Oct 18th, 2008 at 9:45 am
Jump Starting the Transit Space Race
Don’t miss this hot new report from Reconnecting America on the case for massive expansion of our commitment to building a new transit infrastructure.
31 Responses to “Jump Starting the Transit Space Race”
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October 18th, 2008 at 2:10 pm
How is demand determined here? Now living in Manhattan and having lived in Chicago - New York and Illinois are far too low. Just upgrading the freight rail infrastructure in the Chicago area to an acceptable state would cost $10bn over the next 10 years or so. Between the Circle Line, new BRT and other rail infrastructure, the CTA superstation and express links to O’Hare/Midway, the Star Line suburban rail project… I’d expect Illinois’ number is closer to $30-$40bn.
For comparison, the Toronto transport agency has proposed a $55bn plan for the Greater Toronto Area.
http://www.thestar.com/article/490345
What’s wrong with this country?
October 18th, 2008 at 2:20 pm
I think they’re just adding up the costs of various proposals. Here in Baltimore, Amtrak and local commuter trains run in the 140 year old Baltimore and Potomac tunnel, whereas freight runs through the 110 year old Howard Street tunnel. The Howard Street tunnel is only one way and cannot accommodate modern double-stack freight trains, and thus forms a major bottleneck for the port and the east coast. Looking at maps of German cities of similar size and density is just depressing; they’ve almost all got light metros or streetcar subways and extensive local rail. I hope this economic situation at least encourages new, desperately needed infrastructure investment. The American Society of Civil Engineers is releasing a new state-of-the-infrastructure report card early next year, so keep an eye out.
October 18th, 2008 at 2:21 pm
Er, forgot to mention that Amtrak can only run 30mph due to the poor condition and sharp turns in the current tunnel!
October 18th, 2008 at 2:31 pm
Interesting how Arkansas is the midwest. I’m sure that’s news to the people who live here.
October 18th, 2008 at 2:35 pm
Having lived in both the eastern and western sides of the burgeoning sunbelt (as well as in TX, the middle) all of my life, I can definitely say that we could use SOME kind of transit infrastructure as it just isn’t present at all outside of Amtrak and city bus lines.
October 18th, 2008 at 3:43 pm
The report doesn’t break the $248 billion into any kind of time frame, you can’t build a rail system in one year or even five usually. Uncle Sam could just write checks year to year to pay for the whole show (hell it just wrote one for $700 billion) and leave the annual operating costs for the states to cover.
Two other points:
1. commuter rail depends on leasing rail lines from private railroads. The Fed should negotiate one master lease agreement with all the railroads and allow states to just sign on the line that is dotted instead of spending months (years in aggregate) negotiating a new right of way lease for each project.
2. Politically, funding to each states should be as close to per capita as possible. Yes, its cities that need it, but you gotta buy off the rubes if you want to get things done (and Blue Dog Democrats re-elected). Let’s see, if we broke this down by congressional district ($248 bill / 435)… $57 million per congressional district. http://www.thegreenpapers.com/Census00/FedRep.phtml
Hmm, TH is right. NY and IL are too low. On a per capita basis New York should get $16.5 billion– versus this report’s $13 billion. IL should get $10.8 billion instead of $5.96 billion.
October 18th, 2008 at 3:44 pm
Dream on. Neither presidential candidate has shown any real interest in expanding transit. And given the trillion-plus dollars the federal government has just committed to addressing the financial crisis, not to mention record budget deficit projections for the coming years, federal funding for transit is going to be harder to obtain than ever. Obama’s transportation proposals are all about expanding highways and investing in electric cars.
October 18th, 2008 at 4:26 pm
Looking at maps of German cities of similar size and density is just depressing; they’ve almost all got light metros or streetcar subways and extensive local rail.
Germany’s rail network (which includes the S-bahn lines in and around its major cities) shrank by 14% between 1990 and 2003. Over the same period, its motorway network grew by 11%.
For the EU as a whole, rail networks shank by 8%. Road networks excluding motorways grew by 22%. Motorway networks grew by 41%. Europeans love their cars almost as much as Americans.
October 18th, 2008 at 4:27 pm
Mixner- Not really true. Obama’s transportation plan includes some positive things in it.
http://www.barackobama.com/pdf/issues/FactSheetTransportation.pdf
Of course Obama hasn’t shown much of an interest in this on the trail, because transportation is one of the unsexiest issues out there. It’s worth noting that McCain, on the other hand, has been one of the most outspoken opponents of Amtrak in the Senate. I’m hopeful that Obama, by mere virtue of being a Chicagoan, will place greater importance on transit. We’ve had a string of sunbelt Presidents, and merely shifting how resources are allocated to be more pro-transit would have a massive beneficial impact.
