If Transit Investment Produces Jobs, Why Isn’t There More of It?
Bus driver in Manchester, England Credit: Flickr user Ingy The Wingy (cc)
In a nation that is struggling to counter a frustratingly high unemployment rate, any intervention that would increase job numbers at no cost to the American taxpayer would be quickly welcomed by policymakers, right?
Perhaps not. A new study by Todd Swanstrom, Will Winter, and Laura Wiedlocher of the University of Missouri-St. Louis suggests that the U.S. government could produce 180,000 extra jobs in several metropolitan areas by simply shifting spending away from highways and towards transit.
The report, “More Transit = More Jobs: The impact of increasing funding for public transit,” was sponsored by the Transportation Equity Network (TEN), a national group working to improve the mobility of some of the nation’s least well-off households.
Taking advantage of data that demonstrate that transit produces roughly 20% more jobs per dollar invested, the researchers show how the decisions made by just twenty metropolitan areas could affect the nation’s job prospects.
If the regions “Shifted 50 percent of their highway funds to transit, they would generate 1,123,674 new transit jobs over a five-year period.” the study reports. That’s “A net gain of 180,150 jobs over five years—without a single dollar of new spending.” In other words, if the federal government wants to find ways to increase employment, transit is a better place to look than roads.
While some regions, like those including and surrounding New York City, Honolulu, and Portland, spend a majority of their overall transportation funds on public transportation, others spend very little. The St. Louis metropolitan area, for instance, devotes just 15% of its overall transportation dollars to transit. According to TEN, that may reduce the ability of that city to generate jobs. One obvious answer would be spending less on roads and correspondingly more on transit.
The study does note that investing in transit operations produces far more jobs per every $1 billion invested than investing in transit capital projects—41,140 jobs compared to 23,788. That means that in terms of creating employment, the most direct benefits come from doing things like hiring bus and train drivers. Thus transit agencies should not, for instance, reduce transit services in favor of new construction on rail lines or busways. Presumably both are necessary, but at least in terms of jobs, the first is far more effective.
In the immediate term, a focus on increased transit operations is a good idea with a lot of benefits. For people suffering in this bad economy, increasing mobility through better daily bus service is certainly something to work for, since the ability to pay for driving shouldn’t be taken as a given.
TEN hopes to use the study to encourage politicians to redirect transportation dollars in favor of transit funding and away from highways. This week, the organization is holding rallies in fourteen cities to promote the idea. We’ll find out soon if anyone is listening.
Yonah Freemark is an Urban Leaders Fellow, sponsored by the Rockefeller Foundation. He writes the Grassroutes column for Next American City. He also writes The Transport Politic blog. Contact him at yonah@americancity.org
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John Niles in Seattle, WA on Thu, Sep 02, 2010 at 12:17pm
Buses run on roads. Roads are important for buses. Roads are important for moving groceries, building supplies, and other freight. Roads are important for the dominant mode of personal mobility, which is automobiles, which are becoming more fuel efficient.
For example, here in Seattle area, the Metropolitan Planning Organization—Puget Sound Regional Council, http://www.psrc.org—has specified in the new metropolitan transportation plan that about 50% of government transport funding should go to transit over the next 30 years.
But regionally, the transit market share is computer-modeled to go from 3% of all trips today to just 5% in 2040. Transit use is much, much higher in work trips and school trips to a few urban centers, but work and school trips are not the majority of trips overall. For the region as a whole, PSRC forecasts that private vehicle travel will continue to be the dominant mode choice through 2040, compared to transit, walking, and cycling. Private vehicle trips are expected to grow from 8.7 million annually to 12 million over the next 30 years.
So highway investment continues in the Seattle area, with increasing emphasis on making buses work better, since origin-to-destination bus riders are expected to outnumber travelers having light rail and commuter rail segments by four to one in 2040.