut evening, but run late night, weekdays
• RTC ACCESS possible service reduction and fee increases
• Would more than double the RTC ACCESS fare from $1.75 to $4.00

There will be a public hearing on Thursday, February 12 at RTC Administrative Offices, at 2050 Villanova Drive (under the US 395 Freeway next to Wooster High) at no earlier than 9:05 am (whatever that means.)

For what it’s worth, RTC’s new 4th Street Station project is a $37Mil project.  There is clearly some work they can do around efficiency of service – definitely eliminate the useless #19 for example.  But the RTC is looking at a funding shortfall of $6.7Mil, at the same time they are about to undertake a $37Mil capital project.  They should delay 4th Street Station until sales tax revenues begin to improve, and borrow from 4th Street Station funds to minimize the service cuts.

Washoe RTC: Let’s Just Eliminate Transit Service Altogether, Shall We? (NOT)

Via the RGJ today, RTC Washoe is moving ahead with plans to make the anticipated needed cuts to the bus transit system, while it prepares to move full steam ahead on “jobs creation” in the road construction business once it receives its anticipated newly inflation indexed gas tax funding from the legislature in the upcoming legislative session.

That’s a fine how-do-you-do, isn’t it?  At a time when transit ridership is actually up as people look for ways to avoid making trips in their cars, the bus service is being cut.  And the culprit is the voters of course, who refused to pay additional sales tax to keep the buses running.

STOP!  This tried and true formula, “It’s your fault, voters, for not raising taxes, and now the promised cuts must be made,” is a textbook example of the wrong-thinking approach to transit planning in small-to-medium sized cities across the country.

It’s flat out absurd.  I’ve done some number crunching based on FY07 numbers in the draft 2040 RTP.  Cross-referencing those numbers with the results of an onboard ridership survey from April, 2006 reveals some problems in the RTC’s business model that I’ve alluded to here before.  In short, farebox recovery is too low.  The bus does not even come close to paying its own way.  And it could be making a lot more money.

Now, before you cry foul on behalf of the poor, take into account that I’m considering the poor here.  And if you read further, you’ll see how.

Let’s take a look at the statistics from the April, 2006 ridership survey first.

Percentage of Washoe RTC transit riders with cars

The study shows that 60% of riders of the RTC’s buses have no car.  This would probably appear at first to be a troubling statistic, but it ignores the reality that the remainder of the riders have one or more car.  That is, they’re choosing to use the bus.

Income levels of Washoe RTC riders

Next let’s take a look at the income levels of the riders of the RTC.  27% of riders are clearly not doing well economically.  But, let’s be a bit generous and say that 45%, the first two categories of riders, are not doing well.  That is to say, these people are of a high likelihood to require some form of subsidy to ride the bus.  In classic transit system planning this subsidy level is achieved primarily through keeping fares at a level which can be considered low, as defined by a comparison of the fare to reference consumer price index (CPI) levels.  Still, it is worth noting here that 55% of riders would likely qualify for no subsidies or very little fare subsidy, based on the next set of data:  ages of riders and household composition.

Ages of Washoe RTC riders

The age category is the one that really starts to turn this thing around.  63% of the system’s riders are between the ages of 15 and 44 years.  The survey shows that 55% of riders are in one or two person households.

Washoe RTC number of people in riders’ households

Now let’s get into the transit system’s financials from the draft RTP.

First, let’s take a look at the fare structure for cash fares only.

Averaging these numbers, we get an average fare of $1.15.

The average fare on RTC ride is $1.15, which when multiplied by average daily ridership * 365, equals $10,167,604.25.  Yet RTC’s total farebox revenue in FY 07 for its 8.8 million riders per year, is some $3 million less.  On a transit system with an average fare of $1.15, where the only people who ride free are generally not allowed to be out in public without supervision, the system is collecting $0.81 cents per rider.

Now let’s get into the nuts and bolts of this thing.  The RTP does not clearly define the term ridership so I’ll take a stab at it and say that on any given day, 24,223 people are riding the bus.  It doesn’t look like we’re counting trips.  But if we were counting trips, and we assume that a rider pays the average fare of $1.15 per way, the average rider would then be paying $2.30 per day to use the system.  If that were the case, RTC’s farebox revenues would be $20,335,263.70.

If the RTC were collecting a little over the cost of a single adult ride per day per rider, the taxpayer subsidy to the system would be 25%.  The subsidy ratio would be almost the complete opposite of the way the system operates today.

