Two documents are attached. The longer one – 14 pages – lays out the routes
and service for my proposed Transit Revolution Alternative to the proposed
Southwest Light Rail plan. The four pager is a summary, with illustrations, of
the main elements of the plan.
Page 14 of the longer document shows an operating budget based on Transit
Revolution principles: spend money on drivers and vehicles – and only the
absolute bare minimum on anything else. Drivers would be paid $17 per hour,
and would be part time, 20 hours a week – with $3/hr budgeted for mandatory
fringe benefits. I know some people think this is unfairly low for drivers –
that legitimate point of view is addressed last in this post.
I am also assuming that existing suburban commuter service to downtown
Minneapolis would continue. From what I’ve read and heard, people are happy
with the existing service, and it is significantly faster for Eden Prairie
commuters than the proposed Light Rail would be. This appears to be part of a
trend towards offering in some cases transit service that is inferior to what
was provided (or could be provided) – as a way to pump up numbers for Light
Rail, serving as a basis for justifying… well… more Light Rail!
With total annual mileage about ten times the proposed mileage for the Light
Rail plan, the service and quality of what I’m proposing can and will be a lot
better that Light Rail. Here’s a summary of major elements and advantages
offered:
1. As noted – continued service whenever and wherever people prefer it –
Southwest Transit will not be in any danger of being cut up or consolidated.
2. Express service supplements, allowing some longer runs to skip all but a few
stops, resulting in faster service. A bus can pass other busses -- Light Rail
trains on the same route can’t do that.
3. Much better reverse commute and East-West service for North and Northeast
Minneapolis. Weekdays from 7 AM to Midnight, Metro Mobility sized busses will
run on Broadway every five minutes in both directions, from Penn to Stinson
Boulevard – stopping at all North-South routes. During rush hours, reverse
commute routes will provide Five Minute Service frequency – going to Penn and
I-394, and then making express stops only en route to Prairie Central Station.
4. Service on the Greenway, from West Lake, to Uptown, Lyndale, and the
up-coming Lake/Nicollet/Greenway/I-35W Transit Station, and then directly to
and from downtown using existing MnPASS lanes. This means a direct, guaranteed
congestion-free route from Shady Oak Road in Minnetonka to Downtown
Minneapolis. I estimate the time from Uptown Station to the I-35W downtown
Freeway exit will be about six minutes. Combine this with Five Minute Service
frequency, and Downtown and Uptown will be linked in a way that Light Rail
cannot approach – unless the Southwest line were to be rerouted through Uptown.
5. Five Minute Service frequency connecting the North and Northeast Minneapolis
East-West Broadway service to the South Minneapolis Greenway, and directly to
Uptown. Can downtown congestion be decreased by simply bypassing it for people
who are going between anywhere on Broadway, or North, to anywhere on Lake
Street and the Greenway, or South? My plan provides that option.
6. Rush Hour and weekday evening Five Minute Service frequency along the
Greenway from West Calhoun to Lake and Hiawatha – including elevator links from
the Greenway right of way to the existing grid of all surface North South bus
routes. This will significantly improve the service quality and use for the
entire South Minneapolis bus grid. Tony Scallon describes the bus service on
Lake Street as excellent. It is – on paper! But when you’re riding it (I do)
congestion during rush hour and evenings often causes schedules to be “thrown
out the window” – it’s not unusual to see busses travel in small packs – each
one with a big pack of people inside!
7. A finer grid of stops in the Golden Triangle Area, and extending North to
Shady Oak Station and the current rail right of way. The Light Rail plan
provides for stops about every one mile in this area – well beyond what is
considered walking distance. The Transit Revolution Southwest Alternative
provides much more frequent stops – people are seldom more than about one long
city block from the door of their final destination…
8. …but Transit Revolution pushes this to the next level! – with Door to door
service to business districts in Hopkins and Saint Louis Park, and throughout
the Golden Triangle Area. During bad weather, or when you’re carrying
something – this can make a big difference.
9. Shopper Busses – we need to do as much for people who shop by bus as we do
today for people who combine biking and bussing. The Transit Revolution
Southwest Alternative plan includes shopping routes reaching all major
retailers in the Eden Prairie center area. This covers about a square mile –
no problem if you drive, but a huge problem if you don’t. Shopper busses will
be configured with fewer seats, and will allow you to roll carts on and off.
Some of the Transit Revolution busses running throughout the system will be
Shopper Busses – allowing people to roll a shopping cart from their residence
anywhere in the service area to all the Eden Prairie Center and surrounding
retailers.
10. And let’s not forget this!... No messed up Kenilworth Corridor. Kenilworth
is not JUST bypassed – it’s preserved -- to continue its development as a
premiere bike commuter route – and who knows how bikes and other “people
rollers” might evolve in the coming decades? This is a truly beautiful route.
Let’s keep it that way at ZERO cost by implementing the Transit Revolution
Southwest Alternative plan.
11. Flexibility! My plan can easily be adjusted based on experience and
results. A light rail is (practically) forever. Consider this: there are many
at-grade crossings in the Light Rail plan – but NO AT GRADE CROSSINGS in the
Transit Revolution Southwest Alternative from Minnetonka to Downtown. At-grade
crossings are disruptive and dangerous. If we allow them, they will forever
limit the ability to ever increase the service frequency. Ten minute service
means all the at-grade crossings are blocked every five minutes – that’s bad
enough.
