Spoiler: It's a multitude of issues
March 9, 2020 8:56 AM Subscribe
'Do we care about the public?': Cities weigh free public transit amid rising costs
Meet the insurgents who want to make NYC transit free
posted by The Whelk at 9:23 AM on March 9, 2020 [2 favorites]
Meet the insurgents who want to make NYC transit free
posted by The Whelk at 9:23 AM on March 9, 2020 [2 favorites]
From the article:
Freemark, one of the most thorough chroniclers of American transportation projects, calculated that the U.S. spent more than $47 billion on 1,200 miles of new and expanded transit lines in the decade from 2010 to 2019 (most of that mileage has been on bus routes).
And now consider how much is spent on infrastructure in the US: real infrastructure spending nationally has fallen over the past decade, from $450.4 billion in 2007 to $440.5 billion in 2017 (source: Shifting into an era of repair: US infrastructure spending -- Brookings, 2019)
We're spending 1% of our infrastructure budget on transit, most of that bus routes. Transit just isn't prioritized.
My utopian dream is to see no more investments in capacity, and instead build out the transit networks. We can't build our way out of congestion, so let's maximize the network we have!
posted by filthy light thief at 9:46 AM on March 9, 2020 [4 favorites]
Freemark, one of the most thorough chroniclers of American transportation projects, calculated that the U.S. spent more than $47 billion on 1,200 miles of new and expanded transit lines in the decade from 2010 to 2019 (most of that mileage has been on bus routes).
And now consider how much is spent on infrastructure in the US: real infrastructure spending nationally has fallen over the past decade, from $450.4 billion in 2007 to $440.5 billion in 2017 (source: Shifting into an era of repair: US infrastructure spending -- Brookings, 2019)
We're spending 1% of our infrastructure budget on transit, most of that bus routes. Transit just isn't prioritized.
My utopian dream is to see no more investments in capacity, and instead build out the transit networks. We can't build our way out of congestion, so let's maximize the network we have!
posted by filthy light thief at 9:46 AM on March 9, 2020 [4 favorites]
Really? I thought it was unions, because everyone loooooves to blame the cost of transit projects on the unions. /s
posted by SansPoint at 10:12 AM on March 9, 2020 [2 favorites]
posted by SansPoint at 10:12 AM on March 9, 2020 [2 favorites]
I thought it was unions
Oooo, ohhh! I know! It's because we hate poor people, and don't want them to have nice things, right?
posted by MengerSponge at 10:14 AM on March 9, 2020 [8 favorites]
Oooo, ohhh! I know! It's because we hate poor people, and don't want them to have nice things, right?
posted by MengerSponge at 10:14 AM on March 9, 2020 [8 favorites]
I don't care about the London public transport drama, or which particular plutocrat's looking indefinably smugger than the rest because their n-dimensional scheme is garnishing public money more effectively than their rivals. I just want Crossrail to be finished.
The strife Crossrail has caused seems entirely out of proportion when my simple desire is only to get back to pointedly ignoring all other human life but in entirely brand new directions.
posted by Eleven at 10:16 AM on March 9, 2020 [1 favorite]
The strife Crossrail has caused seems entirely out of proportion when my simple desire is only to get back to pointedly ignoring all other human life but in entirely brand new directions.
posted by Eleven at 10:16 AM on March 9, 2020 [1 favorite]
Here in NYC we are jealous of how comparatively cheap Crossrail cost compared to our projects.
posted by 1970s Antihero at 10:23 AM on March 9, 2020 [1 favorite]
posted by 1970s Antihero at 10:23 AM on March 9, 2020 [1 favorite]
This is the second transit article in a row on the blue that doesn’t talk at all about the role of racism in US transit planning history. Seems like a glaring omission that would be brought up immediately if the articles went into the public debates around pretty much any example projects in the last half century.
posted by q*ben at 10:41 AM on March 9, 2020 [11 favorites]
posted by q*ben at 10:41 AM on March 9, 2020 [11 favorites]
Also, seconding Antihero- god I wish we had #crossrailproblems over here.
posted by q*ben at 10:42 AM on March 9, 2020
posted by q*ben at 10:42 AM on March 9, 2020
I searched on the keyword "Koch" in this article and found nothing, which is surprising, because the Koch family funds efforts to disrupt and dismantle public transit and related projects across the country.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 10:53 AM on March 9, 2020 [29 favorites]
The Kochs’ opposition to transit spending stems from their longstanding free-market, libertarian philosophy. It also dovetails with their financial interests, which benefit from automobiles and highways.We can't have a better society, because we have parasites who game the system to feed off of it.
