Moving Together, Faster
Larry Lebowitz reports that our current level of transit service is in jeopardy. Let us not even talk about the Orange Line expansion. When will our representatives understand that no great city is without a functional regional transit system?
Get off your ass people. Call your commissioners and complain that Miami-Dade needs more transit, not less. After all, you voted to extend transit, not reduce it!
The County Commission was busy recently as it tried to finish up important business before the August recess. Several key votes relevant to our ongoing discussions about transit, planning and the Home Rule Charter were made (or delayed) at the July 17th and 18th meetings. Larry L. hit the nail on the head this morning in his assessment of what is going on. I know there are a precious few of us nerds who actually go to the meetings or watch them on TV, so here is a little more info on what is being discussed.
The Commission was given a budget by the Mayor that outlined the finances of MDT and the Metrorail expansion that included certain assumptions about fare increases and other new revenue streams that the board has not yet approved. The board balked at this and said that they want a basic pro-forma that does not make any assumptions, after which they will choose what they want to do. Most of this is political posturing. The fare increases and other measures are not drastic at all, and help show the FTA that we are working in good faith. I’m going to take the unpopular stance that commissioners Jordon and Barreiro really do care about this issue and are not only thinking about re-election. If this budget had not passed to the FTA then we would have certainly lost any chance of getting Quick Start funding for the Orange Line.
The real issue here, as repeated by Assistant Manager Ysela Llort, is whether the Orange Line is a priority of the Commission. Between Joe Martinez being against more gas tax and Sally Heyman against raising fares, one wonders whether these people understand that their constituents are the ones who lose by not making these decisions. It is disingenuous for these people to continue to posture like they give a damn about their consitituents when in fact all they do is pussyfoot around the issue, and mismanage billions of taxpayer dollars. As Commissioner Javier Souto said, “If this were a private business, everyone would be fired.” I agree Senator Souto, we should start with you.
The most sobering assessment of the situation is laid out in County Manager Burgess’ letter to the board. The one big recommendation that I have been against so far, but am changing my position is regarding the PTP dollars. As you see in the letter, the use of PTP dollars exclusively for new projects is hurting us in the long run. We need to allow the money to be used for our existing system. Whether that is what we intended in the first place or not is no longer the issue. Lets be smart about the money we have so that our system can grow at a strategic pace, and for god’s sake don’t repeal the 1/2 cent tax. If studying this situation has shown us anything it is that repealing the tax would kill our system, and send us back twenty years. Looking at other transit systems across the county, the norm for transit funding is equivalent to a 1 cent sales tax. That is part of the answer. We cannot advocate for more transit without wanting to pay for it. There is no one solution to this problem. As Commissioner Dorin Rolle said at the meeting, “We didn’t get here overnight. We have been asleep while this problem has grown.” I couldn’t agree more. I urge everyone who cares about this issue to write to your Commissioner and let them know what you think.
Below are some of the proposed resolutions currently on the table for discussion. If anyone has any other ideas, post them so that they can be considered. It is clear that the commission is useless and relies on other people to do their work for them. Let’s help them out.
My big idea is to float GOB type bonds for individual Metrorail projects. We could put four proposed Metrorail lines on the ballot, each with a different cost and schedule. Let the people vote on where they want their money to go. That way the line that would get voted for would have a dedicated source of funding (without having to go to the FTA), and our system would grow. After three years, if we see that this is working, we could float another bond, and so on. (Keep in mind that the Commission is sending another GOB type bond to the ballot this November for more capital improvement projects. If they can do this for capital improvements, they can do it for transit!)
What do you think?
Photo by Flickr User ImageMD.
Meanwhile, Miami Gardens is asking Miami-Dade to bump the North Corridor Expansion to Phase 1, presumably making it priority over the Miami Intermodal Center (MIC) connector. I’m not sure what benefit they expect to see out of that, as the MIC connection is not using federal funds and is currently the only piece of the Orange Line that looks like it might get built.
The feds pointed out when they downgraded the rating that they didn’t trust Miami-Dade to fund Metrorail properly. This whole failure to refurbish the cars in a timely manner merely proves them right. The CITT is trying to get the point across that band-aid fixes won’t work anymore. MDT needs a solid funding plan to get out of the current hole it’s in, and an equally solid plan to fund expansion. Without that, the feds won’t give Metrorail a dime.
In case you’ve spent the past couple of days living in a cave (or more likely, not paying attention to local transit news) there is trouble brewing on the horizon (by horizon I clearly mean this week) over at
Last week, the FTA dealt a serious blow to the next major phase of metrorail expansion, the north corridor, by downgrading the once favorable rating of the project. The new Medium-low status doesn’t quite kill the project yet, but it places some serious funding hurdles in the way, which, if overcome, will set the project back by 6 months to a year (in
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