At first, it seems that the culprit could conceivably be monthly passes.  But perhaps not.  With the average monthly pass costing $43.75, assuming every rider in the system was using a monthly pass, the revenue collected for the year, if I’m doing my math right, would be $12,717,075.  Monthly passes certainly are not as profitable as single ride charges, but if monthly pass revenue accounted for all the system’s revenue, the system would still be at a considerably higher farebox recovery ratio than it is today:  48%.

Perhaps someone familiar with the RTC’s actual definitions of the numbers I’m playing with could show up to this blog and debunk all these assumptions.  If passengers were paying what is clearly listed in the RTC’s numbers as cost per passenger, that is $3.00, the system would be breaking even.  The average revenue per passenger according to my math is $0.81.

Now, what do we do about the poor?  Well, if everyone who can pay their own way on the system pays their own way on the system, remember earlier from the survey where I estimated 45% of system riders might require a subsidized fare.  45% of the 8.8 million total riders is 3,978,638.55.  Assume for a moment that the subsidized fare is $1 per ride.  The total yearly public subsidy for a break even system is less than $4 million.  That is less than 1/4 of the total public subsidy for the transit system today.

What gives?

The Urban Blog On Transportation Measures

It’s not every day a person sees their name in the newspaper, but I saw mine in the paper today.  It’s ok, it’s for a good reason.  I wasn’t arrested.

I was quoted in the Reno News & Review this week in a piece regarding some Washoe County transportation ballot measures.  I’ve written a fair bit about those subjects here, so it was nice to be contacted by the story’s author.  After dipping my toe into the water of talking about current affairs vis-a-vis the ballot box by making a presidential endorsement, here’s a roundup of the transportation-related ballot measures affecting both Reno and Seattle.

Reno

WC-2 Sales Tax Increase for Public Transit

Yes

As I said in the RNR, everyone could end up on the bus at some point.  Cars are great, I like having one, but cars break, and people still have to get to work.  People still have lives to live with independence.  A good bus system goes a long way toward keeping everything moving.

RTC Ride isn’t a perfect bus service.  In fact, if this blog were going to the ballot with a transit measure, we’d be pretty specific about the improvements in service that would be made, and we’d ask for all the money we’d need.  Our bus service would feature 15-minute headways on 80% of the routes during 12 hours of the day and no less than 30-minute headways on all routes in the system.  Express buses would run all day, every day, between Reno, Sparks, Fernley, Spanish Springs, North Valleys via TRIC, and Carson City.

Turns out they’re not giving buses away, and bus drivers need food and shelter.  So this would cost a pretty penny.

Alas, The Urban Blog’s new bus system isn’t on the ballot this year in Washoe County, and with service cuts looming in the wake of some other service cuts, it does make sense to go ahead and raise the sales tax an eight of a percent bringing the total sales tax rate to 7.5%.

WC-5 Gas Tax Indexing Advisory Question

Yes

If The Urban Blog were running the show, gas tax would be used primarily for the operation of public highway facilities and excise tax would be the way public highway facilities were paid for.  That way, every time you registered your car, you could see line items to tell you about the bonds you’re paying off, and you could see their expiration date.  Suddenly major public facilities such as a road between Sparks and South Meadows or a Spanish Springs Freeway or a US-50 East Freeway, would now have an established, dedicated funding mechanism.

The Urban Blog is not running the show, but in our ideal system we figure we’d probably want our operational budget to account for inflation.  This measure merely lets the RTC know if they should go to the Legislature to ask for the gas tax to be indexed to inflation.  So even though it pains us to say it, this measure should pass.

Seattle

Initiative 985 Traffic Signal Timing & Other Assorted Related Items

No

The bane of the existences of many Washington citizens is a guy by the name of Tim Eyman.  He’s forever getting stuff put on the ballot that sounds great, would break three things to fix one, and usually gets invalidated by the court after it passes.  This measure is one of his.  It would siphon funds off from every transportation budget in the state to fund timing every traffic signal in the state, and would open the HOV lanes to general traffic considerably more than they are today.

The Seattle area is working on finally getting light rail service to its major destinations and for a while now has had great express bus service between major destinations and that express bus service depends largely on what I call the “bus freeway”, which provides all kinds of dedicated ramps and lanes for buses, carpools, and vanpools.  The HOV network should remain closed to general traffic most hours of the day.  Traffic in Seattle is wretched, and public transit ought to be on time.