October 18th, 2008 at 4:45 pm
DBWhite,
As the document you linked to shows, Obama’s support for transit consists of little more than abstract statements of support. The only concrete proposal I see to promote transit is a small change in the tax code for commuting-related benefits, and even that may have the effect of promoting car travel more than promoting transit, since it applies to carpooling and ridesharing as well as transit. More than twice as many Americans use carpooling to get to work as use public transportation.
In contrast, Obama proposes to spend $150 billion over 10 years on clean energy. This includes the explicit goal of putting 1 million plug-in hybrid cars on the road by 2015, a $7,000 tax credit for the purchase of new-technology cars, investment in new battery technology for electric cars, and upgrading the national electrical grid to support large-scale recharging of electric vehicles.
October 18th, 2008 at 5:40 pm
It’s worth noting that McCain, on the other hand, has been one of the most outspoken opponents of Amtrak in the Senate.
Then it’s also worth noting, in a statement you conveniently omitted from your carefully-doctored quotation, that “Obama believes we need to reform Amtrak to improve accountability.” Hard to know what that means in terms of policy, exactly, but it suggests Obama may support cuts to some Amtrak services, or at least reforms that will raise the visibility of Amtrak’s waste and inefficiency.
October 18th, 2008 at 6:36 pm
Mixner,
The other concrete proposals in there: 60 billion over ten years for essential projects. Taking smart growth into consideration in the funding process. Requiring that states examine the energy impact of transportation projects.
The funding process clearly needs an overhaul, so these are steps in the right direction. Transit projects get a level of scrutiny from the feds that highway projects do not. Of course, that has a lot to do with the way funds are allocated, especially during this administration. Transit also has benefits that are extremely hard to predict or quantify.
I agree that this isn’t tremendously concrete, but why would it be? Where is transportation on the list of priorities in a presidential election? These nice big round figures are more for waving around than they are actual policy blueprints. I’m not cynical enough to believe that emphasis doesn’t mean anything, and the emphasis here is clearly on improving existing infrastructure and expanding transit. It’s simply ridiculous to pretend there isn’t a big difference between Obama and McCain or Obama and Bush. Yeah, Obama obviously puts a lot of emphasis on roads and electric cars. But so what? He seems to care more about improving existing roads and improving infrastructure in already urbanized areas, which alone is a huge step forward. It’s just heartening to know we’d have a President who spent most of his adult life in Cambridge, Chicago, and New York, and a Vice President who commutes by Amtrak. As for the “doctoring” I did, I left that line off because it’s obviously a throw-away stuck in to placate people who think rail is a waste of money.
Actually, some Amtrak services DO deserve to be cut. A couple years back I (regrettably, because I’m too stingy to spring for a sleeper) took Amtrak from Baltimore to LA. Having lines from Chicago to Seattle, Portland, LA, and San Francisco simply doesn’t make any sense. It’s totally consistent with being pro-Amtrak to support cutting these lines, which could free up funds to improve routes that actually make sense, ie Chicago-St Louis, Chicago-Detroit, Chicago-Cincinatti via Indianapolis. Amtrak really does need reform, and that reform should include cutting out long-distance lines on which rail can’t compete with air travel. The rule of thumb is that trips under 3:30 are faster than plane, and trips up to 4:00 are competitive. The three day Tolkien-esque journey I took does not deserve federal subsidy. The focus should be on intra-regional systems, like improving Acela, investing in the Midwest, and building the CA high speed rail system. Obama (and Biden) was a strong supporter of providing matching funds to states that want to invest in their Amtrak lines.
As for your comment about Germany, you left off the last several years and everything prior to 1990. You seem to know what you’re talking about so I assume you know recent years have seen major expansions in transit around the continent. Comparing the total lengths of rail is irrelevant, as much of the reduction was from slow, rural lines. I’m sure you could look at the entire EU 2003-2008 and find similar trends, but the post-communist countries (including East Germany) had extensive, but slow and inefficient webs of rail networks for which a reduction in track length would probably be an improvement. Spain cut many of its lesser lines, but at the same time is investing massively in high speed inter and intra-city transit. Poland’s national rail company is eschewing investing in inefficient, local, rural lines but are planning the first high speed network in Eastern Europe. Germans do not love their cars as much as Americans. The average American drives around 24120 km/year. The average German, 10450. Fuel consumption (2004) in the US was around 70.6 barrels / day / 1000 people, compared to around 32 in Germany. Rail ridership there is over 11 times higher (km/capita/year), with the average German traveling 910 km by rail and the average American traveling just 80 km in a year. 9.2 percent (2006) of German modal share is rail, as opposed to just .5 percent in America.