One of the mainstay companies of Koch Industries, the Kochs’ conglomerate, is a major producer of gasoline and asphalt, and also makes seatbelts, tires and other automotive parts. Even as Americans for Prosperity opposes public investment in transit, it supports spending tax money on highways and roads.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 10:53 AM on March 9, 2020 [29 favorites]
At BART, we were able to pass a $3.5 billion bond measure in 2016 to finally start repairing and replacing infrastructure (rails, electrical components, etc.) that had existed since the system opened in 1972. Previously, we were in expansion mode--because that was the will of our Board of Directors and local governments and communities. Expansion is sexier than maintenance.
As part of the bond, a Bond Oversight Committee was created to make sure the money is being spent well and appropriately. Their Annual Reports are full of interesting information on spending and give a good, clear, picture of what is going on. (There are lots of other interesting reports on that page if you want to see how expensive running a transit agency is--and yes, a lot of the $$ goes to salary and benefits because running a railroad takes a lot of people).
The report for 2020 is almost ready to publish. Currently we've sold a little over $440 million in bonds and are about 10% along in the various "Measure RR" projects. We're selling bonds in tranches to get the money we need as we are able to spend it. This work is going to take 30 years to complete.
posted by agatha_magatha at 11:10 AM on March 9, 2020 [13 favorites]
As part of the bond, a Bond Oversight Committee was created to make sure the money is being spent well and appropriately. Their Annual Reports are full of interesting information on spending and give a good, clear, picture of what is going on. (There are lots of other interesting reports on that page if you want to see how expensive running a transit agency is--and yes, a lot of the $$ goes to salary and benefits because running a railroad takes a lot of people).
The report for 2020 is almost ready to publish. Currently we've sold a little over $440 million in bonds and are about 10% along in the various "Measure RR" projects. We're selling bonds in tranches to get the money we need as we are able to spend it. This work is going to take 30 years to complete.
posted by agatha_magatha at 11:10 AM on March 9, 2020 [13 favorites]
This is the second transit article in a row on the blue that doesn’t talk at all about the role of racism in US transit planning history.
It's not in the first paragraph, or the bullet list, or the headings, but:
Meanwhile, another cohort of interest groups form to stop projects they don’t want. Typically, these are neighborhood associations that don’t want a transit line coming through their block, either out of fear of construction impacts or racist concerns that it’ll disrupt the segregation of their urban area. Sometimes, they are not just neighborhood groups but entire regions.
In the 1970s, in what was later called “referendums on race,” Atlanta’s suburban and overwhelmingly white Cobb, Clayton, and Gwinnett counties voted out of the region’s MARTA system before it was even built.
To take just one of scores of possible examples because it affected me personally: back in the 1970s the University of Maryland rejected plans to have the D.C. Metro’s Green Line stop on campus, again for predominantly racist reasons.
posted by Homeboy Trouble at 11:22 AM on March 9, 2020 [6 favorites]
It's not in the first paragraph, or the bullet list, or the headings, but:
Meanwhile, another cohort of interest groups form to stop projects they don’t want. Typically, these are neighborhood associations that don’t want a transit line coming through their block, either out of fear of construction impacts or racist concerns that it’ll disrupt the segregation of their urban area. Sometimes, they are not just neighborhood groups but entire regions.
In the 1970s, in what was later called “referendums on race,” Atlanta’s suburban and overwhelmingly white Cobb, Clayton, and Gwinnett counties voted out of the region’s MARTA system before it was even built.
