Despite the recession, mass transit ridership is higher now than it has been in many years.  Ridership growth is occurring throughout the country, in traditional transit bastions like New York and Chicago, but also in bus systems in cities like Albuquerque, Oklahoma City and Boise.  The demand for new busway and rail systems is huge, with virtually every city of size in the country in the planning stage.  Moreover, improvements such as rapid bus, smart cards, university passes, low floor buses, streetcars and car sharing programs are increasing the convenience and utility of transit to the consumer.

Sadly, many in Congress and the Bush administration see the growing popularity of transit and transit-oriented development as a problem, not an opportunity.  The administration has already proposed to handle approximately 50-year waiting lists for Federal Transit Administration “new start” funds, not by providing more resources, but by increasing match requirements.  This move is totally wrong-headed, especially as the administration has not proposed to do the same for new highway capacity projects.  Transit and highways should be treated the same.

Another dimension of the issue is the huge popularity of TEA-21 programs like Transportation, Community and System Preservation and Congestion Mitigation/Air Quality, which dedicate funds to transit-oriented development and transit types of projects, and the limited use of flexibility in the National Highway System and Surface Transportation Program state categories.  This tells us that transit agencies and localities are eager to try new approaches, but that the traditional programming entities at the state level are intent on limiting the use of flexibility for funds they control.

Confronting and solving this issue of intense demand for transit in the face of resource limitations will be a key part STPP’s reauthorization platform, which will be released in early 2003.

Excerpted from Progress, Oct., 2002.  Surface Transportation Policy Project.  http://www.transact.org/

Surface Transportation Policy Project

STPP's TEA-3 website

Transit Growth Outshines Driving for Fifth Straight Year 
(April 22, 2002) 

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