- Council Committee Passed the Freeze
- Carol Campbell Passes Away
- My first trip to the public library
- Fight digital exclusion
- What if half of Philadelphia didn't have roads?
- You know, let's not even worry about the City Commissioners office messing up voter registration processing
- Bold ideas to fix the budget
- Mayor Nutter's Town Hall Meeting Schedule
- City Releases Library Information to City Council
- Size of Philadelphia government?
Help Save Our Transfers
Submitted by Marc Stier on Sat, 07/14/2007 - 11:15pm.
Next week could be a great week for transit riders and activists as we may finally get the predictable, dedicated funding we have long been seeking for SEPTA and the other transit agencies around the Commonwealth.
But August 1st could be a very bad day for transit riders here. The SEPTA Board, which recently raised transit fares by 11%, has called for the elimination of 60 cent transfers on that day. That means riders will have to pay an additional fare—a $1.30 token—instead of a transfer.
The Pennsylvania Transit Coalition (PTC) has called for a reversal of this decision. Eliminating transfers will increase the fares of riders who have to transfer once by 36%. Riders who have to transfer twice will see their fares go up by 55%.
That is unfair to those riders, who are mostly school children and workers. And it really dosen’t make sense for SEPTA either. People are attracted to public transit when they can get where they want with one trip. If that isn’t possible, they want an easy and inexpensive transfer. So, eliminating transfers is likely to cost SEPTA many riders.
SEPTA argues that riders will buy a weekly transpass if they can’t get transfers. This, however, won’t help the occasional rider or the rider who takes SEPTA three days a week. And very low wage workers may not be able to pay for weekly transpasses.
The current transfer system is not ideal. It is bothersome for riders and costs SEPTA money to administer. But, once we have an electronic fare system, transfer will be easy for riders and SEPTA.
Instead of eliminating transfers, SEPTA should make an effort, which the PTC will join, to encourage riders to buy transpasses and to find a way to subsidize those transpasses for school children. To support our efforts, we are asking member of the public to contact the SEPTA Board and demand that transfers stay in effect. You can contact SEPTA at 215-580-7800 or online at http://www.septa.org/inside/customer_service/cs_survey/service_info.html. And you can sign our on-line petition demanding that transfers continue at http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/ptc2
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I am obviously for mass
I am obviously for mass transit that is as cheap as possible, but what are the recommendations for the additional revenue they will need?
I am not against eliminating transfers (of course I am slightly biased since I very rarely use a transfer) and I am not against keeping transfers and raising the base fare. SEPTA rates are relatively cheap. Chicago is $1.75 base fare for buses and $2 for subway. NY is $2 for both.
I am not against fighting to keep the transfers, but to be realistic, we have to propose how they are going to balance their budget. As I understand it, with the additional state funding, they are still $30+ million short.
Remember, they aren't raising fares to make bigger profits. They are trying to break even.
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"yes adam gave some informative comments but he also seems to sprinkle a little adam dust on it." - merkin
Adam, again- "Remember, they
Adam, again- "Remember, they aren't raising fares to make bigger profits. They are trying to break even."
Do you think we don't understand that?
Sometimes I think you don't.
Sometimes I think you don't. Whenever the topic has come up about SEPTA raising rates, a lot of people on this site come out and rail against SEPTA on how they are screwing people over and how we should picket/petition them, but no one ever offers solutions.
Interestingly though when the transit bill was up to give more money to SEPTA and I tried to motivate some of you to contact your elected officials in Harrisburg to emphasize the importance of the increased revenue, it was the sound of crickets.
Sometimes it would be nice to see you guys rally around solutions involving mass transit.
I am being very serious about this Dan. What if 100,000 people sign a petition to SEPTA to not raise rates and they back ff. What is SEPTA's other option then to balance their budget? Cutting service.
So, without doing something to fight for more non-fare revenue, in essence the petition is saying you prefer lower rates and less service routes. I prefer higher rates and no service cuts. Especially since SEPTA fares are under priced compared to other transit systems.
Sometimes people miss the forest for the trees.
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"yes adam gave some informative comments but he also seems to sprinkle a little adam dust on it." - merkin
Well, I am glad you are
Well, I am glad you are serious!
You trash us, or at least Ray on other sites, and come on here and spew out these 'teaching moments.'
I think PB fits your style better.
SEPTA
Chicago and NYC have more expansive integrated rail systems, which make it much easier to travel without having to pay a second fare. They also have ticket machines more widely available and less tempermental in terms of accepting cash payments. And they have a variety of flexible fare instruments which make them largely invulnerable to supply problems.