To take just one of scores of possible examples because it affected me personally: back in the 1970s the University of Maryland rejected plans to have the D.C. Metro’s Green Line stop on campus, again for predominantly racist reasons.
posted by Homeboy Trouble at 11:22 AM on March 9, 2020 [6 favorites]
I tried to interest people in my Light Rail Gun, which can insert transit systems into cities from almost 100 miles away, but they called me mad!
I ask you, IS THIS THE WORK OF A MADMAN?!?
posted by GenjiandProust at 11:30 AM on March 9, 2020 [18 favorites]
I ask you, IS THIS THE WORK OF A MADMAN?!?
posted by GenjiandProust at 11:30 AM on March 9, 2020 [18 favorites]
This is the second transit article in a row on the blue that doesn’t talk at all about the role of racism in US transit planning history.
It does, actually. It talks about how areas opted out of mass transit for racist reasons. It’s far down the article, but it’s there.
posted by corb at 11:54 AM on March 9, 2020 [8 favorites]
It does, actually. It talks about how areas opted out of mass transit for racist reasons. It’s far down the article, but it’s there.
posted by corb at 11:54 AM on March 9, 2020 [8 favorites]
Whoops, thanks for pointing this out, folks. Though I would say three paragraphs in the bottom third of a long form article (long enough to merit not one but two bullet point summaries in the front half), is burying the lede.
posted by q*ben at 11:56 AM on March 9, 2020 [1 favorite]
posted by q*ben at 11:56 AM on March 9, 2020 [1 favorite]
FWIW it feels like Canada has inherited much of the American malaise when it comes to transit planning and construction: extremely contentious and politicized planning processes, massive cost overruns, megaprojects that fail to address the network concerns of the system in a meaningful way. The specifics of how government transit funding works are different, and I have read the occasional article that claims Canada is still somehow better than various American cities, so the problems aren't equal. But one thing that does line up is the pervasive feeling that good public transit is a pipe dream, often derailed by governments of the day, starved for adequate funding, and degrading before our eyes because no one can even come up with a funded long-term infrastructure strategy.
posted by chrominance at 12:47 PM on March 9, 2020 [2 favorites]
posted by chrominance at 12:47 PM on March 9, 2020 [2 favorites]
It's the cult of Personal Responsibility, which is constructed in an absolutist way: each American has a car and a firearm, and is responsible for both transporting and defending themselves.
This cult would not ordinarily withstand serious scrutiny, collapsing into Swiftian absurdity almost instantaneously, if it wasn't for it serving an importand purpose: to allow individuals to square desiring racist outcomes (“I don't want my taxes being spent on those people” and such) with seeing themselves as a good person (which, in most places, means Not A Racist).
posted by acb at 12:54 PM on March 9, 2020 [5 favorites]
This cult would not ordinarily withstand serious scrutiny, collapsing into Swiftian absurdity almost instantaneously, if it wasn't for it serving an importand purpose: to allow individuals to square desiring racist outcomes (“I don't want my taxes being spent on those people” and such) with seeing themselves as a good person (which, in most places, means Not A Racist).
posted by acb at 12:54 PM on March 9, 2020 [5 favorites]
George Will: "the real reason for progressives’ passion for trains is their goal of diminishing Americans’ individualism in order to make them more amenable to collectivism."
posted by JackFlash at 1:10 PM on March 9, 2020 [4 favorites]
posted by JackFlash at 1:10 PM on March 9, 2020 [4 favorites]
The Kochs’ opposition to transit spending stems from their longstanding free-market, libertarian philosophy. It also dovetails with their financial interests, which benefit from automobiles and highways.
This makes me want to scream into the void. I know "Koch Fam Evil" is hardly a hot take but aaaarrrgggghhhhh
posted by Gin and Broadband at 1:54 PM on March 9, 2020
This makes me want to scream into the void. I know "Koch Fam Evil" is hardly a hot take but aaaarrrgggghhhhh
posted by Gin and Broadband at 1:54 PM on March 9, 2020
Here in Florida, the state government has not only insisted on prioritizing road projects even where transit improvements would better achieve their stated goals for the project, it has also been actively fighting against cities that have the insane idea that functional transit is necessary to have functional roads.
