American Dream

Denver-area resident Deborah Davis was arrested for refusing to show government identification while riding a public transit bus. The bus happened to go through the "Federal Center" in Lakewood, Colorado, and even though she was not getting off the bus at the Federal Center, she and all other passengers were told they must show ID.

The good news is that the U.S. Attorney in Denver has decided not to prosecute Ms. Davis. The bad news is that passengers on this bus are still required to show their ID. In fact, when a bus full of protesters refused to show their ID, Denver's transit agency compliantly provided an "auxiliary bus" for people who were willing to show ID so they could get to their destinations. Ms. Davis is no longer a passenger on that bus, or any bus, having lost her job due to being late because she was arrested.

Lakewood's Federal Center houses various agencies such as the Forest Service and National Archives. These are not exactly critical to our national security. But a recent order came down that anyone entering a federal facility must show identification. Since the bus technically entered the federal facility on a public roadway, security guards began boarding the bus and demanding that everyone present their id.

Ms. Davis initially did so, then realized that "this is not a police state" and decided to stop showing it. Several guards dragged her off the bus, handcuffed her, and arrested her. At the police station, she was later told that if she ever entered the Federal Center again she would go to jail.

"The 9-11 hijackers were asked for their IDs too," Jon Caldera points out. "Having them didn't stop what happened." "In a free country, citizens have no obligation to explain themselves to the government as they go about their daily lives," says Jacob Sullum. "It's the government that owes us an explanation."

A man wanted to buy a transit token at an Atlanta rail station, but the machine was broken. Fortunately, a Good Samaritan offered him an extra token. The man paid the Samaritan $1.75, which was the face value of the token.

The transit police swooped in and handcuffed and cited the Samaritan for illegally selling transit tokens. The Samaritan plans to fight the ticket but will have to ride transit to court because he doesn't have a car. Maybe this will convince him to buy one.

Sociologist John Finley Scott points out that transit is by its very nature degrading ("exact fare only," "you can go where we want, when we want," etc.), while auto ownership is empowering. This is just one more example.

Portland can spend $45 million on a cable tramway to connect a hospital in the hills with waterfront doctors' offices.

It can spend $11 million extending its silly downtown streetcar by eight blocks (sixteen blocks round trip).

It can give tens of millions in tax breaks and other subsidies to developers of New Urbanist high-density housing projects.

It funds or plans to fund the tram, streetcar, and many of the subsidies to New Urban developments out of "tax-increment financing," meaning the property taxes from new developments will go to subsidize urban monuments (or the developments themselves) rather than to schools, fire, police, and other things that the taxes would otherwise fund. (For more information about problems with tax-increment financing, see this paper.)

Things like parks. For some strange reason, Portland has a shortage of money for parks, so it has demanded that neighborhoods raise money to keep their parks and community centers open.

If neighborhood fundraisers are such a good idea, why not use such fundraisers for the tram, streetcar, and New Urban developments?

The Portland area spends about $630 million on transportation projects each year, about half for transit and half for roads. Congestion is getting worse and businesses are complaining that it is dramatically increasing their costs. Yet the city and region say they have no money to build new roads to relieve congestion.

Yet they seem to have money to build light-rail lines, streetcar lines, and other transit boondoggles. In 2003, transit carried just 2.3 percent of passenger travel in the Portland area, about 0.9 percent of which was rail and the rest bus. Of course, transit carried virtually none of the region's freight. Why should the region spend half its money on 2.3 percent of travelers?

A study paid for by the Portland Business Alliance and various government agencies found that every dollar spent on congestion reduction in Portland would return $2 in benefits. But that is a gross generalization: some dollars will produce far more benefits than others.

• According to estimates made by the Federal Highway Administration, a dollar spent on traffic signal coordination can return as many as $40 in benefits.
• A dollar invested in rail transit returns no more than 50 cents in benefits and traffic calming produces negative benefits (i.e., increases congestion).
• Nor are all highway construction projects worthwhile: some might return $10 to $20 dollars of benefit per dollar spent while others produce less than a dollar.

Before seeking more money from taxpayers, planners should make sure the money they have is spent effectively. They should estimate the benefits and costs of all potential congestion-reducing projects and rank them, funding only those that reduce the most congestion per dollar. But this would rule out the rail lines that Portland planners love, many of which actually increase congestion because they occupy lanes formally open to autos.