Let's be clear: The base SEPTA bus/subway fare is $2.00; you get a discount down to $1.30 only if you have a token. With the elimination of transfers, not only do irregular commuters get dinged with a much bigger cost increase than the rest of the rider population, but there's now a much bigger incentive for those commuters to purchase tokens. Keep in mind that SEPTA sales locations are not very convenient in areas beyond the subway stations, so token demand will really spike at the subway termini (e.g., Frankford Transportation Center). Does SEPTA have sufficient token supply? If so, will it be able to keep the high demand areas adequately supplied, with reasonable transaction intervals? Because if it can't, then you're talking about $2.00 fares in many cases, not just for irregular commuters, but for regular "ten trip" commuters who don't need to transfer.
Apples and oranges (and pears)
Yes -- the CTA and MTA in Chicago and New York respectively are much more like all of SEPTA, including the regional rail system, than they are like our bus and subway system (even including trolleys) alone. If you could get as many places on the subway/el in Philadelphia as you can in NYC or Chicago, a $2 base fare would be much more reasonable. To pick a representative example, you can take the El in Chicago all the way from the South Side to O'Hare for $2. You can't get from University City to the airport for less than $6 (and it's usually $7). 'Nuff said.
Did I say how much more I
Did I say how much more I enjoy YPP since the god awful mayoral primary is over? It would be a shame to limit the exchange of ideas over petty disagreements.
Both raising fares and cutting service hurts ridership. It is fair to at least pose a question about what the ballance between the two unpleasant circumstances are. Higher rates hurt poor people more but limited service hurts poor people's access to jobs and services to put it in simplified form.
Adam, you are wrong
Put simply Adam, you are wrong when you say:
Very simply put, the Republicans in the Senate demanded a blood sacrifice for dedicated funding and that came in the form of a fare increase. SEPTA chose to make that increase via transfers and Zone changes that almost entirely effect urban riders. Why? Because despite making up the largest percentage (by far) of SEPTA ridership, urban riders have almost no representation on the SEPTA board.
Obfuscating or triangulating this pretty simple example of a rural/suburban legislature in cahoots with a suburban transit board trying to screw a majority Democratic city is not helpful.
Now, Adam, I do possibly share strategic concerns with you. I have no idea what Marc really means in his original post when he says this:
The simple fact of the matter is that SEPTA won't reintroduce transfers and risk losing the income they need to meet the obligations of the deal that was made with the devil in exchange for dedicated funding. So we can all make calls to SEPTA--and there's no harm in doing so--but it would probably make more sense if we did so in alignment with a more solid ask or plan--like getting the city or School District to cough up to cover the cost of student transpasses or some kind of increase in employer assistance for transit, especially from suburban companies who have a lot of urban employees (like any employer in the KOP mall).
What I mean
is exactly what you (and I previously) said, asking the city and / or school district to come up with money for studetn transpasses.
That won't help everyone who needs transfers, however. For example: Talk to any doctor who treats poor people who are chronically ill, and they will tell you that many of their patients have to take SEPTA once or twice a week to see a doctor, or social worker, or case manager. And many of those patients transfer once or twice to do so. The patients transfering twice will see their fares go up 55%. Some of them are simply not going to be able to afford this. With psychiatric patients, for whom compliance with their regime of medication or therapy is already a major issue, the added cost of the transfers is going to give people one more reason to stay home.
Ending transfers is going to seriously harm these folks.
I do think Ray's comments
I do think Ray's comments are accurate. The only way the Republicans would agree to the the transit funding they did was in SEPTA showed it was "doing its part" in some way to raise more revenue. Much as Councilman Goode's bill raising the ammount of property taxes going the schools was a "good faith gesture" to try and wring some more money out of Harrisburg for our schools. Still by most accounts we got as much as what a lot of politiclal commentators deemed as "realistic" (whatever as that means) out of this Legislature in terms of transit and as much as we bash the Philadelphia contingent for attacking home rule on ethics, we should praise them for sticking with it on this.
The particular approach SEPTA took for raising that revenue was no doubt influenced by the fact that representation on the SEPTA Board is not based on percentage of ridership but by county. As a result the "pain" got unfairly distrubuted on urban riders as opposed to being shared more equally with Regional Rail and suburban riders. The only good thing about the strategy behind the hikes is that it does make buying a pass more of a comparitive bargain, which always struck me as odd about the Philly system. Other systems really reward the habitual pass buyers as a winning strategy to build long-term ridership.
It might be debatebly as effective to rabble rouse for changing the rules of representation on the SEPTA board as protest the hikes at this point but I don't see any problem with doing both.
On that note I thought I would make the i-petition a live link to urge more people to fill it out.
http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/ptc2
As an aside, I'm a fan of ipetition. It's easy to use. It's free. You can still print out the results and hand them in like a normal petition. I've used it in the past succesfully and I am surprised "we" don't use it more on issues we can all get behind.
Passes
Ideally, the transfer elimination startegy doesn't even provide meaningful encouragement to buy passes. People who commuted five or more days per week with a transfer already were buying passes. People who commuted three or fewer days a week with a transfer would still spend less money with tokens than with passes.