Comparing Baltimore to Dusseldorf,(Which I chose solely because the size of the cities and their urbanized areas, as well as their densities, are extremely close. I didn’t know much about its transit situation before looking it up.) there is no contest. The former is burdened with outmoded infrastructure and has spent the last four or five years trying to get together a plan for a light rail line that the feds will inevitably (and rightly) reject. The latter already has an expansive transit network, is planning a large project to improve high speed rail service and has two S-Bahn extensions, including tunneling, under construction.
In the end I’m not entirely sure what your point is. There really is no comparing Obama/Biden and McCain when it comes to transit. I don’t expect a new New Deal, but just a shift in priorities would have massive benefits. Bush has actually plowed tons of money into infrastructure, he’s just gone about it all wrong, putting most of it into building new highways and widening existing ones to accommodate inefficient commuting patterns. If infrastructure investment is kept at the same level as it currently is, with more emphasis on repairing existing infrastructure, smart growth, and energy efficiency, I will be pleased. I think it’s about as much as one can expect from a modern Democrat.
October 18th, 2008 at 7:07 pm
DBWhite,
The other concrete proposals in there: 60 billion over ten years for essential projects.
It makes no mention of new transit projects at all. The “national transportation infrastructure” to be funded by that $60 billion is “highways, bridges, roads, ports, air, and train systems.” The overwhelming majority of transportation infrastructure consists of roads and highways and associated structures (bridges, etc.). And most transportation infrastructure spending is needed for maintenance and repair of existing structures rather than new ones. The New York and DC subways systems, for example, will need billions of dollars over the next few years just for maintenance and repair of their aging tracks and tunnels.
I agree that this isn’t tremendously concrete, but why would it be?
For the same reason he made concrete proposals about cars and highways. If Obama wants to expand the role of transit and reduce the role of cars in our national transportation system, why hasn’t he made specific goals and proposals, like increasing the share of transit passenger-miles, or increasing the length of the light-rail network, or modernizing the nation’s bus fleet, or something of that kind? He’s proposed massive new government spending to keep people driving (notably the $7,000 tax credit for people who buy advanced cars) and to commercialize new automobile fuel and engine technologies, and nothing at all to encourage them to switch from driving to using public transportation.
As for the “doctoring” I did, I left that line off because it’s obviously a throw-away stuck in to placate people who think rail is a waste of money.
Huh? How is that “obvious?” In that case, his vague statements of support for transit are merely there to placate transit fans, rather than signalling a serious commitment to transit.
October 18th, 2008 at 7:55 pm
DBWhite,
As for your comment about Germany, you left off the last several years and everything prior to 1990.
The data comes from the latest (2007) edition of Eurostat’s Panorama of Transport report. Eurostat is the EU statistical agency. If you have more recent data, or if you think you have other evidence that the decline in rail and growth in car and road transportation has stopped or been reversed, please present it. I see no evidence of any such change. Cars are the overwhelmingly dominant mode of transportation in Europe just as they are in the U.S., and that dominance is growing. Car travel (and air travel) are displacing rail travel across Europe. Rail networks are shrinking, road networks are growing, car ownership rates are growing, car passenger-miles are growing faster than any other mode of ground transportation. (Air travel is growing fastest of all).
You seem to know what you’re talking about so I assume you know recent years have seen major expansions in transit around the continent.
What major expansions in transit around the continent? The overwhelming feature of transportation in Europe, as the report notes, is the huge and growing dominance of the passenger car. And this growth has occurred despite efforts by European governments to promote alternatives to driving:
Germans do not love their cars as much as Americans. The average American drives around 24120 km/year. The average German, 10450. Fuel consumption (2004) in the US was around 70.6 barrels / day / 1000 people, compared to around 32 in Germany.
These numbers mean nothing with respect to European transportation mode preferences. Germany is a much smaller and denser nation than the United States. Its population centers are much closer together. That’s why driving distances are so much shorter in Germany than in the U.S. And Germany’s gasoline taxes are much higher than America’s, to fund its more extensive social welfare system. So German cars tend to be smaller and more fuel-efficient than American cars. Hence the lower average fuel consumption in Germany. Europeans don’t do quite as large a share of their travelling by car as Americans do, but the trend is clearly in the American direction.