My Transit Revolution approach is designed to lead to a much lower cash flow
requirement for Transit – because my plan is based on this simple principle:
let’s use what already exists to the greatest extent possible. The new Central
Corridor cost about $1 billion – Southwest Light Rail would be about $1.5
billion, maybe $1.6 billion – the proposed Bottineau Light Rail (Rapid Bus at
$500 million has already been disqualified as an option) is estimated at about
$1 billion. Even with half of the money in Federal dollars, the total capital
cost for these three lines is half of about $3.5 billion, or $1.75 billion.
Assuming we repay an average of 5% over 20 years, the cash going out for
repayment of principal alone will average $87.5 million a year. I put together
a simple 20 year amortization spreadsheet, based on 3% interest in arrears (I’m
not sure what the actual rate is, 3% seems conservative, but let me know if you
think I should use a different rate), and equal annual payments. The cash
going out to pay interest and repay principle for the local contribution for
those three lines would be about $122 million a year for twenty years. This
does not include operating subsidies – which will be both very substantial, and
locked in effectively in perpetuity. We also need to keep this in mind: the
“Corridors of Commerce” plan has a number of additional corridors – including
some for which Light Rail is being considered. As we make a deeper and deeper
commitment to this Corridors of Commerce, New Urbanism, Transit Oriented
Development worldview, we are also committing to what will almost certainly be
over an additional $1 billion for future local contributions to capital costs,
with the need to service that additional debt, repay that additional principle,
and plan for continuing operating subsidies based on the cost structure of
Light Rail. I’ll be providing a framework for estimating the capital cost of
the Transit Revolution Southwest Alternative in the next week or two – it won’t
be free – but it will be a lot less than the $1.5 billion Light Rail option!
I know some people are concerned that my proposed compensation and hours plan
for drivers is too low. Even though the $17/hr W-2 portion is more than double
the current Federal minimum wage, many people are talking about a $15/hr
minimum wage. I find it a little ironic and frustrating that on the one hand I
get criticized for budgeting compensation too low, while on the other hand I’m
being criticized for an unrealistically low operating budget. Let’s leave that
aside – my perception is simply this: our society is having great difficulty
today providing good paying jobs. In this context, I look at $17/hr part time
bus driving jobs as a kind of WPA for our time – people will be doing something
useful, and they will be earning what I think (again, in today’s economy) is
good pay. A $17/hr W-2 job at 20 hours a week will be a good economic base for
a lot of people – the Southwest Alternative alone is designed to deliver over
700 of those driver jobs.
But let’s consider some further factors. It seems likely to me that the jobs
I’m proposing would be good fits for several specific groups: including current
taxi and school bus drivers, and students. Regarding taxi drivers in
particular, and this also applies to many school bus drivers, these people can
use their part time Transit Revolution job as an economic base, which they
could coordinate with continuing taxi driving – likely at a lower rate – or
school bus driving. Also consider this – one of the challenges – and
opportunities -- to make the overall Transit Revolution plan much more
competitive with cars is solving the “last mile” problem – allowing people to
go door to door outside of dense grids of all day and evening city street bus
service that will likely not extend too far beyond Minneapolis and Saint Paul.
Since there is a large group of people who already drive cabs, these people can
coordinate their taxi work with their Transit Revolution driving job. By
providing the last mile at competitive rates, people could reach anywhere
within the beltway without ever driving any car (of course hour car
opportunities are also emerging). Because these people will spend money, there
is an economic incentive for many businesses and employers to “validate”
transit in the same way they “validate” parking. Go To cards could include a
certain number of rides, or miles, of Door-to-Door service as part of the basic
package.
The overall idea behind Transit Revolution is to make it so economical and
practical for people to use Transit that large numbers of people will prefer
Transit to cars – and will adjust their household budgets accordingly – by
owning one less car, or no car.
One further point – unlike “New Urbanism” and “Transit Oriented Development” –
my approach is not designed to encourage construction and economic development
only in certain designated areas. Instead, my approach is designed to make it
easier and less expensive for EVERYONE to use and benefit from the entire
infrastructure of all economic development that we currently have – and for
economic development to proceed with all relevant considerations in view – not
just future expectations regarding transit. Transit Revolution isn't intended
to make economic development go away. It isn't intended to prevent the use of
zoning to promote "quality of life." Transit Revolution IS intended to prevent
what I view as the creation of artificial and unnecessary scarcity of transit
and development options. Transit Revolution IS intended to prevent a "managed"
approach to congestion -- the goal is not to slowly guide people into "transit
corridors" the goal is to drastically reduce or eliminate traffic congestion as
just one more of the many benefits we can expect from a Revolutionary increase
in transit in PREFERENCE to single occupant cars.
Word tells me I’m over 2,000 words – so in conclusion (for now):
We need TRANSIT REVOLUTION! – not the Transit status quo.
You made it this far -- thanks for considering what I’m presenting.
BobAgain
East Lake Harriet Farmstead