The only people who get brought into the pass fold are those who commute exactly four days per week with a transfer. That is, assuming token sales locations don't start resembling gas stations in the early '70s.
shocked
shocked to see you agreeing with me Sean D, but SEPTA is certainly an issue we can all agree on.
I agree with you that any rabble rousing is good, though on the matter of the Philly Transit Coalition, I think this discussion is proof that really clear and easy to understand asks are important.
This is an issue I talk about a lot and often in non-traditionally political circles, and one reality that may be hard for institutions and organizations that fight for transit to really understand is that without a bigger, more proactive vision for SEPTA, the bulk of riders are always going to sit these fights out.
The reality is that there was much crying once again this year from SEPTA, and once again the agency got bailed out. I am not saying that there was not work done behind the scenes to make this happen, but without a real transit users union, that fights for transit beyond budget times, we're not gonna ever see any real involvement from riders.
Again, I am not saying this to dis the PTC, but the PTC is basically a coalition of groups who are interested in SEPTA and transit, and have members who are interested, but none really focuses on actually organizing SEPTA users on any kind of consistent basis (I know the DVARP is out there, but again, they are not very present on the subways, buses and trolleys that I ride on).
Of course that is easier said than done, though I am curious if anyone out there would actually devote time to organizing such a group who is a regualr SEPTA user them selves?
Completely off topic but you
Completely off topic but you and I agree on a lot of things, though each of us may have felt we have acted badly in specific instances in the past. As in all things there are issues we will share, otheres we differ on - issues raider.adam and I share, issues we differ sharply on. I do place a big importance on past behavior but in the final analysis I also see the primary importance of keeping focused on issues, not peronsalities.
Anyhoo back to SEPTA.
I think we can win on transfers
Ray is right that the state legislature demanded some increase in fares as a price for new dedicated funding.
But I think he is wrong in believing that an end to transfers is critical to raising fares an average of 11%. I'm still trying to figure out the details--and I've been away a lot in the last month so haven't finished doing so. But the DVARP folks and other members of the PTC believe that the impact of eliminating transfers on the SEPTA budget is relatively small as opposed to, say, raising the costs of transpasses, trailpasses, and regional rail fares. The only clear item in the SEPTA budget related to transfers is the cost of actually printing them which Matthew Mitchell tells me is only about 200,000.
Second, the Governor has been quoted as saying he wants to see tranfers restored. We at the PTC have been in touch with folks in his office to secure his continued support of our position. We are working to secure the support of other leading politicins in the city.
Third, we think--and we are sure SEPTA knows this--that the outrage against the manifestly unfair elimination of transfers is going to cause an enormous ruckus. The PTC is trying to mobilize people to protest the elimination of tranfers. We will be contacting the 9000 folks on our email list about this issue in the next day ro so.
Folks here can help create that ruckus by signing the online petition and emailing all their friends about this issue. Direct them to the online petition and to the PTC website, which I will be updating this evening.
win what on transfers?
Marc, I am not disagreeing that we need transfers. And I am not saying that transfers are the only way to balance the SEPTA budget. I think you misunderstood what I said.
SEPTA chose transfers as a place to make cuts to create a wedge issue they knew would help them make cuts and avoid pissing off the Republican legislature.
The Senate Rs demanded a fare hike from SEPTA and transfers were the most painless way to do it. It really sucks because I believe we should have transfers for all the reasons you list above not to mention that free transfers (forget the damn 60 cents) from bus to subway/trolley etc. is an easy and smart way to increase ridership overall--other major cities do it.
However, my point, again, from above is that I am glad the PTC coalition is trying to make a ruckus on transfers. However, as a consumer of SEPTA services and as a potential person to be mobilized into action, signing an online petition is about the best you can expect from me.
Why?
Because everyday people are not stupid. Even though not all of us are the leaders in transit coalitions, we do pay attention. The SEPTA board has not really moved on any issue over the past three years at all. The city reps veto and hold things off till the Governor fixes the problem. We have all seen this happen again and again. It's great to try to raise a ruckus on transfers, but there are a lot of battles to be lost out there, and some that can be won, and I think people chose where to spend their time judiciously.
For me personally, honestly, as someone who is busy, like a lot of people, I want SEPTA to be better, but if you really want to enagage SEPTA riders like me, the stakes need to be higher than just fighting to get back something we never should have lost. I'd be more likey to be engaged if we were fighting and winning for improved service, cleaner stations and vehicles, better night time schedules, new routes, lower fares, new vehicles, nicer drivers/token booth attendants, more communication (lkike why can't SEPTA ever tell you when your bus or trolley is not coming or why the sub broke down), handicapped access at all stations, etc.
Like I said earlier though, organizing such a group takes work and I am curious who out there would actually devote time to talking to as many SEPTA riders as possible and figuring out what issues would really motivate them to get more active and truly create a ruckus.