Rail ridership there is over 11 times higher (km/capita/year), with the average German traveling 910 km by rail and the average American traveling just 80 km in a year. 9.2 percent (2006) of German modal share is rail, as opposed to just .5 percent in America.
But rail travel in Germany is losing ground to car travel and air travel (just as in the rest of Europe). In 1990, Germans travelled 9.5% as many passenger-km by rail as they travelled by passenger car. By 2005, that had fallen to 8.6% (despite massive spending on high-speed rail services).
Comparing the total lengths of rail is irrelevant,
On the contrary, the decline in the length of the rail network represents a decline in the coverage of European rail services. More and more places in Europe that once supported rail service are losing that service as demand shifts to car travel and air travel.
October 18th, 2008 at 11:51 pm
Alright, last post here.
1) Obama’s highway plans are no more concrete than his transit plans. You fail to mention how he proposes changing the funding process, which is the most important point. The DC subway system does not need “billions over the next few years”. They oldest parts are from the ’70s! The feds have offered 150 million a year in matching funds if MD, DC, and VA come up with the money. Chicago and Boston, on the other hand..
Notably, his plan does place a whole lot more emphasis on repairing existing infrastructure than I’m used to hearing.
2) Many places in Europe are losing rail, but the major population centers increasingly have better rail. The rail systems of countries like France, Spain, Germany, Italy, and the Netherlands have decreased in track mileage because the governments there have correctly realized that rail cannot practically form a web connecting every town to every town. Rail has its slot in the hierarchy of transportation and smaller communities just often cannot support it. It is disappearing from many smaller towns, but this is not a bad thing; it makes the network as a whole more cost-efficient (TGV turned a profit last year) and most of these places can get along fine with cars and buses. When I say rail is expanding in Europe, I’m talking about high speed and metropolitan networks, which are the most important.
3) I’m not entirely sure what your point is. You don’t seem to be contesting the fact that German cities have better transit networks and better ridership than comparable American cities, which was what I implied in my first post. I made no comment on network or modal share growth, just that ridership and metropolitan systems were better.
Even on the issue of growth, I think you’re off base. Rail’s modal share in Europe has generally held steady since 2002 at around six percent. Not great, and I’m not implying that Europe is transit heaven, just that it’s better in this regard. Looking at Western Europe specifically does show decent growth, however. Germany has seen a 4.57 percent growth in auto passenger miles since 2000, with a 4.77 percent growth in rail passenger miles. 2005-2006, all of the major Western European nations, the ones who have been investing in their HSR networks, have seen rail’s share of passenger miles increase more than the auto passenger mile share, often by a wide margin. A dramatic example; French auto passenger miles increased 2000-2006 by 3.46 percent. Rail passenger miles increased 12.73 percent. Looking at Europe as a whole is ridiculous. Of course car ownership is increasing in Lithuania, Poland, Romania, and Hungary. They had crappy economies in the 20th century.
4) Germany is a denser country, but most Americans live in metropolitan areas. The density of the entire country is largely irrelevant with regards to fuel consumption and miles driven, since most driving is done commuting, not driving from metro to metro. Commuting patterns are clearly extremely different. To me, the most important aspect of metropolitan rail systems is how they influence growth and travel patterns in a positive way.
5) You didn’t respond to the entirety of my response to your accusation that I “doctored” a quote. Cutting Amtrak’s useless cross continental routes is a good idea. Efficiency isn’t always a Republican code word for budget cuts, sometimes it means just what it says. Amtrak is inefficient. It doesn’t focus on what it does best as much as it should, to the detriment of the lines that really need attention.
6) Cars are not evil. Investing in electric cars and improving mileage standards is good. Encouraging carpooling is good. People drive cars because they are better for the great majority of trips and will continue to be for the foreseeable future. Even a small increase in transit’s modal share of passenger miles would induce and reflect a positive change in development patterns. Driving will become much more expensive over the next couple of decades, but not enough to dislodge king car. Again, not a bad thing. As long as the environmental costs of driving are reduced.
7) It takes a level of cynicism I do not have to believe that Obama, who’s lived his adult life in dense metropolitan cities, and Biden, who commutes by train, won’t be better for transit than McCain of Arizona and Palin of Alaska. I simply cannot believe transit’s share of federal dollars will not increase. The reason I’m inclined to take to heart vague statements of support for mass transit and rail is that Democrats are cowards when it comes to supporting liberal policies, and investing in transit is (for some reason) a liberal policy. My intuition tells me that centrist bromides about Amtrak efficiency aren’t as sincere as fuzzy liberal statements of support for transit. I also think the economic situation is creating more support for infrastructural investment as economic stimulus.
