Thursday, February 02, 2012

Light Rail and Its Discontents

You want to be a pinata? Write an op-ed of the sort that David Osmek wrote for today's Star Tribune:
Right now, we are paying over $15 million each year to keep the Hiawatha Line operating. Adding in the amortized costs of building the line, it's more than $56 million in taxpayer dollars each year. Yes, some of the costs were federally funded, and other revenue streams are bearing some of the burden. But with trillions of dollars of deficit spending, do we really want to add to the debt that future generations will pay for decades to come?
No, actually I don't. Osmek, who is critical of light rail spending, marshals a series of statistics to buttress his argument. You may or may not agree with the idea that building these trains is a public good, but there's no doubt it's an expensive proposition and will never, ever come close to making enough money from its operation to cover the costs.

A lot of people don't want to hear that, of course. And the comments directed at the article are pretty silly. Consider this example, which is actually one of the more reasoned responses:

Very weak reasoning. Of course this assumes that gasoline prices will stay the same forever, and that gasoline will remain readily available for the lifetime of the rail system. It also requires that we not consider any of the direct and indirect costs of automobile travel and petroleum usage, and that those costs will never be considered. It further assumes that current financial conditions will never change, and that all public policy decisions should be measured first and foremost against current financial conditions.
Every one of these assertions is wrong, of course. No one assumes that gasoline prices will stay the same forever -- the retail prices change nearly every day in the Twin Cities. As for availability of gasoline, we have an adequate supply for many years into the future and there's potentially a lot more available than we even realized -- the recent discoveries in North Dakota are just one example. But my favorite assertion is the last one, which seems to imply that policy decisions shouldn't be measured against current financial conditions. What would be a superior measure?

The thing about roads is this: everyone uses them. Unless you grow it yourself, the food you eat likely arrived at the market via truck. The furniture in your home did, too. You can't haul grain on a light rail train. And unless you live close to a light rail line, you likely have to consume some gasoline to get to the station.

The reason fixed rail transit works better in places like Chicago is that the city and the suburbs grew along the existing rail lines. You can cavil and kvetch all you want about how spread out the Twin Cities are, but the suburbs have grown where the highways are. That's not going to change. Imposing light rail lines will benefit certain communities, but it's a nonfactor for most people in the metropolitan area. We all enjoy having other people subsidize our lifestyle choices, of course, whether we want to admit that or not. That's human nature. But it doesn't change the need for someone to tell us the truth. And David Osmek deserves credit for laying out a plausible analysis. Read the whole thing.

17 comments:

Gino said...

i'm still tryin to put my finger on the reason why its always the same folks who are trying to force light rail on us.

our own Gov Moonbeam wont give it up, and is still pushing for a line tween the LA and frisco. it makes no sense.
if i take the rail north, how will i get around when i get there?

i may be willing to take rail to seattle, but then gain... how would i get around when i got there?

Brian said...

Gino-You'll be able to rail it to the U District from the Amtrak station in 2016. You should be able to hit the Eastside sometime around 2025. :)

It's definitely an issue for which the calculus is different in different places. I think Seattle does need more rail (and is building it, though not nearly fast enough) because our geography through the urban core is such that there is literally no place to put more road. I-5 can't get any wider without a massive re-grade. The Alaskan Way viaduct is being replaced with a deep-bore tunnel that will probably make the Big Dig look like the Manhattan Project (n terms of efficiency) before it is over--if an earthquake doesn't knock it down first and kill a few hundred people in the process.

In the meantime, I can walk home from work in 25 minutes. People dumb enough to drive the same distance at the same time probably take 15, and don't get any exercise. But believe me, that doesn't stop them.

Anyway...I think if you have high density and geographical constraints (Seattle, San Fran) more rail makes sense, even if you didn't grow up along rail lines as Mr. D points out (NY, Chicago, Boston). I can't really see it being worthwhile in LA, for lack of clearly defined population and business centers. I don't know the Twin Cities well enough to comment.

I also think commuter rail is a different animal. For example, Atlanta exploded since 1990, almost entirely outward. (Recently, it's starting to move towards density in the urban core as people realize that commuting 40 miles each way really sucks.) As you might imagine, the traffic is beyond awful. Light rail won't fix that. But a *good* network of commuter rail radiating in 4-6 outward directions (not coincidentally paralleling the major freeways) with stops and huge parking lots out in the 'burbs could really make a difference, if the up front investment was big enough.

In any case, I'm not aware of any city that has successfully paved its way out of traffic. You build more road, people tend to drive on it.

Gino said...

build more road? that is ATL's problem. they put all these new subdivisions up, and not enough ways to access them.

in Henry, there are certain parts of the day when my dad wont leave the property. it aint worth the hassle to wait for the same red light 4 times to get across the hwy.
its also one of the primary reasons i passed on the offer to buy the home next door. being on the ranch is good living, but you gotta step off of it eventually, like to go to work.

Mr. D said...

Anyway...I think if you have high density and geographical constraints (Seattle, San Fran) more rail makes sense, even if you didn't grow up along rail lines as Mr. D points out (NY, Chicago, Boston). I can't really see it being worthwhile in LA, for lack of clearly defined population and business centers. I don't know the Twin Cities well enough to comment.

I think we agree -- in all of those cases, there are real physical limitations to available land. That's not an issue in the Twin Cities.

I also think commuter rail is a different animal. For example, Atlanta exploded since 1990, almost entirely outward. (Recently, it's starting to move towards density in the urban core as people realize that commuting 40 miles each way really sucks.) As you might imagine, the traffic is beyond awful. Light rail won't fix that. But a *good* network of commuter rail radiating in 4-6 outward directions (not coincidentally paralleling the major freeways) with stops and huge parking lots out in the 'burbs could really make a difference, if the up front investment was big enough.