BINGO!
I think Ray hit the nail on the head with this:
I'd be more likey to be engaged if we were fighting and winning for improved service, cleaner stations and vehicles, better night time schedules, new routes, lower fares, new vehicles, nicer drivers/token booth attendants, more communication (lkike why can't SEPTA ever tell you when your bus or trolley is not coming or why the sub broke down), handicapped access at all stations, etc.
I'd love to start of with something like improved service and move into cleaner stations. I'd also love more automation, like in DC. But, ulimately, riding on SEPTA, with the exception of the Regional Rail, is not a pleasant experience. I have been doing it every day for the last 10 years or so . . .
Until I developed this solution: During the nice weather, I walk 3 miles home just about every day and take the bus in poor weather. No more smelly urine, dirty, crumbling stations, poor customer service, the Token Machine not taking my money, and people eating next to me. Seriously, does anyone actually like taking the subway or the EL when school lets out? Or after 9:30 P.M.?
If SEPTA fixed the little things, I'd love SEPTA again.
Now, I too believe we should have transfers and cheaper fares. But, I think that comes with all the things Ray mentions (which in my estimation will increase ridership). Right now, every day, my $2-4.00 is being invested elsewhere.
I am working to elect Larry Farnese to the General Assembly. Unless otherwise expressly stated, this and every comment or blog I post on YPP and any action I take hereon is solely attributable to me and not Farnese or Friends of Farnese
Transfers and the SEPTA Budget
I agree with all you say at the end of your post about the importance of transit organizing that addresses a broad range of issues. As I point out in another post on this page, I'm going to try to get such work going. One of the important outcomes of succeeding in our effort to get dedicated funding for transit is that SEPTA will no longer have an all purpose excuse for its failures to improve the service we have or plan for better service in the future. So the groundwork is laid for demand a variety of improvements in service both small and large.
I have doubts about your analysis of tranfers. I'm not officially privy to SEPTA thinking. But my sense is that ending the transfers is not just or mainly about the budget. No one has told me or shown me that ending transfers is a major source of additional revenues or operational savings for SEPTA. It has to bring in far less money than the increase in rail fares or the increases in transpass and trailpasses. And even if it brings in new money, there were certainly other ways to do so.
Transfers are an operational pain in the ass for SEPTA. But they are a pain in the ass that will become irrelevant when we get an electronic fare system, something SEPTA promises we will have at some point and something that we transit advocates should be demanding sooner or later.
I don't see what kind of wedge you think the transfer issue was meant to be. A wedge between who and whom?
Some folks I've talked to suggest that
the wedge
marc you keep talking about an electronic fare system, but the electronic fare system that the MTA has in NYC does not solve the transfer problem.
in the current system, SEPTA charges you 60 cents to change modes with the exception of 13th, 15th and 30th street stations where transfers between trolleys, the sub and the El are allowed.
eliminating transfers means that septa can make more money either getting school kids (who used to get free transfers with school tokens) to use two tokens or buy transpasses. it also means that the 3 or 4 time a week rider either pays full fare twice or buys a transpass. further, since teh cost of transpasses went up, if SEPTA did not eliminate transfers than people who only ride to and from work with one transfer along the way would save money buying tokens and transfers as opposed to getting a more exspensive pass.
transfers may be an operational pain in the ass for SEPTA, but in my experience, everything is an operational pain in the ass for SEPTA. i am kind of confused as to what you are saying: are you saying that SEPTA did not have to raise fares to get senate and house r's to agree to dedicated transit funding?
raise fares yes; eliminate transfers no
What you don't seem to get is that, while SEPTA did have to raise fares to satisfy the legislature, it did not have to eliminate transfers. They can, and did, raise fares in other ways.
For example, the weekly pass went from 18.75 to 20.75 an increase of 11%. The day pass went from 5.50 to 6.00, an increase of 9%. Regional rail fares went up a bit more. For example, zone three peak fares went up from $4.5 to $5.00 an increase of 11% while the monthly pass for zone three went up from 126.5 to 142.5 an increase of 13%.
The problem with eliminating transfers is that they raise the fare for folks who use to make one transfer 36% and, for those who make two transfers an astronomical 55%.
That is unfair because it hammers one group much harder than others and because that group consists mostly of school kids and adults who don't travel every day many of whom areeither out of the workforce or have part-time or uncertain jobs.
SEPTA will make more money by eliminating transfers. But it is not clear how much--and their budget documents don't tell us. SEPTA tells us that 90% of their riders use some kind of discounted pass, which means that eliminating the transfers will raise money form only 10% of their riders. A lot of folks who use transfers now may wind up finding other ways of getting around, which means that SEPTA will lose money How much more will they make from those riders who don't have an alternative? That is not clear at all. But clearly most of the additional revenues that comes from the fare increase is not the result of eliminating transfers.