Photograph from Sydney Morning Herald

In what has become a familiar story, Sydney Australia built a transit way that went nearly 250 percent over budget and carries 30 percent fewer riders than predicted. The difference between this and most similar stories in the U.S. is that this transit way is an exclusive busway rather than rail -- but the U.S. will no doubt soon have its own busway failures.

The busway was expected to cost $98 million (all prices in Australian dollars), but ended up costing almost $350 million. The transit agency internally projected that the buses would carry 1.7 million people per year, but publicly claimed it would carry 2.8 million. Actual ridership is about 2.0 million. Based on the higher projection, the agency claimed the busway would pay for its operating costs, but actually a subsidy of nearly $5 million a year is needed.

Despite the problems, an government official quoted in the article claims the busway "demonstrated the potential of transitways." Yep -- the potential to drain away huge amounts of tax dollars.

Meanwhile, various rail projects in Sydney are also suffering problems. One project alone mentioned in this article is $1.2 billion over budget.

Few exclusive busways have been built in the U.S., but Pittsburgh has one along with some expensive light-rail upgrades to worn out streetcar lines. Pittsburgh's transit ridership has declined by nearly 30 percent in the last two decades. Albuquerque, Eugene OR, and Las Vegas are all opening exclusive busways, and these are not likely to be much more successful.

Bus-rapid transit does not require exclusive busways. All bus-rapid transit really means is more frequent buses with limited stops. But pork-barreling politicians want to spend large amounts of public funds so they can be recognized supporting highly-visible public projects that, incidentally, make private contractors (and potential campaign donors) huge profits.

Rail advocates sometimes argue that the operational savings provided by light rail will cover its high capital costs. Rail skeptics counter that buses cost less to operate than light rail, and bus operating costs appear high only because buses tend to serve many areas with low-transit usage while light rail is built in high-transit corridors.

Prompted by emails from rail advocates, I examined this question in more detail by comparing the annualized capital costs of light-rail lines built since 1980 with the operational savings assuming that bus ridership in the corridors now served by light rail is no greater than the average bus run by that transit agency. Of seventeen light-rail systems (including several built before 1980), five actually cost more per passenger mile than buses, and two cost the same.

Of light-rail systems built since 1980, eight cost less than buses. But when capital costs of those systems are amortized over 30 years at 7 percent (the rate prescribed by the Federal Transit Administration), the annualized capital cost of all of them is great than any operational savings. If amortized at 4 percent, two -- St. Louis and Salt Lake City -- cover their capital costs with operational savings, though for Salt Lake City it is very close.

It is safe to say that buses in high-use corridors running on limited or express schedules (similar to light rail) would attract far more riders than average and therefore would have much lower operating costs. Anyone who claims that a new light-rail line will pay for itself in lower operating costs is engaging in wishful thinking.

Instead of building light rail, transit agencies should consider contracting out bus service to private operators. The agencies that contract out part of their bus services save 45 to 75 percent per bus-mile over the buses they operate themselves. Contracting out would allow agencies to provide much more intensive transit service, which will gain far more riders than rail transit.

In five weeks of operation, the new Los Angeles Orange Line bus-rapid transit has been involved in four accidents. In a litany familiar to people in cities with light-rail transit, transit officials claim the line is perfectly safe because all the accidents were the fault of auto drivers.

The bus line has an exclusive right of way that follows an old rail line. Street intersections with the line have traffic signals, and drivers in all four accidents allegedly ran red lights. One thing the stories never mention is that the buses have been given signal priority so that all traffic signals are green when the buses arrive. This means that cross street signals no longer coordinate with other signals, so drivers who expect a series of green lights if they drive at the right speed find themselves with a red light when they get to the bus route.

I don't know if this is why any of the accidents took place, but it is worth consideration. Certainly, transit officials can't place 100 percent of the blame on auto drivers if the bus line messed up coordinated traffic signals. For now, the transit agency is telling bus drivers to slow to 10 mph through intersections instead of the originally scheduled 25 mph.

Another article reports that, in light of the latest accident, a group calling itself United Riders of Los Angeles is calling for a 72-hour closure of the bus line for a safety audit. The group suggest that, as it is now, the Orange Line might have to be renamed the Black-and-Blue Line.

To me, this is just one more argument against exclusive bus lanes. Transit riders do not need their own exclusive rights of way and except in the most crowded areas there are too few of them to justify the expense. Buses ought to operate on the same streets as cars, trucks, and bicycles.