Speaking of simplistic solutions to complex problems, Streetsblog has an article on how to save transit. Based on ridership numbers from thirty-five urban ares, the pro-transit site says the two keys to transit success are, first, to spend lots of money, and second, to spend it in the right places.
I wonder why no one ever thought of that before.
The article points out that only three urban areas saw an increase in transit ridership from 2016 to 2017: Seattle, Phoenix, and Houston (where ridership grew just 0.1 percent). The numbers in the article are somewhat different from the numbers the Antiplanner calculated from the National Transit Database, but I agree that the only significant growth was in Seattle and Phoenix. (My numbers show a 0.1 percent decline in Houston.)
To test Streetsblog’s conclusions, I used the National Transit Database capital expenditures time series to total capital expenditures over the last ten years (2007-2016), adjusting them for inflation using GDP deflators. I then divided the capital expenses by the number of people in each urbanized area as recorded in the 2017 National Transit Database. I compared the per capita capital expenses with the growth (or shrinkage) in ridership between 2016 and 2017 for the nation’s 50 largest urban areas.
The correlation between capital spending and ridership growth was a low 0.31. That’s not much better than random. (Playing in Excel reveals that any two series of 50 completely random numbers can have correlation coefficients as high as 0.33.)
It’s true that Seattle spent about $3,400 per capita on transit capital improvements in the last ten years, which is higher than most urban areas. But Salt Lake spent $3,500 per capita and ridership declined by 0.9 percent. Denver spent $2,700 and lost 4.4 percent of its riders. Phoenix only spent $657 and ridership there grew about as fast as Seattle’s.
To be fair, though it mentioned that both Phoenix and Seattle are spending billions on light rail, Streetsblog wasn’t focusing on capital expenditures. Instead, it claimed that these cities were improving their whole systems, increasing overall service. So I compared the change in vehicle miles of service with the change in ridership.
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In this case, the correlation was a little higher: 0.56, which is considerably better than random but far from conclusive proof of cause-and-effect. Between 2016 and 2017, Phoenix increased service by an incredible 16.2 percent, but managed to get only 3.5 percent more riders. Seattle also increased service, but buy just 2.6 percent, yielding 2.3 percent more riders. But New York increased service 4.4 percent, Denver by 5.7 percent, Las Vegas by 4.6 percent, and Charlotte by 8.1 percent, yet all of them saw ridership decline.
Streetsblog would respond that those cities must have put their resources in the wrong places. Salt Lake, for example, put a lot of money into commuter trains that few people ride. But it also increased overall service by 2.0 percent. San Francisco both spent a lot of money (close to $2,700 per capita) and increased service by 3.4 percent, yet it lots 2.4 percent of its riders.
I agree with Streetsblog that letting service decline, as Los Angeles, Miami, Atlanta, and a number of other regions have done, will hasten transit’s decline. But I don’t think there is any clear formula for maintaining, much less growing, transit ridership. Pointing to regions like Columbus as positive examples because they lost a smaller percentage of riders than their peers is just another way of saying that taxpayers need to prop up a declining industry.
The bottom line is Streetsblog’s analysis is too shallow to be useful. By comparing just 2017 with 2016, for example, it missed the fact that Phoenix ridership ridership has been declining since 2013; while the growth in 2017 made up for part of this decline, early returns for 2018 show it is declining again. Houston got a one-time boost from its restructured bus service, but its ridership is also declining again. Looking at just the 35 largest urban areas misses Salt Lake, which is spending wildly on transit to little result.
That leaves Seattle as the only urban area with unambiguous ridership growth. Is that because of its new light-rail lines? Or because of improvements in the bus system? Or could it be due to something else entirely, such as a surge in millennial workers in the downtown area who take transit because the region is too congested for driving? Basing national policy or regional recommendations on what may be the temporary success of just one urban area’s transit system is highly risky.
The preponderance of evidence shows that transit is rapidly declining and has been doing so since 1947. It has received occasional reprieves from high gas prices, and the $1.1 trillion or so in subsidies since 1970 may have slightly slowed that decline. But it has come time to admit that it makes no sense to keep throwing good money after bad and it would be better to put it out our misery.
Waiting for the highwayman to give us his sage like wisdom
“But YOU ARGUE SPENDING MORE MONEY ON ROADS MAAHHHHH”
Seattle, Phoenix and Houston are three of the fastest-growing large urban areas in the country. That is most likely what accounts for their modest ridership growth. It would be a severe embarrassment to them if their ridership did not grow in the face of strong population growth. Keep in mind that per capita ridership in these cities could be declining and they could still experience ridership growth in absolute terms.
As for the relationship between capital expenditures and ridership, I wouldn’t chalk up a correlation of 0.3 as totally random. But it also doesn’t take into account the possibility of causality running the other way — cities with ridership growth spending more on capital improvements, which seems at least equally plausible. Seattle is experiencing ridership growth and is spending enormous amounts on capital improvements. One can certainly question whether that money is being spent wisely, but it tends to fit the overall explanation.