It's almost shocking how the mask has come off as public sentiment has changed. It's gone from seeming neglect to malicious undermining of local attempts to make improvements and literally building shit nobody wants just to poke a stick in people's eye, only to plead poverty when it comes time to pay their lawful share of transit operating budgets.
Things were broken before, especially in terms of construction costs, but the Teahadists and Trumpists have taken it to a whole new level, standing in the way even when the people affected prove willing to pay because the alternative is even worse than the ransom.
posted by wierdo at 2:10 PM on March 9, 2020 [1 favorite]
It's almost shocking how the mask has come off as public sentiment has changed. It's gone from seeming neglect to malicious undermining of local attempts to make improvements and literally building shit nobody wants just to poke a stick in people's eye, only to plead poverty when it comes time to pay their lawful share of transit operating budgets.
Things were broken before, especially in terms of construction costs, but the Teahadists and Trumpists have taken it to a whole new level, standing in the way even when the people affected prove willing to pay because the alternative is even worse than the ransom.
posted by wierdo at 2:10 PM on March 9, 2020 [1 favorite]
Gwinnett counties voted out of the region’s MARTA system before it was even built.
And again repeatedly since then. I was in Gwinnett in 1990 and the racism around the expansion vote was not even remotely subtle. I still remember a few popular racist variants on the MARTA acronym, for example.
According to Wikipedia the vote was a lot closer there recently, which makes some sense as the county is less white than it was in the 90s.
posted by thefoxgod at 3:55 PM on March 9, 2020 [1 favorite]
And again repeatedly since then. I was in Gwinnett in 1990 and the racism around the expansion vote was not even remotely subtle. I still remember a few popular racist variants on the MARTA acronym, for example.
According to Wikipedia the vote was a lot closer there recently, which makes some sense as the county is less white than it was in the 90s.
posted by thefoxgod at 3:55 PM on March 9, 2020 [1 favorite]
George Will: "the real reason for progressives’ passion for trains is their goal of diminishing Americans’ individualism in order to make them more amenable to collectivism."
You get that in Australia too: apparently the reason that those Antifa/Extinction Rebellion terrorists that George Soros bankrolls lit all those bushfires that would otherwise never have happened was to clear land for a High-Speed Rail corridor, which is a prerequisite for One World Communism. Or something equally stupid.
Though in Melbourne and Sydney, they're building new underground rail lines, rather than doubling down on the American Dream circa 1959 as they usually do. Melbourne's the work of a Labor (centre-left) state government with some NUMTOT tendencies; Sydney, however, has a conservative state government who also have been doing their best to extinguish the city's nightlife. Perhaps Australian Conservatism is gradually shifting its role model from Texas to Singapore?
posted by acb at 4:25 PM on March 9, 2020 [1 favorite]
You get that in Australia too: apparently the reason that those Antifa/Extinction Rebellion terrorists that George Soros bankrolls lit all those bushfires that would otherwise never have happened was to clear land for a High-Speed Rail corridor, which is a prerequisite for One World Communism. Or something equally stupid.
Though in Melbourne and Sydney, they're building new underground rail lines, rather than doubling down on the American Dream circa 1959 as they usually do. Melbourne's the work of a Labor (centre-left) state government with some NUMTOT tendencies; Sydney, however, has a conservative state government who also have been doing their best to extinguish the city's nightlife. Perhaps Australian Conservatism is gradually shifting its role model from Texas to Singapore?
posted by acb at 4:25 PM on March 9, 2020 [1 favorite]
I'll take this opportunity to complain about the word: crisis. It appears 11 times in this article, including right after it recognizes that this problem was recognized 66 years old.
Dictionary:" A crucial or decisive point or situation... an emotionally stressful ... event or change "
We could either call every problem a crisis or decide to sort out what needs taking care of STAT.