So that is why the PTC is not opposing the July 9 fare increase but is saying that eliminating tranfers is unfair and counterproductive for SEPTA.
The way the electronic fare system helps with transfers is that it reduces the costs of printing and handling transfers to $0. (It also eliminates the costs of handling cash.) I suspect that what SEPTA is really trying to do by eliminating transfers is to reduce the costs of handling transfers just as they have been trying to reduce the costs of handling cash and tokens by reducing the number of places to buy tokens.
Once we have an elecronic fare system, SEPTA won't have to handle tokens or transfers and will come close to eliminating cash as well. We need SEPTA to move in that direction to increase its efficiency and for other reasons as well, such as creating new fares that would stimulate economic growth, such as a day pass for commercial corridors, something I've been advocating for years.
and...
marc, do i say anywhere above that i support eliminating transfers?
if septa raised the price of passes to $25 and did not eliminate transfers, a lot of pass users would stop buying passes and use transfers. I understand the rationale SEPTA is using here and i do think it will add up but that does not mean i support it.
i am all for an effort to get SEPTA NOT to eliminate transfers, but it will require some kind of other increase in revenue to SEPTA than what they will get from the state. what do you propose to do that Marc?
An electronic fare system has been in SEPTA's capital budget for years now, but I am pretty skeptical that it will get through the union and through the red tape anytime soon.
if a coalition-based, inside strategy to stave off transfer elimination works, I think that's great, but engaging even 1 % of the system's million plus daily riders to fight for transfers is a very big organizing challenge. Especially when most SEPTA riders I know are pretty bitter and skeptical that SEPTA is "serious about change."
i am not making these comments to say that PTC should not fight transfer elimination--however, I think I represent a lot of SEPTA riders when I say that it's getting tiresome to always be asked to help maintain SEPTA the way it is, when there is so much more that I would like to see fixed.
I'm not sure what you are saying, Ray,
except that you don't like the PTC's organizing strategy which has been to find the money to save SEPTA first and then work on improving the agency and the service it provides.
We have successfully attained the first goal...and I suspect that when we finally see the details of the legislation, we will have done better than anyone could have imagined. I don't know that we will have enough to borrow on the dedicated funding to pay for major expansion of the system. But funding for that objective is morely likely to come from a regional tax than from a state tax and we will only get it when SEPTA--or some political entity outside of it--comes up with an expansion plan that can win broad regional support.
In the meantime, while we are working on long terms plans for minor improvements and major expansion, we have this little issue of transfers to deal with. I simply can't understand why you would criticize an effort to save them. Yes it is hard to organize people but who says we need 10000 people to call SEPTA to accomplih our goals. When was the last time any issue advocay did that or needed to do that? People are responding to our petition drive..and I'm just back from Vermont and haven't contacted my whole email list yet. And, sure, you don't like being asked again and again to help maintain SEPTA. So what? I don't like being asked again and again to contact my federal officials about some plan to get out of Iraq. It would be much better if we were organizing now to elect a Democratic president who was getting us out of Iraq. And it would be much better if we had won dedicated funding two years ago and the PTC or some other group had a major plan for SEPTA improvements and we could be organizing people to get behind it. We organizers often can't choose the fights we are engaged in. And if we had been spending time developing a plan for the future--which, I should say, would have meant in the last year finding a large sum of money to create the plan and to pay people to organize for it--we ould have undedrmined our efforts to secure dedicated funding.
Finally, back to transfers. I don't think we need an alternative to eliminating transfers. For one thing, I don't think eliminating transfers is going to save SEPTA much money. The last response I've heard from SEPTA is that only 5% of riders use tranfers. If that is the case, then SEPTA is going to hurt a small number of people pretty bad and not make much money in the bargain. And, second, I'm almost certain that SEPTA is going to get more from the new state funding than they needed to balance the budget this year. So they don't need to eliminate transfers or find other revenues.
Once we turn to improving SEPTA than an electronic fare system is absolutely critical. Most of the good ideas for improving SEPTA service, from small ones like creating day passes in our commercial corridors to large ones like creating buses with flexible routes, require an electronic fare system. So we are going to have to push for that.
And I don't think TWU 234 will have any objection. I've talked with local 234 pesident Jeff Brooks and other folks at 234 pretty extensivly about how to improve SEPTA service. Our discussions have usually presupposed that we would move to an electronic fare system. No one at 234 has ever raised an objection to it.
the transfer point
Marc you always inspire me to write more than i should.
I think you keep missing the point on transfers:
2 tokens + 2 transfers a day= $3.80 x 5 days a week= $19 a week. This is more than a transpass currently costs so if you mostly ride SEPTA to get to and from work, it makes more sense under the current fare structure to buy a pass and maybe use it a few times on weekends. However, if the cost of passes goes up to $20.75 a week, as SEPTA plans to do, suddenly transfers look more attractive for the commuter.
maybe I am wrong, but as a daily SEPTA rider who always counts my money, I do this kind of math all the time.
