A recent article in the Isthmus by Vikki Kratz about the Mayor suggesting that we pay for his street car proposal with local funds prompted one foron to ask “Is Mayor Dave insane?” I chimed in with my two cents:
Alternative? Busses.
1. They aren’t restricted to one area (there’s more flexibility) – they can change routes when necessary for greater efficiency.
2. If more people rode busses them we could have better (more frequent and longer) service.
and now I feel the need to lay out an alternative vision, so after sitting on the Transit and Parking Committee for three years, here it is:
1. Add express buses that go between the transfer points. One going clockwise, one going counter clockwise as well as a route running North/South and East/West. (Hopefully this will cut down on some ridiculously long rides people need to take.)
2. Run busses so that people who work 2nd and 3rd shift can ride the busses to work. i.e. Run limited bus routes all night. This might even be eventually expanded help prevent some drunk driving late night.
3. Late night, run smaller busses. (If we can buy a trolley with local funds, we can buy some smaller busses.)
4. Run express busses from park and ride lots in Sun Prairie, Verona, McFarland, Waunakee etc.
5. If these busses run and are more reliable, we should have more riders. More riders may mean we could increase the frequency of the busses, so people don’t have to wait an hour for the next bus.
6. Make sure we find a way for small businesses to get in on the bus pass deals that the University and other big businesses can. In other words, have a purchasing pool for small businesses to buy bus passes for their employees.
7. Stop raising fares and discouraging riders and placing bus rides out of reach for low-income people.
8. Allow people to buy half-month bus passes for those who don’t have enough money together to buy a full-month bus pass.
I’m sure I missed a few good ideas I’ve heard over the years . . . may add more later . . . but now, back to the streetcars . . .
So, the Streetcar Study Committee was supposed to have a report to the Common Council by November 1, 2005. They’re a little late. I’ve heard estimates that the trolley would cost 100M and I don’t know how much of that is operating costs vs. capital costs, but I’m guessing my plan would be a better long term investment, be more flexible and responsive to changing needs and with hybrid deisel-electric busses can be more enviro-friendly than our current system. Our 2006 Transit Utility budget has the Transit Utility spending $43,940,821 but the City of Madison is only contributing $9,238,720 (21%). Could you imagine what the $100M could do for the bus system? And, after all, a trolley downtown isn’t going to serve most of Madison and we’ll still need our bus system to operate efficiently, lets put our efforts there.
