Spokane7
58°
January 24, 2011 in City
STA proposes cutting eight routes, 18 drivers
Other lines would be extended to make up for lost service
Eight Spokane-area bus routes would be cut along with 18 driver positions under the latest version of a money-saving proposal by the Spokane Transit Authority.
STA officials spent the past three months working with bus riders, drivers, members of the public, businesses and agencies to refine the fixed-route cuts needed to stem an ongoing loss of cash.
The proposed cuts amount to 7 percent of the agency’s operating costs and would go into effect in September, saving the agency more than $3 million annually.
The proposal follows a smaller 3 percent cut last September. Another 7 percent cut is expected in 2012.
STA’s board of directors has given the OK to offer incentives for voluntary resignations to avoid a need for layoffs.
All of the cuts were assessed under a series of performance standards, including ridership, travel time and fuel consumption.
Among the revisions unveiled last week, STA officials said they are going to continue providing limited bus service to Medical Lake on route No. 62 rather than cut service completely.
Two Spokane Valley express routes are being combined into a single route running every 15 minutes between Liberty Lake and downtown, with a stop at the Mirabeau Park and Ride.
Routes being eliminated include the No. 30 bus on Francis Avenue; the No. 31 crosstown bus on Garland Avenue; the No. 41 Latah Valley route; the No. 42 South Maple Street route; the No. 46 Altamont Boulevard route; the No. 67 to Geiger Boulevard and Medical Lake; and the No. 95 bus to Millwood.
In many cases, the remaining 32 bus routes are being modified and extended to provide service to areas losing routes.
For example, Millwood will be served by an extension of route No. 94 that runs on East Fifth Avenue.
East Valley High School and its surrounding neighborhood will see service on an extension of the No. 96 Pines Road bus.
The No. 2 shuttle to medical facilities on the lower South Hill would be extended to provide weekend service and would be linked to the Arena shuttle.
Steve Blaska, director of operations, said the reconfigured bus routes are intended to reduce the number of people who will lose bus service.
“There is a lot of give and take,” said Karl Otterstrom, director of planning.
The modifications are also allowing STA to reduce the number of riders losing eligibility for paratransit service from 101 riders to eight.
The proposal will be open for written public comment until Feb. 17.
The STA board will convene a public hearing on the plan at its next monthly meeting on Feb. 16 at 5:30 p.m. at Council Chambers in Spokane City Hall.
Adoption is expected the following month at the March 16 meeting, also at 5:30 p.m. in Council Chambers.
Since the nation’s economic downturn began in 2008, sales tax collections in STA’s service area have declined by more than 14 percent; those taxes provide the majority of the agency’s $58 million operating budget.
STA’s budget calls for spending down its cash reserve by $11 million this year.
Under the proposal, bus operations would be reduced by at least 30,000 hours, and at least nine coaches would be parked. Those coaches will be retained in case of a possible upswing in revenue in the future.
Despite the slower economy and loss of service, STA expects to maintain much of the growth in ridership of more than 40 percent that occurred from 2005 to 2008. In 2008, buses logged 11 million trips for the first time. Some loss of ridership is expected with the cuts.
Amtrak Cascades ridership up
Ridership on the Amtrak Cascades passenger rail service in Western Washington ended 2010 with a 16-year high of 838,251 passengers, an increase of 76,600 riders from 2009.
The trains serve Seattle, Vancouver, B.C., Portland and Eugene, Ore., with stops in between.
Returning farmland to a state of nature 
saveyourtatas on January 24 at 12:23 a.m.
Good Story Mike…Now if we can get city council and county commissioners to do the same. CUT here and CUT there.
Fire at least 10 percent of all gvt employees, just to start.
Maybe nuke a few more bus lines and fire an additional number of drivers. Budgets matter. Is this sad for families? Yes. Well, the government does not exist to provide crappy jobs for lazy people…and many who work for gvt tend to be lazy when compared to the private sector. It is a simple fact, usualy caused by unions, but also by bad leadership (aka, Politicals)
Any Questions?
Next…
ZagChuck on January 24 at 12:42 a.m.
Note the poor decisions they make, while they are making cuts.
