Our transit system's past excellence makes the present crisis all the more galling. Milwaukee has gone from a pinnacle to a precipice in less than 10 years, and the reason is a lack of investment. If there is one lesson from the TMER&L years, it is that you have to spend money to make money, even in the leanest times. You have to invest in equipment, routes and promotional campaigns to keep riders on the bus. Milwaukee's recent practice has been disinvestment, and the results speak for themselves. Between 2000 and 2006, no system of comparable size in America lost more riders.
These should be the best of times for urban transit. Skyrocketing gasoline prices, disruptive construction projects and a surge of concern for the environment should make riding the bus an obvious choice for thousands of new patrons. But local transit managers are handcuffed, forced to raise fares and cut service as Milwaukee County continues its fiscal floundering.From the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel:
Stopping Milwaukee transit's death spiral
By JOHN GURDA
If you want to catch the bus, you'd better hurry. A new study by the Public Policy Forum concludes that the Milwaukee County Transit System as we know it is in the fast lane to oblivion. In less than a decade, a system that used to win awards as the best in America has entered a downward spiral of rising fares and declining service. The result, to no one's surprise, has been falling ridership and therefore falling revenue, which has led to even higher fares and more drastic service cuts. If the downward spiral is allowed to continue, it will become a death spiral.
To make matters worse, the system has rapidly been gobbling up its own seed corn. Federal funds intended to replace aging equipment have been diverted to cover operating expenses, which has only delayed the day when the bill for a new fleet will come due.
How did such an exemplary system lose so much ground in such a short time? Don't blame our supposedly pampered transit workers. Milwaukee's system is already the most cost-effective of its size in the nation, and the union made significant concessions in recent contract talks. Blame it, if you'd like, on skyrocketing fuel and health insurance costs, both familiar culprits completely beyond the control of the system's managers. But the root cause of the current crisis is a lack of political will on the part of our elected officials. Milwaukee's county executive and County Board - the transit system's ultimate managers - have either failed to recognize the problem or refused to deal with it. In either case, their lack of leadership is striking.
Eighty years ago, the system had another brush with oblivion. In the 1920s, local transit service was provided by The Milwaukee Electric Railway & Light Co., the predecessor of today's We Energies. Private automobiles were challenging trolleys for control of the streets in the '20s, and TMER&L faced stagnant ridership, falling profits and general fears of extinction.
Instead of cutting back, the system's leaders decided to fight back. They introduced high-volume "articulated" cars - tandem units with reduced crews - to boost operating efficiency, and they joined the move to rubber tires, adding the first gasoline buses to the transit fleet in 1920.
"The motor bus is the poor man's limousine," one ad proclaimed. "It gives him all the comforts and delights of closed-car motoring with none of its expense. It is swift, sure, silent, comfortable and even luxurious."
TMER&L also tried to lure passengers back with the promise of more interesting rides and speedier service. Double-decker buses began to operate on the downtown lines in 1923, attracting a steady stream of pleasure riders. In 1925, work began on the first rapid transit route, which offered fast, frequent service in state-of-the-art cars between downtown and western Milwaukee County.
The Great Depression stopped the transit system in its tracks. TMER&L experienced a sharp loss of both riders and revenue after 1929, but once again its leaders fought back. The weekly pass became a system staple in 1930. Trackless trolleys - rubber-tired vehicles tethered to overhead electric wires - made their Milwaukee debut in 1936. A full menu of promotions, particularly for off-peak travel, helped to stem the losses. In 1931, TMER&L won the Coffin Medal as the best electric railway system in America.
By the late 1930s, TMER&L had decided to leave the transportation field. It was a barely profitable sideline to the much larger electric power business and a political headache besides. But the old standards were maintained, enabling the system to meet the unprecedented demands of World War II. With defense plants humming, gasoline rationed and new automobiles non-existent, Milwaukee's mass transit ridership reached an all-time high of 428 million in 1944 - more than 10 times the current figure.
The entire system finally was purchased by a private operator in 1952, who sold it (with the help of federal grants) to Milwaukee County in 1975. It was clear by that time that public subsidies were needed to support public transit - just as public funds are used to build the public roads we clog with our private cars. The Milwaukee County Transit System did just as well under public ownership as it had in private hands. In 1987 and again in 1999, MCTS was named the best system in the country.
Our transit system's past excellence makes the present crisis all the more galling. Milwaukee has gone from a pinnacle to a precipice in less than 10 years, and the reason is a lack of investment. If there is one lesson from the TMER&L years, it is that you have to spend money to make money, even in the leanest times. You have to invest in equipment, routes and promotional campaigns to keep riders on the bus. Milwaukee's recent practice has been disinvestment, and the results speak for themselves. Between 2000 and 2006, no system of comparable size in America lost more riders.
These should be the best of times for urban transit. Skyrocketing gasoline prices, disruptive construction projects and a surge of concern for the environment should make riding the bus an obvious choice for thousands of new patrons. But local transit managers are handcuffed, forced to raise fares and cut service as Milwaukee County continues its fiscal floundering.
Public transit would be a vital service even if gasoline prices fell below $2 a gallon. Milwaukee's riders include everyone from students to senior citizens, but the Public Policy Forum found that 75% of them rely on the bus as their only practical means of transportation and that 43% take it to their jobs. For low-income workers, in particular, public transit is not just a convenience; it's a lifeline. Milwaukee's current economic development efforts are critically important, but all the jobs in the world won't do much good if workers can't get to them.
The Forum recommends an annual $10 vehicle registration fee as the first step to pulling the transit system out of its death spiral. That strikes me as modest indeed, but I'm sure even that proposal will face an uphill battle.
Have we really become so averse to new taxes that we're willing to let a vital service starve to death instead of fixing its obvious problems? I hope Milwaukee will answer that question in the negative - and before our once-proud transit system comes to the end of the line.
John Gurda is a Milwaukee historian. His column appears the first Sunday of each month.
There's no need for the transit system to suffer if it makes the switch to Natural Gas.
All over the country, more fleets are turning to this alternative fuel as the cleanest-burning, most cost-effective and environmentally friendly solution in order to stave off rising prices and the consequent fuel-surcharge.
Private funding and government subsidies make the switich to Natural Gas pain-free. Indeed, this domestically abundant resource is here and now and needs to be acknowledge as the only practical bridge to energy sustainability.
Posted by: Clean_Burning | June 04, 2008 at 05:25 AM
Unfortunately changes towards more efficient buses are going to require a capital investment which the County doesn't want to do. The thing that helped TMERL in the early days was having access to their own power plants which drove the electric streetcars. MCTS could work towards that end in their next generation by having electric buses which are charged by some type of renewable energy source such as solar.
But that doesn't get to the bottom of the major costs which are hurting the system, health care. Hopefully the government will see the benefit in providing a universal and basic health care system which will lessen the costs of businesses. If health care was removed from the MCTS budget think how much better the system could be?
Posted by: Yance | June 13, 2008 at 01:32 PM