That said, I'll just point out the glaring adjacency of the "too much automobile traffic problem" and "climate crisis". In recognition of the latter, I propose that we cannot remain 'free' (as proposed above by Mr. Will) to exercise our 'independent' whims at the cost of everyone else's future.
Very unfortunately, It's clear that what is *possible* entirely depends on our political decisions. I won't propose a revolution. But I'll recognize that the 'whimper' vs. 'bang' question is creeping closer to the horizon.
posted by Twang at 4:25 PM on March 9, 2020
Dictionary:" A crucial or decisive point or situation... an emotionally stressful ... event or change "
We could either call every problem a crisis or decide to sort out what needs taking care of STAT.
That said, I'll just point out the glaring adjacency of the "too much automobile traffic problem" and "climate crisis". In recognition of the latter, I propose that we cannot remain 'free' (as proposed above by Mr. Will) to exercise our 'independent' whims at the cost of everyone else's future.
Very unfortunately, It's clear that what is *possible* entirely depends on our political decisions. I won't propose a revolution. But I'll recognize that the 'whimper' vs. 'bang' question is creeping closer to the horizon.
posted by Twang at 4:25 PM on March 9, 2020
Anyway, if the conservatives object to passenger trains because of collectivism, perhaps a compromise could be to ensure that a proportion of carriages have seating compartments, like in the days Ayn Rand rhapsodised about?
posted by acb at 4:26 PM on March 9, 2020
posted by acb at 4:26 PM on March 9, 2020
We passed an expansion to our light rail in Phoenix two years ago and then defeated a proposition to defund it last year, but it's hard because building it is so disruptive to local businesses along the route for so long. And it's expensive. I voted for it, and I totally support it, but I do feel for the small businesses that might not survive the construction.
posted by Weeping_angel at 5:14 PM on March 9, 2020
posted by Weeping_angel at 5:14 PM on March 9, 2020
each American has a car and a firearm, and is responsible for both transporting and defending themselves
Which makes you wonder why so many of them have a massive hardon for military spending.
posted by HiroProtagonist at 5:50 PM on March 9, 2020
Which makes you wonder why so many of them have a massive hardon for military spending.
posted by HiroProtagonist at 5:50 PM on March 9, 2020
Which makes you wonder why so many of them have a massive hardon for military spending.
That's defence from the enemy abroad; against the enemy within, you're on your own.
posted by acb at 6:26 PM on March 9, 2020 [1 favorite]
That's defence from the enemy abroad; against the enemy within, you're on your own.
posted by acb at 6:26 PM on March 9, 2020 [1 favorite]
and I totally support it, but I do feel for the small businesses that might not survive the construction
In a more sane world, subsidies going to local businesses being disrupted by long-term city construction changes would be the norm instead of the likes of Amazon and stadiums in Chandler or wherever they want the new one to be.
posted by The_Vegetables at 7:19 AM on March 10, 2020 [2 favorites]
In a more sane world, subsidies going to local businesses being disrupted by long-term city construction changes would be the norm instead of the likes of Amazon and stadiums in Chandler or wherever they want the new one to be.
posted by The_Vegetables at 7:19 AM on March 10, 2020 [2 favorites]
"One of the curses of Western industrial culture is the proliferation of 'nice residential areas' where no shops or small businesses are permitted..." — Alan Watts, In My Own Way, 1965
The US is stingy about providing for the poor: "The Reagan era cuts were ostensibly designed to make the public sector more efficient by harnessing the power of the market, but instead it made public agencies reliant on for-profit contractors that jack up costs, only making government less efficient and more wasteful."
posted by kliuless at 12:48 PM on March 10, 2020 [1 favorite]
The US is stingy about providing for the poor: "The Reagan era cuts were ostensibly designed to make the public sector more efficient by harnessing the power of the market, but instead it made public agencies reliant on for-profit contractors that jack up costs, only making government less efficient and more wasteful."
posted by kliuless at 12:48 PM on March 10, 2020 [1 favorite]
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posted by humboldt32 at 9:19 AM on March 9, 2020 [5 favorites]