The Southeast Pennsylvania Transportation Authority (SEPTA) is one of those transit agencies that depends on annual appropriations for its operations, maintenance, and improvements. The agency bitterly complains that it doesn’t have a “dedicated fund” meaning a tax on something else that it can count on whether it serves its customers or not. It tried to get permission to have the state impose a toll on Interstate 80 and give SEPTA the money, but the federal government rejected the idea.
SEPTA high-capacity rail lines. Flickr photo by Joseph A.
In 2011, fares covered less than 29 percent of SEPTA’s costs, including both operating and capital costs. Local governments provided only 7 percent, the feds 20 percent (mostly capital funds), leaving the state to cover 42 percent of the agency’s budget. Without more money, says SEPTA, it will have to cut service.
Those who have a hard time understanding why the federal government should subsidize local transit programs may find it just as difficult to see why state taxpayers should subsidize programs that almost solely benefit people in the Philadelphia region. To help them understand, SEPTA commissioned a study showing why state taxpayers should spend even more money subsidizing its operations.
Though SEPTA operates low-capacity rail, high-capacity rail, and moderate-capacity commuter trains, more than half of its passengers ride buses. Flickr photo by Bradlee119.
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Of course, transit agencies in large metro areas tend to be more efficient and have higher fare recovery ratios than ones in smaller cities and towns. SEPTA is effectively arguing, “We’re more efficient, so we deserve more subsidies so we can be as inefficient as everyone else.”
SEPTA’s low-capacity rail cars tend to operate individually rather than in two- or three-car trains. Since they carry an average of just 20 passengers, they could easily be replaced by buses whose maintenance costs are far lower. Flickr photo by David Wilson 1949.
SEPTA argues that its operations are somehow critically important to the state of Pennsylvania as a whole. But what I see is that they are a huge and growing burden on the state. If transit riders won’t pay enough fares to keep the system going, why should taxpayers support SEPTA? If local taxpayers won’t provide more than 7 percent of SEPTA’s funds, why should state taxpayers–just a quarter of whom live in SEPTA’s service area–contribute 42 percent?
The study also says that ridership is growing and reached a “23-year high” in 2012. That’s another way of saying that ridership was less in 2012 than during most of the 1980s. The Philadelphia urban area’s population has grown by 30 percent since 1989. So why, after all these subsidies, can’t SEPTA attract as many riders as it carried in 1989?
The study observes that SEPTA is spending about $200 million a year on maintenance, which is at least $129 million a year short of keeping the system in its current state of repair. In addition to that, another $323 million per year would be needed to restore the entire transit system to a state of good repair in 20 years. In other words, SEPTA has more than a $6 billion maintenance backlog, and even increasing maintenance spending by 65 percent won’t do more than keep that backlog from growing any larger.
How much of that backlog is due to rail, particularly to low-capacity rail that could easily be replaced by buses? SEPTA’s low-capacity railcars tend to operate individually instead of in multi-car trains, and carry an average of just 20 people, who could easily be carried by a bus. Perhaps instead of seeking funding to reduce its maintenance backlog, SEPTA should start thinking about upgrading its system to late-20th century standards by replacing those railcars with buses.
Roads require maintenance and are not free. I hate how people insist they require no maintenance. The low capacity stuff is complete non sense it isn’t any less then bus service and a rail system can carry far more people than roads.
A light rail system can carry 20,000 people per hour where as a bus lane can carry 7,000 people per hour.
libertyrailroad: Roads require maintenance and are not free.
JK: That is a gross distortion of the reality. Roads are 100+% paid by users, unlike transit which is only 20-30% paid by users.
libertyrailroad:hate how people insist they require no maintenance.
JK: Who makes that ridiculous claim? Of course road maintenance is paid by road users. Unlike transit maintenance.
libertyrailroad:The low capacity stuff is complete non sense it isn’t any less then bus service and a rail system can carry far more people than roads.
JK: Please give us an example of ANY light rail (light rail is the subject of this post, not heavy rail) that can carry more people than buses. And please give us costs per passenger-mile of bus, light rail, heavy rail and passenger cars INCLUDING construction and maintenance.
libertyrailroad: A light rail system can carry 20,000 people per hour where as a bus lane can carry 7,000 people per hour
JK: Oh please give us a break from teh transit propaganda! Name one LIGHT rail (the subject of this post) that carries more than ONE LANE of freeway over 24 hours. FYI: one lane of road can carry around 30,000 people per hour as proven by the buses through the Holland tunnel.
