Transportation Choices

2020 Initiative

Press Conference Statement of Lea Schuster, Executive Director of Transit for Livable Communities - March 9, 2005

Good morning. My name is Lea Schuster, and I’m the Executive Director of Transit for Livable Communities. We’re a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization working to improve the quality of life in MN by expanding transportation choices.

We’re here today with a diverse coalition of community and transit organizations to launch the Transportation Choices 2020 Initiative, with legislative allies from both parties and both houses. With me today are representatives of the MN Public Transit Association, the Alliance for Metropolitan Stability, the MN Senior Federation, ISAIAH, the Amalgamated Transit Union, the Sierra Club Northstar Chapter, and others. We are grateful to have with us lead authors Representative Ron Erhardt and Senator Sharon Marko, along with Representatives Lieder, Tinglestad, Nelson, Hausman, Nornes, Hornstein, Beard, Cox, Hortman, and Larson, and Senators Belanger, Rest and Langseth.

What’s brought us together is our common interest in a transportation system that provides real choices to everyone in our community. Expanding public transit is critical to Minnesota’s quality of life and economic vitality. With stable, increased funding, our region’s transit system can expand to meet the mobility and access demands of the 21st century. A fully funded transit system will give all Minnesotans choices to being stuck in traffic or stuck at home. When transit moves more people during rush hour, it reduces the need for costly expansion of highways and parking. In regions with a greater reliance on public transit, families spend less of their income on transportation, and seniors, people with disabilities, and those without access to a car have more independence and opportunities. Transportation choices contribute to improved health and protect our air and water quality.

Today, while other regions are building 21st Century transit systems, transit in Minnesota is stuck in reverse. Transit investment in the Twin Cities metropolitan area lags far behind U.S. regions of similar size. As a result we have a smaller bus system, fewer miles of rail transit, and lower transit ridership - and we secure fewer federal New Starts grants for transit projects than our peers. Unlike transit, Minnesota’s trunk highway system has had dedicated funding for nearly 50 years which has provided ongoing money for expansion projects and allows Minnesota to maximize federal funding for roads. Because transit lacks secure and stable funding, its budget has been cut repeatedly. A $60 million shortfall in the transit budget for the upcoming biennium will lead to additional service reductions and damaging fare increases.

This decline is not inevitable. In fact, as Minnesota transit sees ever-shrinking investment, peer regions across the country, like Denver, Dallas, and Phoenix, regions that have historically lacked transportation choices, are greatly increasing their investment in transportation choices.

It is time for Minnesota to stop traveling in reverse. With the Transportation Choices 2020 Initiative, we are offering a vision for how to move forward, we are identifying the real needs, and we have a plan for how to meet the needs.

Our vision is statewide: in the metro area, a system of interconnecting transitways, doubling bus service, adding park and rides, and providing local communities with funds for local transit, bicycle and pedestrian projects. In greater MN, our vision is for service in every Minnesota county, expanded to meet the needs of a growing and aging population. All of this will be accomplished by 2020.

We will not be able to meet the need without significant new, secure, reliable investment. Over the next 15 years, we need an average of $360 million new dollars a year. This amount would provide funds to match federal investment in eight new transitways, and would stabilize and steadily increase operating funds for our greater MN and metro bus systems, our paratransit systems, and our rail system. It would provide additional funding to local governments for local transit, biking and walking projects. And it would provide funding to take the next steps in connecting Minnesota by high speed rail with Chicago and the rest of the Midwest.

The funding to stabilize and begin to expand our transit systems would come from two sources. First, a region-wide sales tax increase of half a cent would add about $225 million new dollars for metro transit operating and capital, and for local transit, bike and pedestrian projects. Second, over the next six years additional revenue from the Motor Vehicle Sales Tax would be phased in for transit in both greater MN and the metro area. In addition the amount that transit currently receives from the state general fund would be switched over to the state MVST. This switch would have no net effect on the general fund, but would provide transit with greater funding transparency and security. If passed by the legislature and signed by the Governor, the bill would go into effect on July 1, 2005 and the first money would be available on January 1, 2006.

Funding for transit must be stabilized this year to avoid additional service cuts and fare increases. There is broad consensus that our region’s health and economic prosperity depends on an expanded multi-modal transportation system that provides choices for all Minnesotans. The Transportation Choices 2020 Initiative identifies the vision for how to address these needs, the amount of state investment required, and a plan for how to start now, and get it done by 2020.