Believe it or not there are a number of transit systems that are in the same or worse condition than our own. Many of them have cancelled service despite the loud cries of protest from riders and potential and wanna be riders. Every state, city and local jurisdiction is having to make some tough choices regarding what it can afford to continue to offer and what it will have to cut. As many of you well know, it's difficult to cut anything, even routes and lines that are not being used much. I remember several years ago when an express bus line was being threatened with closure. This route was a direct line from a suburban location to the corner near a federal office building. Seemed like a winner until it turned out that the route averaged only four passengers on three of the four weekdays it operated and a grand total of six passengers on the other two weekdays. The cost subsidy for this bus service could have paid for a nice stretch limo to drive these folks to work each day. But when time came for the "hard budgetary decisions" these riders and all of the friends that they could convince to join them put up a wailing not heard since the last moments of the city of Babylon. So loud was the protest generated that the route was salvaged for another two years before somebody realized how fiscally irresponsible it was and got it cancelled and consolidated into another, more vibrant, route. The point is that nobody wants to lose what they have even if it's for the betterment of the whole. These are tough times and there are going to be some unhappy people out there. The thing that everyone should remember is that it beats the alternative of shutting everything down because it's gone broke.
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In Los Angeles the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (the former stomping grounds of Metro General Manager John Catoe, Jr.) is replacing paper passes with reusable electronic fare cards for daily use. Yeah, these sort of sound like our very own SmarTrip cards, except without the picture of President Obama on them.
The Transit Access Pass, or TAP card is meant to replace bus, subway and train passes across all public transit systems in Los Angeles County, according to local television station CBS2. But here's the shocking difference from our own roll out of these types of cards: the Los Angeles system will provide the cards for free to those who don't already have one (no mention of how they track that) when the passengers buy a $5 day pass. This will run until the 11th of April or until supplies run out. After that, the TAP cards will cost customers... wait for it... wait for it... $2 each. That's right, this much small transit system (save for the number of buses) is charging 40% of what Metro is charging for the same thing. By the way, coins and bills will still be accepted on MTA buses and trains even after the roll-out of the TAP cards has been completed. Metro has a dedicated and captive audience that will do anything the agency asks of them and it's still $100 million bucks in the hole... go figure.
Steve Eldridge is a long-time reporter,
observer and commentator on the Washington region's transportation
issues. You can contact him directly by writing to: Steve@SprawlandCrawl.com.
Unless otherwise requested, letters or portions of letters can be used
within future columns. Letter writers will be identified by their first
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According to Wikipedia, MTA provides 1.6 million rides per day (rail and bus). WMATA provides about 1.3 million per day (Metro and Metrobus). So it's not actually a "much smaller" system at all. In fact, in ridership, it's larger.
I'm with you, though. I think SmarTrip cards should be as close to free as possible.
Posted by: Steve Offutt | February 22, 2009 at 11:38 PM