Note: The following is a guest column from Paras Bhayani. Please submit guest columns to moderator1stc@yahoo.com
When thinking about transportation issues in Illinois, it can often be useful to look around the country to see what other American cities are doing to improve their transit systems and how they are working to place transit in the broader context of regional transportation.
Unfortunately, there are only a handful of cities from which Chicago can draw meaningful lessons. The American cities with transit systems like Chicago's—buses and non-surface trains in the city, commuter rail for the suburbs—are New York, Washington, Philadelphia, and Boston. While many readers might be familiar with the excellent networks of New York and D.C., Boston—a city with normal levels of tourism and federal funding—can serve as a more useful model in terms of how it organizes and thinks about transportation.
The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) is responsible for all transit in Boston and its suburbs. Much like the CTA, the MBTA operates a subway system in Boston and its inner suburbs—cities like Cambridge, Somerville, Brookline, and Newton. The MBTA also operates commuter rail lines that extend to the limits of the metropolitan region—Worcester, Lowell, and Providence, R.I.—much like Metra does in Chicago. Finally, the MBTA—yes, the same agency—runs buses in many of the suburbs, though the far-flung parts of the metropolitan region (Worcester) have their own bus systems.
Organizationally, Illinois has much to learn from Massachusetts. The latter abolished county governments in late-1990s—for those following the Stroger chronicles, this doesn't sound like a bad idea for Illinois, but I digress—meaning that the composition of the MBTA board of directors is removed from local county boards chiefs and/or blocs of commissioners.
The board of directors, appointed by the governor and serving coterminous with him, ratifies all planning and budget decisions for the MBTA. The board also chooses the general superintendent—the effective czar of the region's transit system. The effect is that the system is highly-centralized, integrated, and accountable; all blame for MBTA's failings can be laid at the feet of the governor and his superintendent.
I would be the first to admit that talent—and not just institutions—matters a great deal. Massachusetts has benefited recently from a reformist, Huberman-like general superintendent who has made substantial capital improvements to the system. But anyone who has taken a serious look at Illinois transit would acknowledge that diffuse authority across the service boards and a lack of accountability—the buck clearly does not stop with either Daley or Blagojevich—have been two key factors in creating the mess that is Chicago transit.
The centrality and cohesiveness of the Massachusetts transportation agencies will be taken to a new level if a plan being crafted by Governor Deval Patrick, a native of Chicago's south side, is enacted. Under Patrick's plan, the boards of both the Mass Pike—the Illinois equivalent of IDOT—and the MBTA would be abolished, and a new "Massachusetts Transportation Authority" would be responsible for all transportation in the state.
Like the MBTA and the Massachusetts Turnpike today, the board of MassTrans would be appointed by the governor. But the new agency would have an exceptionally large mandate (everything that affects how people move on the surface) and exceptionally wide budgetary authority (every dollar spent on transportation). The massive centralization of power within the governor's office has no precedent in the United States.
While the plan is in its early stages, an agency like MassTrans would allow for a great deal more coordination in transit and road construction—projects like the Dan Ryan median could become commonplace—as well as a tighter integration of surface transport with the region's three airports. The new agency would also be able to refinance the Commonwealth's transportation debt at more favorable rates, thereby reducing long-term borrowing costs and making new bonds—and new expansions—less costly.
The bold thinking evidenced by this plan is necessary given that Massachusetts must invest $19 billion over the next 20 years to simple maintain current standards of performance.
If IDOT, which is in better financial shape than the transit system, were merged with the RTA and its three sub-agencies (CTA, Metra, Pace), the sky would be the limit for synergy, greater efficiency, and improved coordination. Such a superagency would not just allow for broader strategic thinking, but could use its fiscal power to focus dollars on the weakest areas of the region's transportation grid. One could imagine a case where tolls or gasoline taxes are used, for the first time, to subsidize transit. And for those of us who would love to see congestion pricing implemented in the Loop, determining what to do with those dollars—and how to reduce the strain on suburban and peripheral city residents—is a job that could only be handled well by an agency with a broad focus and a broad budgetary portfolio.
I want to take care not to glorify too much the state of transit in Massachusetts. To be sure, the region faces challenges, many of them stemming from former Governor Mitt Romney's decision to drop billions of dollars of legacy costs from the "Big Dig"—a project that principally benefited drivers—onto the back of the MBTA. As a result, the MBTA is currently spending 27 percent of its budget, or its entire take from fares, on debt service, and hiked subway fares from $1.25 to $1.70 this past January.
Still, it's worth noting that in a city as expensive as Boston, the subway is still less expensive than in Chicago. And politicians seem to be getting the message: In addition to Patrick's massive reform bill, which has not yet been unveiled, legislators from Cambridge and Somerville are pushing a bill that would make the Commonwealth responsible for $2.9 billion of the MBTA's $5.7 billion in debt—an effort to stave off fare increases and allow more money to be spent on maintenance. The bill has already received the blessing of both legislative leaders and the governor.
Links:
http://news.bostonherald.com/news/regional/politics/view.bg?articleid=1035555
http://www.eot.state.ma.us/downloads/tfc/TFC_Recommendations.pdf
http://www.eot.state.ma.us/downloads/tfc/TFC_Findings.pdf
Paras Bhayani, a native of Palos Heights, Ill., currently lives in Cambridge, Mass. He has long been active with the Illinois and Massachusetts chapters of the Sierra Club, and closely follows transit politics and politics more generally in both states.
Showing posts with label MBTA. Show all posts
Showing posts with label MBTA. Show all posts
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)