More than eighteen years ago, the Onion reported that “98 percent of commuters favor public transit for others” so that everyone else can drive on uncongested roads. That hasn’t changed, as in 2016 Los Angeles overwhelming voted for measure M, which will spend $120 billion on transit improvements, yet ridership there has dropped from 600 million trips in 2016 to 550 million annual trips in 2018.
To find out why this is happening, UCLA researcher Michael Manville, an associate professor of urban planning, did a survey of 1,450 Los Angeles-area voters and found out the Onion was right: very few voters supported the transit tax because they expected to ride transit. Instead, nearly 70 percent of supporters voted for it because they thought it would relieve congestion and reduce air pollution.
“In truth, taming traffic isn’t what transit does best,” observes CityLab in its review of Manville’s study. “Done right, it brings low-cost, efficient mobility to the masses, even when the roads are jammed.” But spending $120 billion on high-cost, low-capacity transit lines is hardly the definition of “done right.” Continue reading
