Transit Demand Growing
The nation's public transportation network provides access to jobs, mobility for the young, elderly, and disabled, and helps reduce congestion, conserve fuel, enhance the efficiency of highway transportation, reduce air pollution, and support security and emergency preparedness activities. An efficient and safe public transportation system is essential to moving people in both rural and urban areas and to the health of the national economy.
Today there are approximately 610 transit operators serving urban areas, operating 115,000 vehicles. Rail systems comprise 10,700 miles of track and 2,900 stations. There are around 770 bus and rail maintenance facilities. Over 19,000 transit vehicles operate in rural areas. Passengers now make close to 10 billion trips by public transportation each year. In the 1990s, transit carried approximately 5 percent of commuter traffic nationally. In major metropolitan centers such as New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Philadelphia, Washington, DC, and Boston, the percentage of commuters carried is much higher. Transit ridership is growing and communities all over the country are struggling to fund capacity expansion at a pace that keeps up with demand.
Figure 7. Transit Needs Adjusted by the Consumer Price Index* 2007 Through 2030
AASHTO’s 2007 Transit “Cost to Improve” Estimate: $31.4 Billion
AASHTO has calculated the level of investments needed through 2030 to bring the transit system to a condition that produces positive net benefits to the American public in terms of both condition and performance—referred to as the “Cost to Improve.” When the U.S. DOT’s 2002 estimate of $24 billion is adjusted for inflation and increased construction costs, AASHTO estimates that the “Cost to Improve” is actually $31.4 billion in 2007, increasing to some $55.3 billion by 2030. (Figure 7.)
If in 2004 annual transit capital spending was $13.2 billion, a not unreasonable question is how can it be expected to increase to $31 billion in the near future, not to mention to $44 billion by 2020. The good news is that over the 23-year period from 1981 to 2004, transit spending overall increased from $6.4 billion to $42.9 billion, and transit capital spending increased from $3.4 billion annually to $13.2 billion. It obviously will not be easy to increase transit investment to the levels needed, but it is instructive that over the past two decades transit agencies, with major assistance from the Federal government, were able to increase capital investment nearly 290 percent. According to U.S. DOT’s latest Condition and Performance Report, the Federal share of transit capital investment from 1997 to 2002 averaged 45.8 percent.
FHWA forecasts that highway travel will increase at 2.07 percent per year through 2022. If this rate of increase holds for the next 50 years, highway vehicle miles traveled will more than double from 3 trillion today to nearly 7 trillion by 2055. That is more traffic than the system can accommodate. In order to reduce highway demand, a policy objective should be set to double transit ridership over the next 20 years. With supportive land use and transit-oriented development, many trips which would otherwise take place by car, can be shifted to transit. One recent study showed that by 2030, about half of the buildings in which Americans live, work, and shop will have been built after 2000. In other words, if about half of what will be the built environment in 2030 does not yet exist, there is an opportunity through land use and other policies to shape what is built, and how this affects transportation choices.
AASHTO and APTA recently conducted a joint analysis of future alternatives funded through the Transit Cooperative Research Program. That analysis showed that if transit capacity were to double over 20 years, ridership would have to increase by 3.5 percent annually. The capital cost of expanding urban and rural capacity to make this ridership possible would be to increase the “cost to improve” estimate from the $24 billion level set in U.S. DOT’s 2004 C&P Report to approximately $45 billion (expressed in “constant” dollars).
There are indicators that there is a potential demand for far more capacity than the system is currently providing. Between 1996 and 2006, more than 460 miles of fixed guideway transit service were added in 26 cities. The current New Starts program includes 36 projects that have moved beyond the initial stages of study. Total funding needed for this part of the New Starts program is $35 billion. More than 200 additional projects are in earlier stages of study and do not yet have cost estimates available. Other communities are considering expanding service through bus rapid transit.
In rural areas, there are also indications of unmet demand. The Greater Minnesota Transit Improvement Plan identified the need for an 81 percent increase in total rural fleet size. North Carolina recommended a 124 percent increase in its rural public transportation system. Vermont estimated a 100 percent increase in its rural fleet size. And Montana saw the requirement for a 242 percent increase in annual capital expenditures. Our study showed that satisfying this demand would require annual capital investment in rural transit to increase from $700 million to $1.2 billion.
