Tuesday, March 4, 1997
MTA:
Experts research ways to boost ridership as it hits 10-year
lowBy Vicky Geeroms
Daily Bruin Contributor
"Build it and they will come."
This statement has often been made in reference to public
transportation. And having invested more than $4 billion on new
rail projects over the last 10 years, the Los Angeles Metropolitan
Transportation Authority is standing by this premise.
Yet, despite the MTA’s mass investments to improve public
transportation, public transit ridership in Los Angeles is at a
10-year low. On an average weekday, 1.1 million Angelenos rely on
public transport, 500,000 less than in 1985.
"Los Angeles actually (has) higher levels of transit users than
many (people) believe," said assistant professor Brian Taylor of
the UCLA department of urban planning. Out of 350 metropolitan
areas in the United States, Los Angeles holds about the 10th spot
when it comes to transit ridership, said Taylor.
"But," Taylor continued, "in the last 10 years, we spent an
enormous amount of money expanding a rail-transit system, and
during that time we lost an enormous amount of ridership." The
number of passengers MTA carries a year has gone down 100 million
over the past 10 years, according to Taylor.
This wasn’t always the case in Los Angeles. At the turn of the
century, public transportation was the predominant mode of
transportation for Angelenos.
In 1880, five railways criss-crossed Los Angeles County and
connected the city with remote areas such as San Fernando, Anaheim
and Wilmington.
By 1900, Pacific Electric’s Big Red Cars rode all over the
greater L.A. area. At its heyday, this electric railway covered the
streets over 1,164 miles.
It was a time when it was just as convenient to live in San
Bernardino or Santa Monica as in the inner fringes of the central
city.
But it was also a time when the motor age hadn’t developed yet.
Most people agree the invention of the automobile and the low costs
attached to it are the major culprits in the now-low transit
ridership.
"The general policies of urban transportation that have been
pursued in the U.S. have favored … travel by automobile," Taylor
said. He pointed out that gasoline prices are low, getting a
driver’s license is relatively easy, and registration fees are
fairly low compared to other countries.
Furthermore, the policies of urban development adopted in L.A.
have favored decentralization and hence don’t make it very
attractive for people to use transit.
"Los Angeles is a 20th-century city that adapted to the
automobile," said Gene Kim, an urban planning master’s degree
student. L.A. is characterized by a lack of a clear city center,
and forms an area with high accessibility through freeways, he
said.
"When you invest in public transit projects such as railway, you
only improve accessibility by a very small margin," said Kim,
adding that those investments would only be worthwhile if the
freeways weren’t there. He believes the railway package is flawed
because it is based on the premise that people will leave their
cars at home.
"People are used to living in L.A. the way they do," Kim said,
"and building a rail isn’t going to change that."
Transit ridership is low because rail, which has become the
center of MTA’s investments, and in some cases has replaced
existing bus lines, isn’t serving large enough of a market.
Then why does the MTA keep investing billions of dollars on huge
rail projects such as the Red Line?
"On the Red Line we just opened a two-mile extension last
summer. So we (at the MTA) are very much encouraged, because we
continue to make progress," said MTA spokesman Steve Chesser. The
MTA supports the idea of rail in Los Angeles because it offers a
separate system of transportation which is more attune to the needs
of Los Angeles, Chesser said.
"We don’t need more buses, because they get caught up in
traffic," Chesser continued, adding that once the project is
finished, the 22.3 miles of subway will, in addition to bus and
carpool lanes, improve mobility in the Los Angeles area. "The Red
Line is really the transit system of the future," he said.
Considering the $5.8-billion price-tag attached to the Red Line
(which is still under construction), many are hoping Chesser is
correct.
However, the MTA also has other incentives to stay on the
project. "The Red Line is the biggest public rail project ever in
the United States," said Kim. "And if L.A. didn’t go on with the
project, the (federal) funding would go to other projects in other
cities."
As with all major projects, the Red Line has also encountered
many problems. The MTA has been criticized for being behind its
schedule. Problems such as thin tunnel walls, sinkholes and a
recent fatality have delayed construction. "Our project has been
criticized," countered Chesser, "but when you build a project of
this scale, that’s what happens."
Despite the major setbacks the Red Line has encountered, Mayor
Richard Riordan has backed the project since its conception.
"A lot of decisions were made a long time ago," said Jason
Greenwald, press deputy to the mayor. "The mayor’s belief is that
we should carry through the project we’ve started, but also search
(for) new solutions."
In other words, public transit in Los Angeles shouldn’t have to
be just a choice between the bus or the train.
Hence Riordan’s longtime support of the bus services. "The mayor
believes buses are the heart of the public transit system in Los
Angeles," said Greenwald, adding, "we need to focus on buses
because they serve more than 95 percent of the people who use
public transportation."
Public transit is and will always be an essential part of
transportation in a city. However many people feel that the L.A.
public transportation agency should revise its strategies at
attracting riders.
"The main role of public transit," Kim said, "is to serve people
who don’t have an automobile, and who don’t have another
option."
So public transit should become more of a "backup service,"
Taylor feels.
"It (transit) is only attractive for people who are
transit-dependent, too young, too old, infirmed or too poor to
drive," Taylor said. "And for people who work in places where
parking is too expensive or too difficult."
Besides that, Kim argues, the city can also try to make public
transportation as appealing as possible for people who do have
other options.
"I think there should be increased services, more buses and
investments in bus-way facilities," he said. The latter could
provide fast and easy transit options, because unlike rail it can
go into the communities and practically provide people with
door-to-door transportation.
But, said Taylor, investing in new transit facilities will never
be viable unless all the policies favoring automobile use change.
"We’ve too underpriced the automobile, we’ve made it too cheap to
travel (by car)."
Furthermore, Taylor said that public transit, and rail in
particular, can only work if there was the political will to make a
more compact city.
So unless a central location is made advantageous by changing
all of the policies toward automobile use and urban development, no
investments in rail will attract sufficient ridership to justify
their high cost.
Redevelopment is also a solution advocated by Gloria Olen,
California project director at the Service Transportation Policy
Project. "I believe that we have to redevelop our communities along
existing transit lines," she said, adding that if the communities
were more center-focused and closed, people wouldn’t have to use
their cars so much.
But solutions to low transit ridership do not necessarily have
to be so radical or utopian.
Ridership  at least among students  can be built up
by simply providing students extra services, Kim said. He added
that the MTA and UCLA administration should try to work together to
offer students cheaper, or even free, transit services, as such is
the case at UC Davis, Santa Cruz and Berkeley.
"When you pay your registration fee … you get a bus sticker
that gives you unlimited bus rides for the semester," Kim said.
"And that would be very useful here at UCLA, because parking is so
hard."
So providing better, but cheaper public transit is another
possible way to attract more commuters on the bus and train.
"I would definitely use public transportation in L.A. if it was
better," said Silvio Duarte, a former UCLA Extension student from
Argentina, "because parking in L.A. is impossible and if you do
find parking, you spend a lot of money."
However, a better public transportation system in Los Angeles
isn’t necessarily going to lure all car owners to public buses and
trains.
Vanessa Craig, a fourth-year German student, said she’d rather
spend the money for a monthly bus pass on gas for a car. "What’s
worse," she asked, "sitting in a crowded bus during rush hour or
sitting in your car with the car stereo, air conditioning, a
smoke?"