Timing the traffic lights in the state is a great idea.  We’d support a measure that provides a dedicated funding source that doesn’t impact other budgets.  This is not that measure.  This measure is a turkey and needs to be voted down.

Sound Transit Proposition 1

HELL YEAH!

Sound Transit is the Seattle-area regional transit authority which operates the aforementioned express bus system, and is building the aforementioned light rail system, and also operates the regional commuter rail system.

In 2009 the first trains from downtown to the airport will begin operating, and that’ll be a glorious day.  Downtown Seattle has for many years had a tunnel running underneath it carrying buses.  When the tunnel was originally built, tracks were installed to carry the light rail trains they were going to purchase any day.  Turned out the tracks were not installed properly and the tunnel had to be closed for two years while they installed the track for THESE trains.  Once the initial segment to the airport is complete, another segment will begin construction linking downtown to the University District.

This measure would authorize the expansion of the system further, across Lake Washington to the technology and business havens of Bellevue and Redmond, and would also push transit further north from the University and south from the airport.  It would add to the commuter rail and express bus services.  In short, it would authorize the expansion of the regional public transit service to a point where its usefulness would be greatly improved.

And that’s why we say “HELL YEAH!” to this one.  The population of the tri-county area served by Sound Transit is about 3 million.  This is long overdue.

Public Transportation Ridership Up, A Perfect Time For Service Cuts

Reports abound lately about people ditching their cars for their daily commutes and hopping on the bus instead.  With the price of gas fast approaching 4 dollars a gallon in America, people are looking for lower-cost alternatives to driving.

This is true even in car-loving Reno, where despite a recent bus fare increase, ridership is up ranging from 5 to 10 percent on Truckee Meadows routes and a whopping 33 percent on the Intercity service between Reno and Carson City.

Sadly, because the bus relies on sales tax for most of its funding, and sales tax revenues are declining, RTC is looking to make service cuts of at least 10 percent.

Now is the time to be looking at new funding sources for transit service, not cutting transit service.  A region's economic viability is greatly impacted by mobility options available there.  In Reno's case traffic is still virtually nonexistant from a big-city perspective and parking is abundant.  Even with $4 gas the bus is still socially regarded as the province of the transit using underclass.  Consequently, the burden of proof is still on the transit service.

Transit services must prove that they are effective and well-run.  Service must be frequent and reliable and routes well connected with each other without requiring travel to a central transfer center to get across town.  By beginning to make these kinds of changes on their existing routes, effectively getting away from over-reliance on the hub-and-spoke system now employed, the RTC could demonstrate to the public that transit is worth riding.

RTC should be talking about alternative designs for the transit system currently in place.  It is critical at this juncture to increase the amount of farebox revenue that is applied to the service as a percentage of the service's overall funding.  The service it currently operates is not efficient by any stretch of the imagination and due to its over-reliance on subsidies is vulnerable to the availability of the subsidy funds and not taking enough advantage of the money it receives from the people who actually use the service.

It's a two-way street when it comes to both roads and transit.  Roads are currently oversubsidized.  Drivers get a great bargain in the end with the service they receive for owning and operating their own vehicle.  Roads are highly subsidized by public funding sources and are priced disproportionately to transit.  Consider the fees paid on vehicle licensing vs. the fees paid over a year's purchase of monthly bus passes.  Assuming a $300 excise tax and a $60 monthly bus pas, the amount of money paid in bus passes is more than double.  This is somewhat evened out by gas taxes, though a driver filling up twice a month for a year and paying 6 dollars per fill-up in gas tax, is laying out $120 a year. 

The driver of an automobile's user fees (discounting insurance and cost of fuel, whole other balls of wax) amount to several hundred dollars less per year than the transit rider's user fees, and yet transit service continues to suffer setbacks in funding from subsidies.  What gives?

Public Transportation In the Lake Tahoe Region

Julie Brown of the Sierra Sun does a little experiment to find out if she can live her life for a week using exclusively the bus to get around.  She fails, but it makes for an interesting report.

The report spends plenty of time on one of the messages this space has been trying to make for a while - quite possibly the largest impediment to more people riding the bus is the lack of schedule frequency.  Even the people involved in running the transit services in the Tahoe region admit to it as the reason they don't ride.