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The Importance of Fare Enforcement

By | | Transportation
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According to the New York City police department, subway crime is up 53 percent so far in 2022 compared with 2021. Since ridership grew by 64 percent in that time period, that means that crime rates per rider have actually fallen, but that doesn’t reassure many people.

This photo was taken by MassDOT in 2010, when the MBTA could say that 2009 crime had reached a 30-year low. Yet FTA data show that, by 2021, the MBTA suffered almost 19 times as many “security events” as in 2009: 94 vs. 5.

Nationwide, Federal Transit Administration data show that, through the end of March 2022, transit crime (not counting suicide) is 44.4 percent more than the same period in 2021. This is almost exactly the same as the increase in ridership, which was 44.9 percent. Former riders who are reluctant to return to transit may be justified in not doing so. Continue reading →

Transit’s Existential Crisis

By | | Transportation
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In November 2020, a report from McKinsey & Co. to the New York Metropolitan Transportation Authority predicted that transit ridership would recover to as high as 92 percent of pre-pandemic levels by 2025. Now McKinsey has revised that number downward to as low as 70 percent. Even that is probably optimistic considering that recent data indicate that New York subway ridership has been flat at least since February 2022, and has even declined somewhat since June.

In McKinsey’s study, scenario S1 assumes people will steadily return to working in offices while the much more likely S2 assumes many will continue to work at home at least three days a week. Neither is good news for New York City transit but S2 is particularly bad, especially since even it is probably optimistic.

More than in most cities, transit in New York depends on fare revenues. Before the pandemic, fares covered more than half the operating costs of New York City transit but only about a quarter of the costs elsewhere. A decline in ridership hits the city’s transit budget harder than almost anywhere else, so it’s no surprise that both national and local media are focused on the “fiscal cliff” that MTA is likely to hurdle over when it runs out of federal COVID relief funds, probably in 2024. Continue reading →

“Equity” Means Less, Not More Transit Subsidies

By | | Transportation
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Danny Westneat, a columnist for the Seattle Times, openly wonders why Seattle is building so much light rail when we seem to be entering “an era of ‘untransit.'” He quotes a Stanford law review article saying that Zoom is “the modern equivalent of the streetcar — a technological advance that will profoundly alter land use.”

Puget Sound Transit is spending tens of billions of dollars building high-cost, low-capacity transit lines that make even less sense after COVID than they did before, yet there is no indication that Sound Transit is changing is plans in response to the pandemic. Photo by brewbooks.

Instead of altering their plans, however, transit agencies and transit advocates are busy trying to figure out how to justify increased subsidies for decreased ridership. Many of them are hoping that “equity” can be the issue that tips the balance in favor of more subsidies. Continue reading →

Preserving Vital Technologies

By | | Mission
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Protecting America’s typewriter and slide rule industries is critical for the nation’s future, said John Underwood, with the American Public Typewriter Association, and William Keuffel, with Slide Rule America, in a report released today by the Typewriter-Slide Rule Center. “Typewriters and slide rules played a vital role in the nation’s victory in World War II,” noted Underwood. “What will happen to the U.S. if we don’t have access to these irreplaceable technologies in the future?”

We couldn’t have won World War II without it.

It is commonly believed that these tools have been replaced by microcomputers and the internet, but Keuffel scoffed at that claim. “The original internet was subsidized by the Defense Department,” he pointed out. “If the typewriter and slide rule industries had received similar subsidies, they would be thriving today.” Continue reading →

Concrete Columns Cracked

By | | Transportation
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The first phase of the Honolulu rail transit system is supposed to open at the end of this year, with trains serving nine of the planned 21 stations. But those plans may be put on hold because contractors have discovered cracks in the concrete pillars holding up the elevated stations. Due to these cracks, the consultants have “advised that passengers not be allowed into the seven affected stations until further inspections are done.”

The Honolulu rail project was idiotically designed to be entirely elevated, creating problems both with scenic views and differential settling in swampy land.

That leaves just two stations that might open later this year. Most likely, none will open at all. What is known for sure is that the cracks are growing. Continue reading →

May Driving Exceeds Pre-Pandemic Miles

By | | Transportation, Useful Data
7 Comments

Americans drove almost 288 billion miles in May 2022, compared with 286.4 billion in May 2019, according to data released yesterday by the Federal Highway Administration. This represents a 0.5 percent increase over pre-pandemic levels. Considering that regular gasoline prices were under $3 a gallon in May 2019 and around $4.50 a gallon in May 2022, this suggests that high fuel prices aren’t leading many Americans to abandon autos for transit or other modes.

While transit ridership appears to have plateaued at 60 percent of pre-pandemic levels, miles of driving have exceeded pre-pandemic numbers for most of the last year.

Transit advocates are increasingly promoting free transit for everyone, regardless of income, as a solution to transportation equity issues, when in fact transit practically irrelevant to 95 percent of American workers (including low-income workers) before COVID, and even more since. The real inequity is in low automobile ownership among low-income households, and that inequity can be reduced without giving everyone, regardless of income, free cars.

May Transit 59.5% of Pre-Pandemic Levels

By | | Transportation, Useful Data
7 Comments

Transit ridership remained below 60 percent of pre-padenmic levels in May 2022, according to data released by the Federal Transit Administration yesterday. This was only a slight improvement over April’s 58.7 percent despite average fuel prices climbing from a little over $4 in April to more than $4.50 in May.

Amtrak passenger miles, meanwhile, reached 78.5 percent of May 2019, a 5 percent climb from April. Air travel remained right around 90 percent of pre-pandemic levels. Driving data will be released later this month. Continue reading →

Buttigieg “Forced” to Drive

By | | Transportation
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Supporters of subsidies to Amtrak and mass transit often say that, due to the lack of such subsidies, Americans have been “forced to drive.” Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg experienced this earlier this week when his flight was cancelled and he was “forced to drive from Washington DC to New York.” If only the nation had spent billions of dollars subsidizing intercity passenger trains between DC and New York, he wouldn’t have been forced to drive.

Why didn’t Buttigieg take the train? Photo by Fan Railer.

Wait a minute: the nation has spent billions of dollars subsidizing passenger trains between DC and New York. So why was Buttigieg forced to drive? For that matter, why was he flying if Amtrak’s high-speed Acela is so good? Continue reading →

Inflation Eats Infrastructure Bill

By | | Transportation
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In addition to restoring allegedly crumbling highways and transit lines, the 2021 infrastructure bill was supposed to provide tens of billions of dollars for building new infrastructure. Now it appears that inflation will eat away most of the new money provided by the bill, leaving highway and transit agencies with no real increase in funding.

A city in Massachusetts reports that the price of asphalt has increased by 37 percent.

According to Jim Tyman, CEO of the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials, inflation in construction costs is “wiping out that increase [in funding] from the federal government that [state officials] were so excited about earlier in the year.” As a result, the increased dollars from the bill “are essentially evaporating.” Continue reading →

Most Americans Don’t Believe Planners

By | | Regional planning, Transportation
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A recent survey found that 93 percent of planning students oppose highway expansion because they believe that it won’t relieve congestion due to induced demand. However, the survey found, only 24 percent of the general public agrees. Similarly, 83 percent of planning students believe the government should try to reduce the amount of driving Americans do, but only 31 percent of the general public agrees.

When was the last time an urban planner lied to you? Photo from Seattle Municipal Archives.

It never occurs to planners that results like these might indicate that they are wrong. After all, they are the experts and the general public is not, so the public should let them do what they want. Continue reading →