They could just as easily make the same number of cuts in employees, and reduce the fuel costs, by simply increasing the amount of time between buses. If a bus currently comes every 15 minutes, make it run every 30 minutes etc…. you can then still serve the same amount of people while at the same time decreasing the cost of providing the service. It’s not that difficult to see, unless you’re blinded by political motivation.
It’s almost as if they’re cutting entire routes in an attempt to motivate people to call for an increase in taxes…. Hmmmm…….
spokanecougar on January 24 at 12:50 a.m.
So just because you work for the government you are lazy? Ok. Also unions are the ones ruining the country but less than 12% of the country belongs to a union.
http://www.stltoday.com/business/local/article_0eb9854a-b2bf-533a-ad83-1e40c610d7a8.html
Meanwhile private corporations who have seen their CEO’s pay increase over 180% since 1980 while keeping workers pay the same, and in some cases less than what it was in 1980. Then they started shipping nearly every single manufacturing job overseas to countries paying their workers 10 cents a day killing this countries ability to make anything but hamburgers and fries.
Wow, some really stupid people in this country that allowed a group that accounts for less than 12% of the population in the USA to destroy the WHOLE planets economy.
ajw73 on January 24 at 2:26 a.m.
Its very sad to see more potential cuts to the city’s transit system…
As if raising fares wasn’t bad enough, now the system seems to be facing cuts…again…
The system here seems to be moving backwards rather than moving forward…
As a long-time rider of Capital Metro Transit in Austin, Texas, I have to admit I got spoiled by the convenience and the lower fares…
If anyone has been to Austin in recent years, then you’ll know what I’m talking about…
While fares skyrocketed here, fares and such there saw very little change…
My favorite feature of Cap Metro was the convenience of the night owl service that operated on merged routes, hourly from 12am - 3 am on most nights…
That was popular by people that decided to go downtown for late nights…
I saved lots of money by taking that from downtown versus having to take a taxi…
I know on New Year’s I was wishing that STA had some type of night owl or special events service when I was leaving First Night…that was a long cold wait for a taxi…
It just seems that if Spokane Transit continues to shrink its routing and workforce, it’s going to be to the point of non-existense and it will force people to start driving again…
Currently, the daytime service on most routes here seem to be decent…but I wonder how long that will last?
The bottom line is, whether we like it or not, STA riders will have to pay higher fares for less service…
Yes, I do realize that Austin and Spokane are two very different cities with two very different economies.
I know that the national recession seems to be to the blame for STA’s and other cities’ transit reductions, but when does it get to the point of when enough is enough?
Its no wonder why people would rather drive than take the bus…
oneanddone on January 24 at 4:49 a.m.
It’s true. Unions exist for the sole purpose of extorting ridiculous wages and benefits, based on nothing other the threat of destroying the business. Why else would cars cost what they do.
ZagChuck on January 24 at 5:24 a.m.
Since 1970, the number of workers needed to operate America’s public transit systems has increased by 180 percent while the inflation-adjusted cost of operating buses, light rail, and heavy rail (the only modes whose costs are known back to 1970) increased by 195 percent. Yet ridership on those modes increased by only 32 percent.
Each transit worker produced 53,115 transit trips in 1970, but only 26,314 trips by all modes in 2008. The real cost per rider grew by 124 percent, while subsidies (fares minus operating costs) grew by more than 8 times. Though capital cost data prior to 1992 are sketchy, capital costs also grew tremendously, almost certainly by more than operating costs. By any measure, then, transit productivity has declined more than 50 percent. “It’s uncommon to find such a rapid productivity decline in any industry,” noted the late University of California economist Charles Lave.
This Cato briefing paper compared the costs of different forms of travel in 2006. Updating to 2008, auto owners spent about 22 cents a passenger mile driving, and subsidies to highways added another penny a passenger mile. Airfares averaged about 14 cents a passenger mile, and subsidies to airports added another penny. Amtrak fares averaged 30 cents a passenger mile, and subsidies brought the total to nearly 60 cents. Urban transit is about the most expensive form of travel in the United States, with fares averaging only about 21 cents a passenger mile but subsidies of 72 cents a passenger mile. This makes transit 4 times as expensive as driving.
