Over at Greater Greater Washington, urban analyst John Ricco has had a mind-shattering revelation: if we spent less on transit, we could have more transit. He notes that the United States spends far more on transit projects than other countries, though he adds that, “No one’s really sure why.”
Actually, his revelation isn’t quite as mind-shattering as I presented it. Instead, what he realized is, “If we lowered transit construction costs, we could build more transit.” Apparently, he is one of those people who thinks transit is only transit if it is built.
The Antiplanner would go further and say, “if we stopped wasting money building transit, we could have more transit.” While Ricco is correct that transit construction costs are bloated, even the least-expensive rail transit is going to be more expensive than running buses on roads and streets shared with other vehicles. We’re spending $100 million or more per mile building light rail, but even if it cost only $10 million per mile, buying and running buses would still cost far less.
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By the way, contrary to Ricco’s claim that no one knows why transit construction is so much more expensive in the United States than elsewhere, the Antiplanner has revealed the answer to that question. Congress’ method of financing transit construction has turned the Treasury into a commons, encouraging cities and transit agencies to select the most expensive transit alternatives rather than the most efficient ones. This is in sharp contrast to the way highway funds are distributed, and highway construction here is not notably more expensive than elsewhere.
Ricco’s shallow analysis gives no hint of whether he is aware that transit construction costs in the U.S. are not only far more expensive than other countries, they are also far more expensive than costs in the U.S. just a few decades ago. After adjusting for inflation, light-rail lines built in the 1980s averaged about $25 million per mile. Today, the average line costs nearly $200 million per mile. This is a direct result of transit agencies competing with one another to get their share of the federal pie.
Ricco lists things like union work rules, high land costs, and overengineering as possible causes of high construction costs. But the fundamental cause is the ways funds are allocated. Until that’s fixed, transit costs will continue to climb.
“We’re spending $100 million or more per mile building light rail, but even if it cost only $10 million per mile, buying and running buses would still cost far less.”
Why build a freeway when it would be cheaper to have a rutted country lane?
“Unfortunately, too many transit advocates also believe that transit is morally superior to cars”
Not in my case. I observed that each lane is 3.5m, or thereabouts, and a car is 2.5m wide. Each lane can only contain one car at a time. When the first car is stopped, the rest queue up behind. Adding extra lanes is possible, but not where there is development along the road edge. Ultimately, there is a limit to how far you can go with just cars.
Hence transit.
Yeah… Francis the problem with your first comment is that paved highways carry greater passenger miles per hour than country lanes, while transit carries fewer than paved highways. Your second comment is just nonsensical. A train by definition is a bunch of cars stuck behind one car at all times, and there are no extra lanes.
“Francis the problem with your first comment is that paved highways carry greater passenger miles per hour than country lanes”
Just like light rail has a capacity much greater than buses (except in Antiplanner’s strange calculations). Metro has a capacity greater yet.
“Your second comment is just nonsensical. ”
Bless you.
“A train by definition is a bunch of cars stuck behind one car at all times, and there are no extra lanes.”
Yet the capacity of each train is very high, and the frequency can be high too.
Trains have to stop for people to get on and off. So do cars. Difference being, everybody already on the train has their commute interrupted while stopping to pick up or drop off other passengers while cars can get on and off a highway without requiring that the other people currently on the highway stop, too.
Francis is a government planner; don’t expect any common sense from him.
Planners like Michael Setty and Francis King are parasites living a big lie. They serve no useful function and suck the life out of everything.
And when Francis comes back and retorts that he is a “consultant” and not a government-employed planner, I have this classic rejoinder for him:
Same shit, different asshole.
Goes double for Mikey
Yet the capacity of each train is very high, and the frequency can be high too.
The higher the capacity of each train, the longer it takes to get people on and off, which decreases the frequency.
”
“Unfortunately, too many transit advocates also believe that transit is morally superior to cars”
Not in my case. I observed that each lane is 3.5m, or thereabouts, and a car is 2.5m wide. Each lane can only contain one car at a time. When the first car is stopped, the rest queue up behind. Adding extra lanes is possible, but not where there is development along the road edge. Ultimately, there is a limit to how far you can go with just cars.
Hence transit.
”
~ Francis King
Come on, that’s puerile reasoning. Everything has it’s limits. Put on your big boy pants and talk about capacity along with footprints along with pricing.
For example, Colorado DOT’s T-Rex project could have added more capacity for the same price had they added additional freeway lanes instead of the light rail line. That lack of capacity is very important today.
They’re stuck with congestion, unable to afford to expand the freeway capacity. Cost wise, they can only afford to expand on the side without LRT. Expanding LRT capacity could be even more expensive.
They may be able to expand stations to handle another car per train. Beyond that it’s not clear since most stations don’t have room for that. And the system isn’t built to handle express trains or other that would increase capacity by doing things like adding track to bypass stations. Which, btw, also increases it’s footprint.
And what is actual footprint and costs compared to other options?
For example, a new freeway section of US 212 in the Twin Cities ( MN ), cost @$250M to build. It’s about 15% shorter in length than the proposed Metro Transwit Southwest Light Rail ( LRT ) line.
Today the recently built freeway serves 50% more customers than the proposed LRT claims it will serve in 2020. The proposed LRT line is projected to cost a hair under $2Billion.
The proposed LRT line will serve a route already well served by bus transit. The proposed transit route’s footprint means killing a popular existing trail. It means reducing park land. It means creating a lot of noise in places where 1/2 the current corridor has none.
How is this footprint smaller than beefing up existing bus transit service with HOT lanes on MN 62 ( Crosstown Freeway ) and signaling and BRT on MN 7?