And tell us how often light rail trains of how many cars, with how many people each, have to run to achieve 20,000 people per hour and which lines in the USA accomplish this?
Thanks
JK
A good introduction to the fallacies of light rail is Tom Rubin’s presentation here:
http://blip.tv/file/2743664
Thanks
JK
The Antiplanner wrote:
It tried to get permission to have the state impose a toll on Interstate 80 and give SEPTA the money, but the federal government rejected the idea.
Not just once, but twice.
The USDOT under the George “W” Bush Administration and again under the Obama Administration rejected the scheme to toll I-80 across Pennsylvania.
In SEPTA’s defense, not all of the I-80 toll revenue would have been diverted to its coffers – some of the money would have gone to the Port Authority of Allegheny County (the transit authority in Pittsburgh), and some money would have gone to other transit operators in Pennsylvania and for highway projects (having nothing to do with I-80).
A light rail can potentially carry 20,000 people an hour………..no ones arguing the capacity, why are we arguing capacity? The question is does it and is it efficient? No, it’s not. A body builder can lift hundreds of pounds, do they do it as a daily activity; No, they’d destroy their bodies and rail is like a body builder, physically impressive, powerful but ultimately it burns out. A better analogy, rail is like the digestive system, it only goes one way basically. Buses are like the circulatory system, they can go everywhere. Buses can be rerouted at a moments notice. If a noticeable change occurs and passengers wanna go somewhere a bus can easily adapt to fill those additional demand by providing more buses. When demand drops you route fewer buses and save costs. Rail is monolithic, buses are modular. Rail goes and goes. Buses can travel to the outskirts. With rail, you have to build through the outskirts just to carry a few people.
There are some things you cant do because government says “No”. But Government says “Yes” to the “Chosen Ones”. The Chosen Ones include Big Banks, Sugar producers, union automakers, green energy companies, etc. Established taxi providers benefit from the government’s ability to say “No” at the expense of cool new or innovative businesses such as Uber and ZipCar or jitneys or private bus operators. The Chosen Ones are those selected by Government to receive special favors. If you wanna do somebody a favor, fine, if a business wants to give favors, fine, it’s their money. Hell, Hollywood thrives on favors. But they spend their own money doing so and unlike the government they cant force people. Government uses force when it gives favors. It taxes you to give money or privileges to mostly rich people with connections. Rich people with connections helped pass Obamacare, transit appropriation, high speed rail, federal flood insurance for million dollar homes and they did it all by convincing Congress to say Yes the them and No to everyone else.
Remember virtually everything that benefits some or screws the majority over is based on some government saying “Yes” or “No”. Fast Amphibians makes these incredible amphibious four wheel vehicles that can go 30 mph on water. The cars were already available in Europe for sale but not in the US; the reason supposedly a matter of safety, as a four vehicle it didn’t have an airbag (which would naturally deploy due to the constant smacking on the water). In Europe they don’t mandate such strict safety precautions, yet air bags are ubiquitous in cars anyway. Why not just have a system where the air bag can be turned off while on water. You can turn off the passenger air bags with the key. Here the quad is approved for recreation, but you cant drive it to work. In this case the “Chosen Ones” are the Big Three automotive companies that simply don’t want the competition of an affordable, fun and useful vehicle they never thought of.
I bet the US Marines would love a version of this where the fastest amphibious vehicle they have travels at merely 8 mph. The US Military spent billions of dollars to develop a vehicle that would go faster ($16 billion) than 8 mph that they later cancelled (to be fair, the quad isn’t armor plated or large to carry 16 Marines). I bet the Army would love an ATV they could ride over a river instead of a bridging vehicle. We’re sending our Marines to shore using essentially WW2 technology. Fire departments and police would love them too, they could rescue people without the need or extensive costs of harbor patrol, dedicated Maritime Patrol or the Coast Guard. With Amphibs you can rush them out of the water and straight to the hospital without transfer to an ambulance.