In short, those who want to get people out of their cars and onto transit are trying to get people from an inexpensive, convenient, and increasingly energy-efficient form of travel to an expensive, inconvenient, and increasingly energy-wasteful form of travel.
The real solution for transit is privatization. Private operators would use smaller buses and would mainly serve the dense inner cities that have low rates of auto ownership. At a broader level, the transit industry offers lessons for anyone who thinks that government can do a better job at providing goods and services than the free market.
http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/public-transit-a-classic-example-of-government-in-action/
ZagChuck on January 24 at 5:25 a.m.
Between February 2009, Obama’s first full month in office, and June 2010, the number of private-sector jobs dropped from 110.3 million to 107.7 million, a decrease of nearly 2.7 million. In the same period, the number of federal government workers rose from 2,792,000 to 3,171,000, an increase of 379,000.
We couldn’t afford to grow government when the economy was booming, but the Democrats think even when there are less tax dollars to spend, the answer it to spend more moeny.
Diana on January 24 at 6:28 a.m.
Is that what the Democrats think, ZagChuck? Cite your source.
How about a little perspective on private-sector job drops? Why do you suppose that happened? Could it be related to the pre-Obama economy crash in 2008? And as long as you’re hijacking the thread, what about Bush tripling the deficit 200-2008? Tell us about that.
jimvw2 on January 24 at 6:29 a.m.
Same lame blame game. Unions didn’t create this recession. Greedy bankers did. Privatization of every service isn’t the answer either. Punishng unionized public servants because they have managed to keep more jobs and benefits than some of their private sector peers is just stupid. It’s like saying you want to eradicate a flu pandemic by making sure everyone is infected. We should be working to restore jobs, wages, and benefits to the innocent victim’s of these champions of greed who call themselves capitalists, not be turning against the survivors of their greed. The folks at STA are just trying to survive and hold on until we can climb out of this mess they had no part in creating. So stop,with the personal attacks.
ZagChuck on January 24 at 6:51 a.m.
@ Diana
Have you forgotten how Lisa Brown, Chris Marr and their Ilk threw out I960 and raised our taxes by huge percentages?
Do i need more evidence than that debacle perpetrated by increases by the Gregoire and her Democrat Controlled house and senate, most of which was rejected by voters a few weeks later….
Need more proof? They tried 1098, it failed….
We did pass 1053 by 64% because the Dems can’t seem to put down the already over-draft checkbook.
on a national level:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ydzfV_vab5c Biden: Spend Money to Save Money - Government must spend money to prevent Bankruptcy
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D9CF8SIO0
President Barack Obama outlined new multibillion-dollar stimulus and jobs proposals Tuesday, saying the nation must continue to “spend our way out of this recession” until more Americans are back at work.”
You can’t spend money you don’t have without raising taxes.
DeeDee_Loberg on January 24 at 7:47 a.m.
How is it possible that every topic that is posted ends up a discussion on political views? Not everything can be about the left or the right.
eagleproducer on January 24 at 9:24 a.m.
It’s how things are framed in the U.S. for the last forty years. What have you missed? I agree with the absurdity of it all, but you’ve been sleeping if you missed the transition from government working for all people to government bought and operated by the few.
tatas: Here is my question. Do you agree the economy is suffering from lack of demand? How is removing more demand a good idea? How will the revenues that used to support STA return if revenue never does? Where are the jobs for the 10% of government employees you wanted fired?
aj: I have been to Austin recently (SXSW) and was impressed with the expansion of their public transportation. Portland and Seattle are also models of great systems. No one needs to wonder why Spokane has been skipped by during the tech and other booms that caused huge growth in other communities: A north/south freeway that still doesn’t exist after 50 years of planning and a horrid public transportation system that is slow, a hassle, and expensive.
eagleproducer on January 24 at 9:28 a.m.
I’d say it’s time citizens quit acting like spoiled teenagers and sack up, pay what it takes to operate a modern country and make the wealthy pay well over 50% in income taxes. It’s time for a return to sanity. Giving the wealthy more and more money has done nothing for the average Joe except degrade his quality of life.