Well, in our case we have a commuter rail line, the Northstar, that is hemorrhaging money at a rate comparable to the light rail line. The question is how much are you willing to spend. And right now, there's no money.

In any case, I'm not aware of any city that has successfully paved its way out of traffic. You build more road, people tend to drive on it.

It's not a "solution," but it does help. What may change things are other factors, including the likelihood that more people will be able to work from home in the next 10-20 years. If anything, that will tend to pull things even further outward.

Brian said...

Henry County, GA, is a great example of how the costs of unchecked, car-centric development are almost never adequately accounted for whenever the transit-versus-roads argument comes up.

15 years ago, you could hop on I-75 in downtown and be out to Jonesboro in 30 minutes, pretty reliably. (20 minutes if you drove like I did when I was 19.) Maybe 45 min in peak rush hour. It takes twice that long now, because 75 through Clayton is choked with people going to Henry (and beyond). Those hours add up over the course of a year...an extra 30 minutes each way x 5 days/week x 50 weeks = 250 hours! That's between 5 and 6 work weeks for most people! You never hear about the cost imposed on people who live close in by unchecked development further out. But man, you say you're going to build a train somewhere, and it's all about the good people of the small towns and suburbs subsidizing the fancy lifestyles of city people.

Like I said before: transit makes more sense in some places than others. In some places, it's just silly. But we really ought not pretend that spreading out to 1.5 acres and 2.5 cars per family doesn't carry significant costs. It does. And I'd argue that that lifestyle has been subsidized far too long in many places.

And yes, everyone does use roads, one way or another. And (to my knowledge) none of them pay for themselves, either.

Brian said...

(Obviously, I was typing my last comment as Mr. D typed his.)

I'd imagine (from what I remember of my brief visit--which was lovely, BTW!) that the Twin Cities are a lot more like Atlanta than the other cities we've thrown out here, in terms of density and development.

I'm sure the commuter rail doesn't make money. I don't think that expecting it to is reasonable, though "not hemorrhaging" is probably a worthwhile goal.

I guess my point is that the highways don't make money either, but nobody expects them to.

Mr. D said...

Brian,

I've never been to Atlanta, so I'll have to take your word for it regarding the traffic.

In my own case, I have about a 26 mile commute each way. When I first came to town, I worked in downtown Minneapolis and I took the bus into work most days. For the last decade, I've pretty much worked in the south suburbs.

This is a topic with a lot of side issues. The largest difference with road building is that more than cars use the roads, of course: trucks use the roads, too. You can't run a truck down a light rail line, so it is of limited utility.

It's also an urban planning issue, or rather a dispute between those whose vision is to have people live in higher density concentrations, and those who'd prefer to have some space. There are costs involved either way, of course. My particular suburb isn't a place of big lots. My home is modest and sits on a 1/4 acre, whereas city lots in Minneapolis tend to be more densely packed, but not a lot more.

I don't know what the right solution is, but my suspicion is that it's better to let people make their own decisions when possible.

W.B. Picklesworth said...

Do you think this issue might solve itself as information and communication technology make it easier for people to work from a decentralized location? We urbanized and then we suburbanized. Maybe there will come a time when we ruralize.

Mr. D said...

We urbanized and then we suburbanized. Maybe there will come a time when we ruralize.

If you believe Joel Kotkin, that might be the future.

Gino said...

i had a breeze of a time getting through and around the twin cities.
dont know what ya'll are crying about.
sure the rather one square mile of downtown sucked a little, but it wasnt that large of a suck area.
certainly better, in all ways, than what i've been living through all my life.

Anonymous said...

Ruralization has already been tried, in Cambodia.

Rail is a good idea when it can pay for itself. When it can't, it isn't. Another big issue is the projects could be done more cheaply if High priced Lazy Union Labor was forced to bid against non-union counterparts, and if the Railroad and other related workers didn't get to be above market priced government employees with above market government benefits that are paid by everybody else.

Mr. D said...

Ruralization has already been tried, in Cambodia.

Oof. Good point. That's not what WBP had in mind, though. Thankfully.

W.B. Picklesworth said...

No, it's not a good point. What was tried was murderous statism where people were forced from their homes and businesses at the point of a gun, and knowledge and the knowledgeable were systematically destroyed. That's trying ruralization like rape is trying marriage.

Mr. D said...

That's trying ruralization like rape is trying marriage.

True, but I'm pretty sure that the anonymous commenter had his tongue in cheek, since I'm pretty sure I know who the anonymous commenter is in this case.

Actually, the ruralization thing is an interesting topic for a future post, especially in terms of Joel Kotkin's thoughts. I'll have to write that up.

W.B. Picklesworth said...

Ah, I must have had my cranky, literal pants on this morning. My apologies.

Anonymous said...

The comment about Cambodia was most definitely met to be tongue in cheek. My apologies if it was interpreted in any other manner!!!

Bike Bubba said...

It's worth remembering that even in most big cities,light rail is heavily subsidized. I know that in Chicago, it sure is.

Never mind the fact that in Chicago, it's easy to get from Lombard or Brookfield to the Loop via light rail. Now from Lombard to Brookfield, or really from Lombard to any part of Chicago that's not on the El or Metra line going from the Loop to Lombard, you're taking a few transfers.

Same thing if you're going anywhere in the Twin Cities not along the major routes. If you're not going the way the central planners want to go, you're out of luck.

Which is why transit is subsidized, heavily, just about wherever you go.

And Atlanta and the Twin Cities in driving? Well, what percentage of road taxes have been diverted to boondoggles like transit while building carpool lanes and such? How many more lanes could 394 have here in town if we didn't mess with carpool lanes? (answer; you could about double the regular lanes if you eliminated them)