There are “Chosen Ones” and people who pick who the chosen ones are, they’re called Congress. And no one gets more perks and favors than Congress. Vehicles, hair cuts, valet, huge salaries, pensions, protection, a custom carpenter shop for production of congressional furniture (the Senate barber shop that loses a third of a million dollars a year, the House barber shop was privatized). Of course there’s no bigger decider of yes or no than a President and his perks include two Boeing 747’s to use at ones discretion, a fleet of armor plated vehicles, a fleet of helicopters, 5 full time chefs, a doctor on call, a barber and service staff, army of landscapers and a thousand man personal security force; all for a 55,000 square foot Georgian style mansion for a family of four and one dog.
LazyReader wrote:
There are “Chosen Ones” and people who pick who the chosen ones are, they’re called Congress. And no one gets more perks and favors than Congress. Vehicles, hair cuts, valet, huge salaries, pensions, protection, a custom carpenter shop for production of congressional furniture (the Senate barber shop that loses a third of a million dollars a year, the House barber shop was privatized).
Don’t forget parking courtesy of federal taxpayers for all Members and many of their staff people. A perk that is denied to the vast majority of federal workers in downtown Washington, D.C.
Of course there’s no bigger decider of yes or no than a President and his perks include two Boeing 747?s to use at ones discretion, a fleet of armor plated vehicles, a fleet of helicopters, 5 full time chefs, a doctor on call, a barber and service staff, army of landscapers and a thousand man personal security force; all for a 55,000 square foot Georgian style mansion for a family of four and one dog.
I have no problem with the President and (to some extent) the Vice President having those perks. In part because they need them in order to do their jobs, and in part because there are a lot of nuts and kooks out there.
More Dribble and non sense roads don’t pay for themselves. This has been debunked tons of times. The fees for roads aren’t fees and paid by anyone who drives on any kind of road. Roads with all fees accounted for don’t all of the cost of maintence. Road fees aren’t fees. Gasoline is often exempted from sales taxes and the excise tax on gasoline is often less then that of the regular sales tax. Railroads were often taxed to build roads. Just because capacity isn’t being fully utilized doesn’t mean it has less capacity.
http://www.lightrailnow.org/myths/m_000010.htm
http://subsidyscope.org/transportation/direct-expenditures/highways/funding/analysis/
http://www.uspirg.org/sites/pirg/files/reports/Do-Roads-Pay-for-Themselves.pdf
Light rail now.org!!! Give us a break
Got any credible sources?
here is a credible source, traceable to government and other data:
the Subsidies/Externalities section of http://www.portlandfacts.com/autos.html
Thanks
JK
There were was USPIRG and Subsidyscope both valid sources. Light Rail now was simply explaining the payment system. Just because you don’t like a source doesn’t mean it isn’t valid.
Jim Karlock:
” Of course road maintenance is paid by road users. Unlike transit maintenance.”
99% of roads carrying around 75% of vehicle miles are maintained via local property taxes, including paving, snow plowing, and street sweeping.
I don’t recall being a land owner made you a highway user.
As to the rest, the gas tax is an excise tax, not a user fee. It is not paid proportionate to use, and it is levied on non-uses like gas for lawnmowers, ATV’s, and leaf blowers. Before the gas tax was earmarked for roads, it was simply part of the general revenue stream. When it was earmarked in the 1950’s, other taxes had to be raised to cover the hole left, an obvious implicit subsidy.
That the gas tax must pay for roads is not obvious. It is related to the exact same extent that having the liquor tax pay for distilleries and breweries, or the cigarrette tax to cover the growing and processing of tobacco. I.e., it is not related at all, and the relationship in your mind is a simple artificial political association.
Randall:
“SEPTA’s low-capacity rail cars tend to operate individually rather than in two- or three-car trains. Since they carry an average of just 20 passengers, they could easily be replaced by buses whose maintenance costs are far lower”
SEPTA operates smaller vehicles at frequent headways of around 4 to 6 minutes, as opposed to the 15-20 minute headways seen on more recently constructed lines. The streetcars operate on unpaved private right of way in the suburbs and in an unventilated tunnel downtown, thus avoiding much urban congestion and providing more direct routes through the street grid. Replacing the service with buses would require more drivers and more vehicles since they have less capacity (51 seats vs. 37 seats) and would be run in traffic. It is not at all obvious that these routes cost more to run and maintain as rail routes. SEPTA does a careful accounting of all routes in its Annual Service Plan, and the streetcar lines generally come out with ridership and cost recovery at the upper end of the scale.