This needs to be class warfare, I’m afraid.
DeeDee_Loberg on January 24 at 10:17 a.m.
Well. that would put me at about age 7 when the great divide started. I wasn’t watching then, nor throughout my twentys(sleeping). But once I had my first child at around thirty I realized other people exist and have needs and want a future that is promising. I honestly believe that as a collective whole we all want the same thing. The opportunity to live a full and happy life.
redhead on January 24 at 12:05 p.m.
i’ve lived in several big cities (and used public transportation for years) and spokane has the best bus system of all except for seattle/tacoma. it beats portand by far. so even with the cuts, for a city of this size it has a great public bus systems. it’s very reliable and very very low cost. so hats off to spokane for helping low income people with a very comprehensive and reliable public transportation system.portand has the met but the surface bus system is very poor, here in spokane you don’t have to waite a hour for connecting bus routes. it’s very nice.
philipgregory on January 24 at 1:06 p.m.
Sure, the STA needs thinning and trimming - maybe wages too, but the bottom line is how are the working class and poor going to get by without those 8 routes and busses?
Doesn’t anyone care about these people?
It’s a dirty shame that no one here is crying about them and the stress and burden this will put on them.
SpokyDaBear on January 24 at 1:12 p.m.
It’s not the cost of pay going up but the cost of health care benefits. The health insurance companies keep raising rates, because they can. They claim it’s the rising cost of healthcare, but they never say it’s because of the rising profits they want to make.
Doctors are not making more. Nurses are not making more. Hospitals are not making more. But Health Insurance companies are making more and more.
They fatten their bottom line by charging higher deductibles and lowering their capitated rates for doctors and hospitals. Expensive and life saving procedures are excluded by shrewed health care companies.
In some cases, the cost of benefit’s for a government employee are almost as high as his pay.
Five years from now, health insurance companies will be charging even more and providing less services. The costs will soar even higher for government entities trying to cover the benefits of their government employees. To do so, they will have no choice but to cut services and employees.
Welcome to the new century!
greenlibertarian on January 24 at 2:34 p.m.
“Tulsa Mayor Bartlett (Republican): Stimulus package ‘worked’
by: JIM MYERS World Washington Bureau
Friday, January 21, 2011
1/21/2011 5:23:51 AM
WASHINGTON - Tulsa Mayor Dewey Bartlett on Thursday described as “a little unfair” a House Republican proposal to cancel all unused stimulus funds.
“I would prefer them to at least give us an opportunity to use them for another reasonably supportive project,” Bartlett said.
In Washington for the U.S. Conference of Mayors, Bartlett again made positive comments about the impact of the 2009 stimulus package, which was opposed by every Oklahoma Republican in Congress.
“It worked,” said the mayor, who is also a Republican.
Bartlett said the funding provided by the package, which was promoted by the Obama administration as a way to help jump-start the nation’s faltering economy, gave Tulsa the opportunity to upgrade its infrastructure.
Last week, he specifically credited the $787 billion package for its economic impact on the city.
“This nationwide recovery measure has helped Tulsa as we come out of the recession,” Bartlett said in a lengthy news release that provided details on how and where the stimulus dollars were spent.
According to that news release, Tulsa has received nearly $64 million in stimulus funds for crime, public safety, energy and environment, poverty and infrastructure projects.” (continues)
http://www.tulsaworld.com/site/printerfriendlystory.aspx?articleid=20110121_16_A1_CUTLIN816018
TIMJOFRED on January 24 at 4:40 p.m.
ZagChuck and CATO very conveniently fail to observe that the transit industry after the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 was also required to provide “complementary” demand-response paratransit service to those with mental, sensory, or physical disabilities. For many transit systems the cost of providing one paratransit passenger trip is 5-7 times the cost of the normal fixed route cost per passenger. Also, in Washington State the law requires that the fare charged for that service can be no more than the regular adult fare on fixed route service. Also, the ADA reguired that all buses from that point on must also have lift equiped doors for fixed route buses as well. Also Congress has added several unfunded mandates on to the industry. Transit systems are responsible for all drug and alcohol testing costs of their “safety sensitive” employees.
