Suburban Public Transportation changes? (pros and cons, tax, versus)

[uptown_urbanist]

Just saw this article in the Star Tribune: TRANSIT WAR OF WORDS HEATS UP | StarTribune.com

I'm posting it NOT to start any kind of suburb versus city bashing session (as I think many of the distinctions are pretty artificial, anyway), but rather because I ride public transit, sometimes in the suburbs, and was curious to hear what others thought about this. The gist of the article is that there's some discussion about organizations like MVTA being folded into the larger Metro Transit, with the larger question being whether or not smaller suburban transit services should exist.

The article seems to be missing a lot of details, and I'm not up enough on transit policies or daily operations out in the outer suburbs to have a strong opinion. It would seem, though, that it would make a lot of sense to just fold them into the larger metro system. I'm assuming some of the concerns would be that some local routes could be lost. On the other hand, would MVTA being part of Metro Transit mean more bus options that run longer distances (beside the express, I mean)? I'm thinking back to my time in LA, where there were Rapid buses that drove very long routes through a swath of city and suburb; they were express in the sense that they only stopped every mile or so, but still relatively local in the sense that they weren't just connecting downtown with outer suburbs, but rather allowed for easy and relatively fast connections between all points in-between. That seems to be largely lacking in the Twin Cities right now, so if combining services were to encourage new routes of that sort then I think it could be a very good thing, especially for people riding the non traditional commuter routes. Then again, I rarely ride MVTA or most of the other suburban-specific transit providers, so I'm not entirely sure of the pros and cons of the issue from the point of view of someone who regularly uses MVTA, not Metro Transit. I'm assuming there are definite pros and cons to the situation, but from a general public transportation rider it seems that when it comes to using public transportation, easier is better, with consolidation being the easier option here.

Anyone have any insights into this issue?

[DaPerpKazoo]

I've never ridden any of the non Metro Transit service providers, but from what I've seen/read I think they should probably be combined. Of course, there are obvious benefits operations wise, by streamlining services, facilities, and management. I someimes see Metro Transit and MVTA buses running nearly empty... seems like some money could be saved without reducing service levels.

I think the suburban transit providers were created to provide a higher quality of service, but I also think that Metro Transit has impoved over the years, and the new buses they are planning on using for the BRT are pretty nice, like the MVTA buses are.

Also, with the new transit tax district, it seems like transit within the district should be unified.

Finally, it would be nice to have a single map and schedue service, which would make a lot of trips simpler.

If the suburban communities are still really concerned about losing their tax revenue to fund services that go to other communities, there could probably be a system/agreement that would ensure that didn't happen.

It just seems to me like a lot of money and inconvenience would be saved by having a single unified system.

[designer/builder]

The true benfit of combining all of the services into a Metro umbrella is that service could finally run both ways...into the city from the suburbs and into the suburbs from City. Currently all of the suburban routes take passengers into the City and then head back empty to the station in the morning and head back empty to the City to bring their riders back to the suburb in the afternoon. This is an incredible waste of resources. We do need a system that can serve the entire metro area. Although the one thing that I fear in creating one agency to run the system is the historic inefficiency of large, underfunded government agencies.

[uptown_urbanist]

Yes, I agree. If done right the "reverse commute" options could really be beneficial (and get rid of some of those empty buses). If done right maybe a consolidated system could better organize routes, decrease some of the inefficiency (and perhaps costs), AND provide better service to more people at the same time. Besides the city-to-suburb and suburb-to-city routes there's also all the suburb-to-suburb routes to also consider; I would assume that it would be easier and more efficient to simplify those routes if all Metro Transit. It seems like having one unified agency handling all of that makes sense, at least in theory.

[Ben Around]

Not sure, but I think I heard long ago that the employees of the suburban bus lines are not union and have fewer benefits. That might be a reason why we won't see the systems merged.