Yes, as light rail lines in Philadelphia run in the Market Street Subway Tunnel there would be a severe decline in quality of service if they were replaced by buses, which would be stuck in traffic on surface streets in the Center City area. This would result in a significant ridership decline just in itself, not considering the fact that merely replacing rail lines with buses reduces ridership – a result first seen when transit agencies replaced their streetcars with buses in the 1920s and 1930s (the converse – replacing buses with rail lines, increases ridership, which is seen, amongst other places, in LA (Blue Line carrying many more riders than former express bus route 456, Red Line carrying more than 426, etc.) and Toronto (Spadina 510 streetcar line replacing Spadina 77 buses).
The more fundamental criticism I have with this post is the implication that the rest of the state of Pennsylvania should not subsidize Philadelphia. The population of Pennsylvania is 12.7 million, of which 3.8 million are in the Philadelphia metro area in Pennsylvania. 30% of the state population is in Philly, and probably a higher percentage of the state economic output. If the rest of the state should not subsidize Philly than Philly should not subsidize the rest of the state – why should someone filling up in Center City Philly pay gas taxes to repair a rural section of I-80 that the person never uses?
99% of roads carrying around 75% of vehicle miles are maintained via local property taxes, including paving, snow plowing, and street sweeping.
That is not true.
I don’t recall being a land owner made you a highway user.
1) Property taxes are used to pay for local roads, not highways
2) What land owner does not use the local roads he/she pays for via property taxes (as a car owner or otherwise)?
As to the rest, the gas tax is an excise tax, not a user fee. It is not paid proportionate to use
So your definition is “proportionate to use”? Out of curiosity, I pulled some data from the USDOT’s Highway Statistics (3 decades’ worth) and estimated a simple bivariate regression of highway motor fuel use on national VMT. The resulting R-squared value was just under 0.98. Sounds pretty proportional to me.
…and it is levied on non-uses like gas for lawnmowers, ATV’s, and leaf blowers.
Who cares? There is no such thing as a perfect revenue source. The inclusion of these users is the tradeoff for the extremely low transaction costs associated with gasoline taxes.
Before the gas tax was earmarked for roads, it was simply part of the general revenue stream. When it was earmarked in the 1950?s, other taxes had to be raised to cover the hole left, an obvious implicit subsidy.
That isn’t a subsidy, unless you think that gas taxes should be paying for both infrastructure and for other items the government pays for out of general revenues.
Randall:
Those who have a hard time understanding why the federal government should subsidize local transit programs may find it just as difficult to see why state taxpayers should subsidize programs that almost solely benefit people in the Philadelphia region.
Perhaps because with 40% of Pennsylvania’s economic output and tax payments and 32% of the state’s population, the 5 county region gets just 27% of the transportation spending. And this considering that the 5 county region by far also makes the most intensive use of the Pennsylvania Turnpike, meaning it pays more tolls for less benefit.
Maybe the better question is how the rest of the state would get by without Philadelphia’s money seeing as the region pays 1 of ever 3 dollars spent in the rest of the state, thus providing a massive subsidy to drivers in rural and small urban areas.
MJ:
2) What land owner does not use the local roads he/she pays for via property taxes (as a car owner or otherwise)?
Any landowner who does not own a car does not use the roads. Many people in the Philadelphia area own houses but do not use cars, inlcuding both poor people, seniors, and young urban dwellers.
More to the point, paying for roads through property taxes (and tolls) is the mode of subsidizing highway travel by those who commute on freeways. Those drivers burn gas and pay gas tax, but get no benefit in return in the form of free improved roads. Pennsylvania economic costs clearly show that the costs of fully paying for an expressway like the Turnpike is 4 or more times the rate of the gas tax paid by driving down a freeway at 20 mpg (10 cents per mile vs. around 2.5 cents per mile). Freeway users are the biggest moochers on the commute.
MJ:
So your definition is “proportionate to use”? Out of curiosity, I pulled some data from the USDOT’s Highway Statistics (3 decades’ worth) and estimated a simple bivariate regression of highway motor fuel use on national VMT. The resulting R-squared value was just under 0.98. Sounds pretty proportional to me.