This last year, Washington State law makers passed a law that required transit systems, such as STA, to place a union representative on their Board of Directors.
ZagChuck and CATO do a disservice to the discussion by omitting several facts surrounding the issue.
zelda on January 24 at 4:41 p.m.
This appears to be a workable plan and with a lot of thought given to retaining as much service as possible under dire circumstances. I like that the plan included the possibility of retirement incentives which is just about the only way to reduce government labor costs fairly in this economic climate short of de-certifying unions. Buy-outs are a tool that’s been used across many decades during tough times and some employees for one reason for another find a buy-out financially manageable. Is it ideal? No. But the current expenses are unsustainable.
I doubt that labor is a major portion of STA’s costs anyway. This is a cost-heavy public service (vehicles, maintenance, fuel, route administration, IT) but a basic economic responsibility that must be supported for our citizens.
saveyourtatas on January 24 at 7:34 p.m.
Spoketucky,
I simply think government has too many worker bees and beaurocrats.(sp) Furthermore, I have observed gvt employees for a very long time and they do tend to be lazy. The precise opposite, generally speaking, of the private sector.
For those who lose their job, tough noogies, get a new job. The government does not exist to create jobs. The private sector is far more efficient. I am not hypercritical of all unions…only 90 percent or so (-:
If that all sounds a tad blunt and heartless, so be it. We need a tough guy in the white house and although I like Obama, I think he has very little in the manner of a spine. He is a champion toastmaster, but he does not inspire me with what he does. He gives one heck of speech. When it comes to bold moves and tough leadership, he fails miserably. Like him…but we need Romney or Huckabee…or even Ron Pauls son !
On the demo side, I really like a few over there as well, but they will not even challenge the big zig (ziggler).
SRugerEsq on January 24 at 7:40 p.m.
Tim, thanks for the information. I suspect Zagchuck would have the disabled crawl on hands and knees like they do in India if it means he or she would have to pay an extra cent in taxes! I am certain Zagchuck would agree slashing military budgets but 50% would be an even better idea, then we could really save some money.
eagleproducer on January 24 at 7:53 p.m.
Let’s just turn it over to the private sector and the hell with it all.
Canada doesn’t have government air controllers. Private companies perform the work just fine. Private companies transport school kids, why can’t they make a buck on public bus routes too?
The answer: Because if they could, they already would. Public transportation serves everyone and should be paid for, in full, by everyone. This mantra that 12% of the workforce (current union membership) is causing all the revenue shortfalls and depressed labor market is ludicrous. 40 years of the working class believing lies and voting against their best interests is the main cause of most of the maladies in the U.S.
“You’ve been hoodwinked, lied to, bamboozled!”
greenlibertarian on January 24 at 11:33 p.m.
STA is certainly not perfect, it is run by humans after all. The utterly foolish idea to rent out the upper floor of the building, which would take many years, if not decades, to pencil out, is, apparently dead.
I am a near daily STA rider. I know many older drivers who would love to retire but they can’t because they couldn’t afford health care coverage in the private market.
It would make sense for these top of the wage scale employees to retire and let the younger folks move up, but you’d need to provide, say, 5 years of health care coverage to get them to Medicare eligibility age, or close to it.
New_Improved_Drywitt2000 on January 25 at 12:05 a.m.
STA riders…..by in large the old, the young and the working poor…..have absorbed a 50% fare increase over the course of the past 13 months….without a complaint.
Just imagine a similar increase in the price of….oh…I don;t
know…….bullets…..or beer…….or teabags!!
There would be open rebellion and a call for a Second Amendment Remedy!!
ZagChuck on January 25 at 10:39 p.m.
Note to all, I provided my sources as Diana demanded, and she had NOTHING to say.
It’s like i keep saying, liberals and facts are not friends.
gmorton on March 22 at 10:22 p.m.
eagleproducer wrote,
“Public transportation serves everyone and should be paid for, in full, by everyone.”
Uh, no. It most certainly does not serve everyone. In most markets it accounts for about 5% of trips. Over 90% of the citizens in most communities never use it.
But they all pay for it.