I am sure you are on to something with all of your other reasons that SEPTA may want to get rid of passes, but I think the math does make sense here. SEPTA has to get rid of transfers to make sure the transpass increase brings in more money.
In the meantime re: PTC, you are right. PTC should fight for transfers. However, I disagree with you here:
Good organizing fights on the short term and the long term issues. I of all people understand how hard this is to do and this conversation has been exciting because ultimately it points out to me how badly we need a real rider's union led by daily SEPTA riders to fight for the priorities of daily riders as a complement to the PTC which currently represents riders only through multi-issue groups and unions.
It's true organizers don't chose the issues they work on--they let the people they represent do it. The process of finding out what riders want is not something that has been done with any real care by anyone in the city. It is logical to do what you say and fight to keep transfers and I wish you luck in doing it. I will shut up in the meantime, but again, if anyone else besides Marc or I has a desire to put some into organizing a rider's union, I would be willing to help.
Lastly Marc, you blog frequently at great length about the strategies you are implementing in the myriad groups you are involved in. The main rule I learned early on at this blog is that if you put your ideas out there, other people are going to react. Certainly the ideas I put out are disagreed with frequently and vehemently. That's actually the beauty of blogs--that strategy and leadership which is often consolidated by an elite few can be dispersed and shared on an online forum, and often what you learn is that lots of people have the same ideas that you do. I always find it exciting when this happens.
Every time I have a question about the strategy you propose though, you accuse me of being against the goal you are working toward. Strategy and Goal are two distint concepts. I believe I have repeatedly said that transfers should be saved and that they should be offered for free to all riders. As one of many people I imagine you as a "leader" would like to convince to take action on this issue, I gotta tell you that the strategy you are proposing does not jibe with my read on the situation.
Transit Strategy and other related issues
Well, your not the only one writing too much…
OK, now I see your point about transfers. And maybe that is what SEPTA is thinking. I’m not sure since SEPTA has not done a very good job of explaining there thinking.
But I still don’t see why we have to kill transfers for this reason. The price of a pass is going up to $20.75. And you are right that a token and a transfer twice a day five days a week will cost only $19.00. Now, if someone who takes SEPTA to work never uses a bus on the weekend or to visit someone at night then it probably would not make sense for him or her to buy a pass. But if they take one more trip with a transfer a week or two trips without a transfer, then the pass is cheaper. And it is always more convenient to use a pass than to get a transfer.
What I heard from SEPTA today is that only 5% of people even take transfers. How many of those folks only use SEPTA twice a day five days a week with one transfer? If they use SEPTA less often, then a pass doesn’t make sense. If they use it more often, the pass definitely makes sense. Only if they use SEPTA twice a day five days and don’t care about the convenience factor (or can’t afford to lay out the money for the pass), might they decide to forgo the pass they use now.
I just can’t believe that there all that many people who fall into that category and their situation might make all that much difference to SEPTA’s finances.
The difference certainly isn’t great enough to create a real economic hardship for the folks who do use one or two transfers twice a day three or four days a week.
And, again, with an electronic fare system, most of these problems would go away because we would have lot more options that both suited the way we use SEPTA and encouraged people to use it in a way that spread ridership around to make the most efficient use of SEPTA’s equipment.
As for strategy, the issue between us has never been the transfers. You made clear earlier that you don’t want to see them eliminated.
The issue also isn’t whether we need a riders union that addresses a broad set of issues. I made clear earlier that not only is this something we really need, it is something I’ve worked on creating two years ago.
Nor is the issue whether it makes sense to talk about strategy. As you point out, I think that talking about strategy on this blog is very useful.
The issue is whether the PTC had any choice but to focus for the last few years on getting dedicated funding. If you think we did have a choice, then take a look at what has happened to PAT in Pittsburgh. Their transit system has already been cut to ribbons. The new funding might enable them to rebuilt part of the system. But ridership will never be what it was. The dangers of SEPTA going that route were too great to ignore.
Now that we have funding, everyone will say that we were always going to get it. That’s just not so. Transit was not at the top of Rendell’s agenda four months ago, health care was. Transit was not something the House Democrats were going to insist on. Instead, Bill DeWeese was telling everyone that he would not ask the freshman Democrats to vote for taxes for transit. And no one had any idea about how to get a Senate with 29 Republicans to support transit funding.
Four months ago, in other words, we were all pretty despondent.
We owe Dwight Evans thanks for pushing the House Democrats to say that there would be no budget without transit funding. We owe Vince Fumo thanks for figuring out how to fund transit without raising taxes. (And, by the way the funding is not just coming from tolls on the Turnpike and on I-80. Fumo somehow got the sales tax already dedicated to transit restructured and increased.) We owe Rendell thanks for, at almost the last minute, putting transit at the top of his agenda.
