Western cities double down on taxes for failing transit
By D. Dowd Muska | October 24, 2024
Well before COVID-19, transit was in big trouble. A 2018 analysis found that “factors such as lower fuel costs, increased teleworking, higher car ownership and the rise of alternatives such as Uber and Lyft” were “pulling people off trains and buses at record levels.” Lockdowns put the undeniable decline into a jaw-dropping freefall.
But the politicians, bureaucrats and activists who embrace faith-based transportation policy aren’t losing their religion. On Election Day, voters in several urban communities will be asked to funnel additional revenue to transit systems.
Measure G, placed on the ballot by a coalition of “labor organizations and businesses,” increases San Diego County’s sales tax by a half-penny. If approved – a simple rather than two-thirds majority is needed – the hike will devote 64% of its haul to “capital projects related to transit,” “transit operations and maintenance for the Metropolitan Transit System and North County Transit District” and “the repair, rehabilitation and replacement required to maintain reliable, safe, effective and efficient rail transit services.”
Between 2014 and 2019, ridership on San Diego’s light-rail system dropped by 1.5%. During the same period, buses lost 8% of their passengers. Lockdowns greatly accelerated the slump. Trips on light rail tumbled by 20.3% between 2019 and 2022, while bus travel plummeted by 41.5%. Transit’s share of work trips in San Diego is down to 2.1%. Meanwhile, telecommuting is booming. In the decade between 2013 and 2023, working from home soared from 6.4% to 16% in the San Diego metropolitan statistical area.
Big Business and Big Labor agree on Measure G. Voters aren’t so sure. Beyond the dismal ridership data, opponents make a compelling plea for “no.” The San Diego Union-Tribune’s editorial page noted that due to its “history of malfeasance,” the region’s metropolitan-planning organization is under investigation by federal prosecutors.
Measure G faces resistance from within the public sector, too. Poway council members argued that its “mass transit projects … would bring no benefit” to the city, and that in the notoriously expensive MSA, “saddling taxpayers with another sales tax increase when electricity, gas, fire insurance, housing and grocery costs have gone through the roof is utter insanity.”
At the other end of America’s Pacific Coast, Seattle’s mayor and council members want residents to adopt a heavier property-tax levy. Much of Proposition 1’s revenue would go toward “transit spot improvements, transit ambassadors, corridor project development, Link Light Rail access projects and RapidRide and Frequent Transit Network corridor improvements.”
Also to be funded: “strategies that increase transit rider safety and security.” The usual suspects – the Seattle Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce, Transportation Choices Coalition, Cascade Bicycle Club and Transit Riders Union – are on board.
If victorious, Proposition 1 will cost the typical homeowner hundreds of extra dollars per year. Former council member Alex Pedersen, warning of “sticker shock for families, small businesses, renters,” calls the proposal “unaffordable, unfair and ineffective.” (“Why would anyone want to pay more … to let [the Seattle Department of Transportation] aggravate traffic congestion, leave most roads in worse condition and fail to fix dangerous bridges?”)
Notwithstanding the price tag, it’s far from clear that increased “investment” for government-run buses and trains will reverse a dramatic trend. The Emerald City may be far to the left, but its denizens aren’t choosing “green” transportation. Transit’s share of travel to work in the MSA decreased from 9.3% to 5.7% in the past decade. At the same time, telecommuting ballooned from 5.4% to 20.3%.
Even the liberal editorial page of The Seattle Times advised voters to nix Proposition 1, “and tell drafters to come back with something either less expensive or that actually delivers on the needs that residents clearly identified in the city’s own polls.”
Heading inland, Denver’s Regional Transportation District (RTD) does not seek a new or higher levy – it seeks “to remain exempt from the limitations of the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights,” a 1992 ballot initiative that limits government revenue and spending. Ballot Issue 7A is an attempt to “extend the current voter authorization for RTD to retain and spend all revenue without further voter approval.” Once again, establishment organizations are voicing support.
The Downtown Denver Partnership claims that passage “is an important step in ensuring that RTD can maintain its current funding levels at a time when the agency needs to support our growing city, state and region with a safe and reliable transit system.”
Denver’s MSA is indeed growing. Its transit system is not. Axios reported that while an “organized opposition group has not been created … those against 7A argue its lagging ridership – coupled with ongoing cost problems, driver shortages and service challenges – raise concerns about financial accountability.”
Bus trips were down 44.1% between 2019 and 2022, and light rail experienced an almost identical tumble. (Telecommuting more than tripled, to an impressive 22.3%.) Transportation expert Randal O’Toole advises voters not to “reward RTD for running an inefficient transportation system that poorly serves more than 90% of the people in the region.” (From 2013 to 2023, transit’s share of Denver commuting was cut in half, and now stands at 2.3%.)
To the southwest, the Phoenix MSA will decide the fate of Proposition 479, an extension of a half-cent sales tax. Among other transportation-related expenditures, the revenue produced would “expand regional bus services” and “expand the region’s high-capacity transit system.”
Expand a system that’s shedding passengers? Just 1.2% of workers in metro Phoenix use transit to get to their jobs, down from a far-from-impressive 2.6% a decade ago. Bus travel lost half of its riders between 2019 and 2022. Light rail lost almost as much: 44.7%. According to the Arizona Free Enterprise Club, since “transit ridership in Maricopa County has plummeted to a 20-year low,” Proposition 479’s “transit slush fund masquerading as a transportation plan” should be rejected.
Since the middle of the last century, elected officials, planners and “environmentalists” have refused to accept the fact that Americans prefer the freedom of auto-mobility to the inconvenience – and weather-related frustrations – of transit. Now the obtuseness extends to the irreversibility of the work-from-home revolution. The transit theocracy’s dogma is on the ballot in 2024 and will soon see if voters are willing to be heretics.
Dowd Muska is a researcher and writer who studies public policy from the limited-government perspective. A veteran of several think tanks, he writes a column and publishes other content at No Dowd About It.