Again, most driving is done on local roads and a large amount of highway driving in Pennsylvania is on the Turnpike. Users of roads paid for by gas taxes, primarily freeways, are the only ones receiving a benefit from gas tax subsidization of road maintainence and construction. The use of freeways is not proportional to the consumption of gas. Living around the northern Philadelphia suburbs for example, most of my driving is on local streets and almost anything long distance is on the Pennsylvania Turnpike. I pay around $600 in gas tax every year, but my driving on roads paid by gas tax is limited to perhaps 5-10% of my mileage. That means most of my gas tax money goes to pay for commuting by people who drive the handful of local freeways or to rural areas of the state. Knowing where my neighbors live and work, I don’t think I am at all unusual.
Yet these rural drivers on US 322 or locals commuting on I-95 are people like you who call transit users moochers even as they receive an enormous subsidy for their daily commute. If freeway users all had to pay tolls for use, they’d be out thousands per year.
Who cares?
Well, if you are all burned up about subsidization of transit, why does my lawncutting subsidize your driving? Why are you such a moocher?
That isn’t a subsidy, unless you think that gas taxes should be paying for both infrastructure and for other items the government pays for out of general revenues.
No, there is nothing inherent about any excise tax that mandates it “belongs” to a certain subset of society. You are writing here claiming an entitlement of freeway users to all gas tax revenue to pay for their road use, as opposed to a toll system, and as opposed to gas taxes returning to their former role of being a source of general revenue to lessen the need for income and sales taxes.
As I said, gas taxes MUST pay for roads to the exact same extent that liquor drinkers MUST pay for constructing new government owned distilleries.
“Any landowner who does not own a car does not use the roads.”
Bullshit.
They use the roads when they ride a bus. They use the roads when they get a delivery from Safeway or Amazon Fresh or USPS or FedEx. They use the roads when they bike. They use the road when the garbage truck picks up their shit. They use the roads when they walk to the store or walk their dogs. Non car owners who pay property taxes (and this includes renters–you think landlords don’t factor taxes into the rent?) use the shit out of roads.
Control over local roads should be returned to neighborhoods. Overthrow a city government that will spend millions on a city park a few dozen feet wide but won’t repair potholes or won’t install sidewalks or crosswalks or speed bumps.
The obligation of states to provide education would require states to build and maintan local roads if they were not already there. Same obligation for fire, police, ambulance, water, sewer, electric, gas, cable, and internet. Federal obligations for postal service and interstate commerce also requires local roads.
So why do people think that automobiles should have to pay the entire cost of local roads? That is why they are general tax revenue obligations.
Frank:
By definition, non-drivers do not use roads. Whether or not various businesses and government agencies use paved roads to provide services to such people is irrelevant. Those services were provided prior to the advent of paving 100 years ago, and the use of roads should be noted as something done by them, not by their customers.
Sandy Teal:
I agree wholeheartedly that it is silly to demand drivers pay all the costs of local roads, although they are clearly the vast majority of users. At the same time, the same principle would say that alternate means of transportation should be provided to those who do not or cannot drive under the same conditions – i.e. that the full costs of mass transit not be pushed upon its users, and especially tht discounted mobility be provided for school children and senior citizens.
Andrews:
“By definition, non-drivers do not use roads.”
By which definition and of which word? This statement is pure semantic non-sense, a handflapping if you will. Non-drivers use roads. This tap dance has not refuted the fact that non-drivers use roads indirectly and directly. The may not DRIVE on roads, but they sure as hell use them.
“Whether or not various businesses and government agencies use paved roads to provide services to such people is irrelevant.”
Why? I contract with business A to deliver product B to my residence. I indirectly use roads. I pay property tax to provide access to my building. Please explain why exactly indirect use is “irrelevant”? When I walk to the store, I use roads.
“Those services were provided prior to the advent of paving 100 years ago”
Yeah, so? I drive up cobblestone streets everyday. Paving is a red herring you’ve thrown in. Can’t refute ’em? Distract them!
“and the use of roads should be noted as something done by them, not by their customers.”
Again, explain why. Explain why if I contract with company A to deliver product B that that was not “done” by me. I initiated the transaction.
Or maybe you should just stop trying. Because you’re wrong. And you got nothing.
Stated another way: Non-drivers use the shit out of roads.
Frank & Mr.Karlock, no one is saying that there shouldn’t be roads.
So, you guys have absolutely no valid reason to be against rail lines. :$