And we really owe Pat Eiding and Tom Cronin for keeping the Transit Coalition together when interest in it was waning, even among labor, and we had no money to pay our staff (and I was too busy doing other things to provide staff support). Pat did a great job of reaching out to the Chamber of Commerce and working with them to do the joint lobbying that was critical in the last two months. As usual, Lance Haver played a key strategic role in our efforts. And the 9000 folks on our email list responded again and again to my requests to send emails and to sign petitions.
None of this was foreordained. I think you are right that some folks are tired of our continually asking them to keep SEPTA alive. A few months ago, and from time to time since, I have tried to draw a line between the PTC and SEPTA. (I was even quoted in the City Paper, somewhat hyperbolically saying, “we hate SEPTA and they hate us.”)
But if the larger effort to improve transit was hampered, I’d still make the same strategic decision again and again. For, what choice did we have? Any transit expert will tell you that when you lose ridership because of service cuts or fare increases, it is almost impossible to get it back. If the doomsday scenario or anything close to it had gone into effect, SEPTA would be in a death spiral and it would ultimately take the region with it.
Now that we won the funding fight, we have a chance to build a twenty first century transit system in our region. And Pat Eiding—is committed to creating a permanent organization to improve transit. Anyone who wants to help us do that, please let me know.
And as the choice to fight against transfer elimination, I actually see this as the first attempt of the PTC to use our organization to push SEPTA in a direction it doesn’t want to go. It won’t be the last time. And we are doing it on an important economic justice issue. So I really don’t see why you have any problem with this choice, especially since you keep saying that transfers shouldn’t be eliminated. I just don’t see why you are making a big deal about our strategic choice to try to mobilize people on the transfer issue.
and again marc
go transfer elimination fight!
If SEPTA did not get rid of passes, why wouldn't someone spend $2.75 a week extra to get a pass because it's more convenient?
#1- It's not convenient. More stores in neighborhoos sell tokens (some legally and some not) than passes. Passes expire and a lot of people can't put out the $80 + for a monthly. So you have to go out of your way often to buy a weekly pass. It's not that a big deal really, but if I had to make a transfer every day to get to work, I'd consider transfers over transpasses if they were cheaper.
#2- It's still $2.75 a week extra. For people who count their pennies--who the hell wants to give any extra to SEPTA?
I am not defending SEPTA's logic, but our dysfunctional system seems to understand the psychology of its abused riders well. SEPTA sucks. It's a stupid and annoying thing to do. SEPTA is always doing dumb things and I have little faith they will change. However, you are right to fight, and for the third time I am realizing how cool a real, live rider's union would be.
On PTC
and Marc...you keep talking about PTC as if it is a rider's union. It's not. It's a coalition of a lot of good groups. I am not disparaging that coalition or saying PTC should have done ANYTHING but fight fare hikes and service cuts. Coalitions form among groups on key issues that can only be won by working together.
However, getting the system to run on time; providing clean vehicles, stations, and stops; making sure the system is safe; posting maps and clear information; improving disabled access; creating new lines; selling tokens/passes more widely; getting staff to be friendier--none of these things will a coalition do. It wouldn't make sense to have a coalition do them.
A Rider's Union could do these things and should, and again I thank you for getting me more engaged in thinking about that.
Form A Rider's Union, Ray
You are absolutely right about the difference between a Rider's Union and the Philadelphia Transit Coalition.
So organize a Rider's Union. Even if it is small, it will fill a vacuum in policy advocacy and have a major impact.
Various legislators would have love to have such an organization to work with. And you could probably get Community Legal Services to file lawsuits on your behalf, just as the late Consumer Education and Protective Association leader Max Weiner did.
If you want to form a planning committee for organizing for a Rider's Union, count me in.
The PTC and a Riders Union
The PTC has long promised to work to improve transit once the funding issue was resolved. As I mentioned before, two years ago I proposed that the members of the PTC coalition help create a permanent organization working to imrpoe transit. At the meeting of the PTC last week, we spent most of our time talking about what such a group should do and how it might be formed. Pat Eiding, co-chair of the PTC and President of the Philly AFL-CIO strongly supported this notion and had some ideas about how the PTC and AFL-CIO might support such an effort. I'm going to dust off the proposal I put forward a few years ago and make some additions and circulate it at the beginning of August and talk to a variety of people who are interested in creating a riders union and who might have ideas different and / or better than mine.
If people are around in mid-August, how about we hold a meeting with interested parties to talk about how to move forward?
sounds great, count me in
marc, it would be great if PTC members could help provide funding to a rider's union.
In terms of moving forward though, I'll say it august too, but I don't think there is anything we could do without spending a month or two on and off line surveying riders and figuring out what they want, start where there people are at and all...
