As Metro celebrates the 20th anniversary of urban rail service, the Bus Riders Union calls for Los Angeles County leaders to make an honest assessment of its 20-year rail experiment and re-prioritize its resources toward a bus-centered mass transit system. MTA's aggressive pursuit of another $20 billion rail expansion plan, funded in part by massive federal borrowing through Mayor Villaraigosa's 30/10 plan, coincides with fare increases and major bus service cuts. In the process, the plan threatens to repeat the mistakes and re-create the civil rights crisis of the past.

BRU & transit experts agree: 20 years of rail construction, but no real progress  

A retrospective in last Friday’s Los Angeles Times cites two leading independent transit policy experts, James Moore of USC’s Department of Industrial and System Engineering and Tom Rubin, former Chief Financial Officer of MTA’s predecessor agency, both echoing an argument long made by the BRU: that MTA’s push for rail has driven down overall transit ridership for two decades as massive rail spending has coincided with increased transit fares for the system’s riders and insufficient investment in the bus system.

The Bus Riders Union’s civil rights lawsuit, made in response to unequal spending on bus verses rail, led to a federal court-ordered agreement with MTA and forced the agency to re-direct $2.7 billion in MTA’s resources into the bus system. As a result of the BRU lawsuit:

• MTA raised fares only once in 13 years
• added one million hours of bus service
• created the highly successful Rapid Bus system.

Although rail expansion, according to experts cited in the LA Times story, cost the agency at least 1.5 billion passenger boardings between 1986 and 2006, bus ridership actually increased during the period--1996-2006--when the BRU’s consent decree forced improvements to the bus system. After 20 years of rail expansion, the bus system, carrying 80% of riders, remains the backbone of the system.

Villaraigosa's amnesia: Repeating the rail mistake on a grander scale  

In the early 1990's, Antonio Villaraigosa attempted to use his seat on the MTA Board to put the breaks on MTA's first rail construction bonanza. Today, the Mayor threatens to lead the agency down the very same dangerous path, gutting the bus system in the midst of another rail boom. Villaraigosa and the MTA Board want to:

• use 2008's ½ cent sales tax Measure R to fund $20 billion in new rail and $34 billion in new highway construction
• doll out these lucrative contracts to powerful construction lobbying interests
• set in motion their "30/10" plan which will accelerate 30 years of construction--and spending--into 10 years through an enormous loan from the federal government. These loans will saddle the agency with potentially crippling debt for decades to come.

Leadership from Washington needed on civil rights and sustainable urban development 

The Bus Riders Union urges the Obama Administration and members of Congress to:

• reject MTA's 30/10 loan request
• withhold federal support and consider a new legal intervention to stop MTA's attacks on the gains of the civil rights consent decree
• use the carrot of federal dollars to push LA toward an equitable and sustainable vision for urban development--one that creates permanent green jobs through massive expansion of a clean-fuel bus system and reduces auto use by promoting high-density affordable housing built around bus transit hubs over highways and trains.

Since the end of the civil rights consent decree, MTA policy has moved aggressively to undo the gains from it. Two fare increases in three years have:

• doubled the price of the Day Pass
• increased the price of the Monthly Pass by 40%
• driven down ridership 10% overall and 14% on buses.

Another hike is planned for 2012. By January, MTA will have wiped out more than half of the bus service introduced under the decree. 9 bus lines, including 5 rapid lines, are currently on the chopping block. Bus riders, who are 90% people of color with an average annual household income of $12,000 are being asked to bear the burden of this rail boondoggle, re-creating the civil rights crisis that provoked federal intervention a decade and half ago.

For more expert analysis on these issues, check out noted urban planner Ryan Snyder's
report "The Bus Riders Transit Model: Why a Bus Centered System Will
Best Serve U.S. Cities."