October 19th, 2008 at 3:41 pm
DBWhite,
Obama’s highway plans are no more concrete than his transit plans.
I just gave you a list of concrete proposals Obama has made to subsidize and promote driving. And the vast majority that $60 billion he wants for transportation infrastructure will go to roads and highways, not rail.
The DC subway system does not need “billions over the next few years”.
Wrong yet again. The WMATA just announced that it needs over $11 billion over the next 10 years just to maintain and repair the existing DC Metro system. The amount does not include any money for rail expansion. And that’s just DC. The New York subway also needs billions of dollars for maintenance and repairs.
Many places in Europe are losing rail, but the major population centers increasingly have better rail. The rail systems of countries like France, Spain, Germany, Italy, and the Netherlands have decreased in track mileage because the governments there have correctly realized that rail cannot practically form a web connecting every town to every town. Rail has its slot in the hierarchy of transportation and smaller communities just often cannot support it. It is disappearing from many smaller towns, but this is not a bad thing; it makes the network as a whole more cost-efficient (TGV turned a profit last year) and most of these places can get along fine with cars and buses. When I say rail is expanding in Europe, I’m talking about high speed and metropolitan networks, which are the most important.
The point is that rail travel in Europe is in decline. It is increasingly being displaced by road travel and air travel. High-speed routes are just a tiny fraction of the total network. The network as a whole is shrinking. Fewer and fewer towns and cities in Europe have rail service. A smaller and smaller share of travel in Europe is done by rail. Travel in Europe is already overwhelmingly dominated by cars, and that dominance is increasing. Air travel is also growing dramatically in Europe. Transportation in Europe increasingly resembles transportation in America.
And the TGV does not make a profit. Ticket sales and other operating revenues only cover operating costs (if that), not total costs.
Germany has seen a 4.57 percent growth in auto passenger miles since 2000, with a 4.77 percent growth in rail passenger miles.
You provide no source for these numbers or any of your other numbers. As reported by Eurostat in Panorama of Transport, passenger-km of travel by rail in Germany declined between 2000 and 2005, from 75.4 billion to 74.9 billion. Over the same period, passenger-km of travel by passenger car in Germany increased by 38 billion, from 831 billion to 869 billion.
A dramatic example; French auto passenger miles increased 2000-2006 by 3.46 percent. Rail passenger miles increased 12.73 percent.
Again, where are you getting these numbers from? As reported by Eurostat, between 1990 and 2004 (the longest range for which it provides data on passenger-km by mode), rail travel in France grew by 17% (63.7 billion p-km to 74.3 billion p-km), while passenger car travel grew by 26% (586 billion p-km to 737 billion p-km). Even in France, which has spent far more on rail than any other country in Europe over the past 30 years, rail travel is losing ground to car travel.
October 19th, 2008 at 4:04 pm
DBWhite,
Germany is a denser country, but most Americans live in metropolitan areas. The density of the entire country is largely irrelevant with regards to fuel consumption and miles driven, since most driving is done commuting, not driving from metro to metro. Commuting patterns are clearly extremely different.
Germany is denser than the U.S. with respect to both distances between metro areas and distances within metro areas. America is just much more spread out than Germany. Hence, Americans tend to travel longer distances than Germans. Hence, Americans use more gas than Germans.
Cutting Amtrak’s useless cross continental routes is a good idea.
I think the vast majority of Amtrak long-distance routes should be cut, not just “cross continental” ones. The U.S. is simply not dense enough for long-distance rail travel to make sense, except for small niche markets like sightseeing and vacation services.
6) Cars are not evil. Investing in electric cars and improving mileage standards is good. Encouraging carpooling is good.
It’s good for car travel. It’s bad for transit. In order to give people an incentive to shift from driving to using transit you have to make driving less attractive relative to using transit. Obama’s proposals will have the opposite effect. He’s encouraging people to keep on driving by massively subsidizing new technology for cleaner and more fuel-efficient cars. If Obama wants people to shift to using transit, he needs to increase the relative cost of driving (through, say, a tax increase on retail gasoline) or decrease the relative cost of using transit (through, say, lower fares). He’s not proposing any such thing.
Even a small increase in transit’s modal share of passenger miles would induce and reflect a positive change in development patterns.
And you know this, how? Where is your evidence? Transit’s modal share has been in decline for decades (notwithstanding the recent tiny increase due to summer gas prices), and is now minuscule. All the evidence suggests that it will continue to fall. Obama isn’t proposing to do anything to stop this trend, let alone reverse it.
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