SEPTA's Biggest Problem - Why care, it's filthy?
A large portion of this region has two views of the system, late and/or filthy. As a city division rider that occasionally ventures into the burbs for work on some lines, I haven't had too much of a problem with the former, but filthy, I can't accept. While acknowledging that SEPTA is the largest housing agency for those with mental illness and/or homeless and that this often contributes to its decrepit state, it's unacceptable that buses and El trains should have urine on the floor, outdoor stations smell like sewers, etc.
To me, this is the single biggest problem SEPTA has. Other than Oscar the Grouch, who loves something that smells like a trash dump? Who cares about things that are constantly filthy? Until SEPTA gradually changes it's image into something that isn't a synonym for garbage, no one will care enough about it, especially the city division, to provide for it at the rates required to make it the gem it ought to be for the city. You can't remake this system overnight, but baby steps, especially those involving ridership, will make a difference in improving SEPTA's stature in the minds of its riders, casual users and even refusers in the coming years.
That said, here's a small suggestion for action:
Each month, the PTC and Ray Murphy's-Yet-unnamed Rider's Union (SEPTIC Local 1776 for now) pick a filthy station, spotlight it, get into dialogue with SEPTA's seemingly-unfunded clean-up department and challenge them to have it spotless by the end of the month (generous, but this is baby steps folks). If it's not spotless by the end of the month, free rides on the first Monday of the next month at that station.
Also, like each Rec Center has an advisory council, so should each Septa EL, Subway and major bus station. With a small $10K grant each year, a committed group of community-oriented people, especially riders, can really help to keep a station clean, though I firmly believe that routine maintenance and upkeep should be performed by the agency. It's a logical partnership that empowers people to care for their station and make it a point of pride for their neighborhoods.
Like everything else in the world, a small minority of losers try to ruin it for everyone else. SEPTA is no different. Graffiti-morons, vandals, careless litterers, etc. take it to another level on our trains and buses.
Feel free to critique, but it's time to challenge SEPTA by making it cleaner. Until it's done, no one will love SEPTA.
www.whatever-it-takes.net
I don't know that I represent anyone
But I know I did the math and never would consider a transpass for just the reasons that Ray outlines above. I'm right at the edge, and given how many token machines are broken or unavailable, a lot of weeks I may have been better off with a transpass----but given my normal ridership pattern, token plus transfer is most of the time going to be just cheaper.
It's funny and, like everything, ties into the larger changes that are needed: there's like a counter-incentive to push your ridership up to the level where you'd need a transpass, because service is so infrequent and inconvenient for 'unnecessary' trips. (If either the service or fare purchase system was better, passes would look way more appealing.) So given a choice, you try to keep your ridership down and gamble with tokens.
It's sad but clearly endemic that SEPTA is engaging in these number games--let's make it so they can't afford not to get the passes, and no one's touching the background problems.
Jennifer
Transit Advocacy Beyond the Crisis
A few people posting on this thread pointed out that we need a permanent advocacy organization for transit riders, one that focuses on protecting the interests of riders and on expanding and improving the SEPTA system.
I couldn't agree more. Three years ago I proposed that the PTC develop a non-profit off-shoot that would take on this role.
In addition to representing transit rider and the broader community on the large issues of fares, service, and expansion, we came up with a number of other goals for such an organization.
One was to monitor SEPTA performance. A number of us thought it might be useful, for example, to evaluate the cleanliness of SEPTA vehicles. One of our members proposed asking high school students who ride SEPTA to help us with this as a public service project.
Another goal was to encourage SEPTA to work with community groups to make local transit improvements. I actually met with SEPTA officials a number of times to secure their agreement to an idea along these lines. I suggested that this new organization could meet with community groups around the city to draw up an agenda for neighborhood transit reform. There are many local problems that stand in the way of first class transit in the city, from schedules that don't make sense, to stops and stations that are dirty or underutilized, etc. SEPTA has little capacity to find out let alone deal with these problems. Businesses and community groups, with the help of transit advocates, could be develop an agenda for doing so one that might not be very costly. And then the transit riders organization could work with the community groups and the relevant SEPTA officials to implement it.
We had a little success using this model to begin restoring and bringing businesses into train stations in Mt. Airy by having SEPTA work with West Mt. Airy Neighbors.
However, this undertaking did not get very far when I proposed it two years ago, for a few reasons. The first was that the members of the PTC coalition were still primarily focused on funding issues, and the Governor's Transit Reform Commission. Second, I got involved in a few other projects and ran out of time for transit advocacy beyond the funding issues.
At the last PTC meeting, there was some enthusiasm for looking again at creating the transit advocacy organization we need in the region. So some of us are developing / dusting off some plans to move in this direction. If anyone reading this would like to take part in the effort, contact me at MarcStier@stier.net.