To be perfectly honest, Milwaukee County Executive Scott Walker’s 2010 Proposed Budget regarding transit was not as bad as it could have been. That said, there is still significant room for improvement.
Every year, the transit system, as with the Parks, in in the unenviable position of begging for budget scraps. For the past twenty or more years, the State of Wisconsin has traditionally underfunded Milwaukee County for all of the services that it mandates the County to perform. As the prices related to providing these mandated services have risen over the years, fund
ing from the state has increased very little, if at all. This means more and more money that would have otherwise gone to non-mandated services, like transit and parks, becomes a little less. This has only been exasperated by Scott Walker’s refusal to look for other realistic sources of dedicated funding for these services.
This year is proving to be little different. One saving grace was the fact that the County Board pursued and was able to get millions of dollars in stimulus money to help get a little caught up on replacing the aging, broken down buses we now have.
Despite that extra funding for the new buses, there are still problems.
One is that Walker is counting on some savings and revenues that are not likely to happen.
Walker is counting on saving almost $43,000 in his proposed wage cuts. The problem is simply that the County and the unions are in negotiations for a new contract. It is illegal for Walker to try to negotiate the contract through the budget in this manner.
The other issue is that he is counting on using nearly $7 million from the sale of the county grounds to go towards his Bus Rapid Transit project. However, it is growing more and more doubtful that this land sale will even happen.
In his proposed budget, Walker has a number of disappointing things. Despite his claims to the contrary, there is a loss of services with routes being shortened, the number of buses running routes being decreased, and some routes being cut out altogether:
Not only are services being cut, but Walker is also increasing fares, and is creating a new tax on people, by initiating a charge for bus transfers:
To gloss over these cuts and fare (or tax, if you prefer) hikes, Walker tries to distract everyone’s attention by touting his plan to create on a Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) route going from UW-Milwaukee to the county grounds.
While Milwaukee County First applauds Walker for trying to find innovative ways to improve the transit system and increase ridership, there is cause to believe that this plan is faulty.
One of the bigger issues is that it is becoming increasingly doubtful that the sale of the county grounds is going to happen. That would eliminate the $7 million that Walker is putting towards the project. Related to this, is the simple fact that if the school, hotel, restaurant and what not aren’t going to be built, that route won’t need to be fortified.
Milwaukee County First would suggest to the County Board that it takes a different approach to the transit issue.
When Milwaukee County received stimulus money earlier this year, in the amount of $25.6 million, they used it to buy 45 40-foot buses. The County will now be receiving $36.6 million to be used for transit, after a 17 year delay.
The County Board should use that money to buy some more buses, perhaps another 20 or so. They could use the rest of the money to lower fares and restore some of the routes that have been cut in the past. If the previously cut routes were cut because of low ridership, it would be worth considering looking at a route that would connect the south end of the county, where Northwestern Mutual Life is located to downtown.
Dave Casper also makes an excellent observation and has a good suggestion that he wrote on his blog:
But the truth is that if MCTS is using a variety of estimates based on number of passes sold, paid fares, occasional ridership surveys (never seen one of those in twenty years, either) and other high-level guesstimates as the primary, if not sole, tools in determining resource allocation, then it isn’t seeing the forest for the trees.MCTS needs to implement an ongoing process of data collection providing it with an accurate and up-to-date picture of actual usage. Even if budget constraints or the current economy weren’t an issue, using dubiously sourced data to manage the system rises to the level of incompetence. Drivers must monitor and MCTS must analyze who is riding the bus when and where at all times in an effort to fully meet riders’ needs. Every person who steps on a bus should be tracked. Exceptional situations involving wheelchairs or strollers should be noted. Delays should be taken into consideration. As GI Joe would say, knowing is half the battle.
I was just speaking with a gal that relies on the bus system about this tonight, as I gave her a ride home.
If routes increased, to a faster quicker service, wouldn’t it make it easier to get around Milwaukee and increase ridership? She thought about it and agreed. She also stated that she never goes anywhere on Sunday because of a 40 minute wait in between buses. Since some are early, and you don’t know if you miss them – you could wait 40 mins to 80 minutes for a bus.
Seriously, instead of cutting service, you should increase it. Make it easy to get around and more people will ride the bus.
If it takes me 10 mins to get downtown by car, why would I ride the bus for 45 mins on a good day?
“They could use the rest of the (stimulus) money to lower fares and restore some of the routes that have been cut in the past.”
One-time funds for ongoing operating expenses. That’s poor fiscal policy.
It would suffice for the one year until the sales tax is fully in place. But the economy could start healing now.
More than just time, why would I spend $2 to get on the bus (even the pre-increase $2) and ride it for 45 minutes to get as far as work, when I could use about 1/3 or less of that amount on gas to get me there. The mass transit system has long seemed like a sham for a city to make money. Operating costs are fairly low, and with a high ridership, you have say 60-200 people on a bus during a high traffic route (not all at once necessarily, and that is probably a really low estimate for a lot of routes), each at $2, and that is $120-400 for that run. figure that’s over 4 hour, and the driver makes $15/hr, that’s $60 for the driver, figure another 50-60 for gas, that’s $120, which hits the low mark exactly, but on the high end, which is likely still low, that leaves $280 just floating around to do what? Figure $50 is set aside from that 4-hour period for maintenance, and you still have $230.
People are getting upset about being charged for a transfer? All other major metro areas I’ve been to have been charging for them for over a decade, and they are only timed, one-use transfers, and you need to pay full price if you get on a third transit vehicle, as compared to ours which are good for several hours, and work until they expire. Milwaukee is finally starting to act like a “big city” and people are getting bent out of shape.
Maybe that’s just me. I used to ride the bus all the time, and complained about how inconvenient it was, even when they were running regularly and often. But it has gotten more and more inconvenient as time went on.
You forget that there are other costs associated with driving a car. There are the car payments, insurance, maintenance costs, etc.
The fares for the buses are not high when compared dollar to dollar with other cities, but these other communities have a lot more than a decrepit fleet doing 80% of their routes. For the same money, other communities have different forms of rail and often trolleys.