I’m testifying before Congress about WMATA

Tomorrow morning, I’ll be testifying before the U.S. House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform about WMATA.

The hearing will focus on three questions:

• WMATA’s efforts to improve safety and service, particularly in the wake of a spate of accidents that have occurred within the Metro system over the past year, including the June 22, 2009, crash at Fort Totten.
• Short term and long term solutions for addressing the budget shortfall currently confronting WMATA.
• The process for selecting a permanent General Manager for WMATA and establishing effective long term leadership.

I’ll be testifying for the Riders’ Advisory Council, of which I am the DC Vice-Chair. The other witnesses are Peter Benjamin, WMATA Board Chairman; Richard Sarles, interim General Manager; Matt Bassett, Chairman of the Tri-State Oversight Committee; Jackie Jeter, President of ATU Local 689; and Peter Rogoff, FTA Administrator.

The RAC’s written testimony, submitted yesterday, focuses on the nexus between funding and safety, the importance of local, state and federal support for the capital budget, and the safety issues beyond WMATA’s faregates, such as pedestrian safety getting to and from rail stations and bus stops.

If you work on Capitol Hill and/or feel like coming by the hearing, it’s in 2154 Rayburn House Office Building starting (theoretically) at 10:00 am.

The RAC’s full written statement is below.

Chairman Towns and Members of the Committee,

Thank you for inviting me to testify today. My name is David Alpert and I am the District of Columbia Vice-Chair of the WMATA Riders’ Advisory Council. I also report on and advocate for transit and better urban design through my Web site, GreaterGreaterWashington.org.

The Riders’ Advisory Council was established by WMATA in September 2005 and serves as the riders’ voice within WMATA. The Council provides feedback to the Board and customer input to Metro staff. Council members are appointed by the Board of Directors. The Council consists of 21 members, two from each of the District of Columbia, Maryland and Virginia, two appointed at-large and the Chair of the Accessibility Advisory Committee. Members use Metro’s transit services — Metrobus, Metrorail and MetroAccess — and represent a diverse mix of ages, backgrounds and ways in which they use Metro.

WMATA experienced its worst year in history in 2009, and suffered a substantial loss of public confidence. The June 2009 crash on the Red Line and subsequent track worker fatalities catalyzed that change, and accelerated awareness of the larger problem, the growing disrepair of the Metrorail infrastructure.

Despite the challenges faced by WMATA, it remains a vital asset to the Washington region. A recent Washington Post poll found that 80% of riders rate the system positively. During this past month, Metrorail recorded three of its top five highest ridership days (April 1st, 2nd and 7th). This underscores the region’s dependence on Metro and also highlights the need to redouble efforts to maintain and expand the system.

WMATA, its new Interim General Manager Mr. Sarles, and its future permanent General Manager as well as all employees must ensure that safety is their top priority. We need the best safety managers and a culture from the top that ensures that all employees respect and follow the safety recommendations. One day, hopefully very soon, the immediate safety crisis will be a memory.

At that time, we will wrestle with the much more difficult task of repairing a system that is chronically underfunded, both from federal transportation spending rules which contain built-in biases against transit funding, to state and local fiscal decisions which fail to adequately fund a system that has brought hundreds of billions of dollars in economic value to the region.

Failing to keep the system in a state of good repair also seriously threatens safety. While certainly not as dramatic as the incidents that have occurred over the past year, crowded platforms following service disruptions, crumbling platform tiles and out-of-service elevators and escalators are significant, recurring safety concerns.

Ensuring stable and sufficient capital funding for Metro is necessary to improve safety. As WMATA prepares to enter into its next capital plan on July 1st of this year, governments must also provide the resources necessary to adequately maintain Metro’s safety and service, from specific safety recommendations from the National Transportation Safety Board to the everyday yet critical maintenance challenges.

Renewing the local Metro Matters funding agreement, which is currently under negotiation, is essential. Recent news reports have revealed that Maryland, in particular, has deferred some 2010 capital payments, may defer additional payments i n 2011, and may not be able to renew its multi-year commitment to capital funding. In the Washington Post poll, 62% of respondents said that the region should “provide more public transportation options, such as trains or buses” rather than “expanding or building roads.”

The Council appreciates Congress’s support for the $150 million annual federal capital funding for WMATA last year and hopes Congress will continue to provide these funds. Unfortunately, even continuing that appropriation annually and renewing the Metro Matters agreement leaves WMATA about $3.4 billion short of its identified capital needs over the next 10 years.

In addition, WMATA must secure support for its Operating Budget. Closing the currently-projected $190 million operating budget gap for FY2011 will likely require both significant fare increases and substantial service cuts. Proposed cuts could create long headways up to 30 minutes on rail and an hour or more on some buses, increasing crowding and driving many choice riders away from transit. Others would eliminate some service entirely early in the morning and late at night, stranding riders who depend on Metro to get to work at those hours. The General Manager’s proposed budget even shortened rush hour trains and eliminated Yellow Line service at many times.

During recent public hearings on WMATA’s proposed operating budget and imminent fare increases and service reductions, riders expressed a clear preference for increased fares over reductions in service. However, fares cannot be raised too greatly lest riders, especially the most vulnerable, be priced off of Metro.

Riders are not the only ones who benefit from good transit. The entire region benefits economically. The federal government benefits from greater productivity. And drivers benefit from reduced congestion on roadways. For that reason, the Riders’ Advisory Council and transit advocacy groups have asked local jurisdictions to increase their contributions enough to forestall severe service cuts.

The Northern Virginia counties have taken the greatest steps in this area, explicitly making room in their budgets for greater support for transit. Elected leaders including some DC Councilmembers and many Maryland state delegates and county councilmembers have expressed their support. However, there remains a great deal of uncertainty about the amount the funding jurisdictions can or will ultimately provide.

Over the long term, federal, state and local governments must recognize the tremendous asset that Metro represents to the region and support it accordingly. A majority of residents in the aforementioned poll said that the region should find new ways to fund Metro, even if that meant raising some taxes.

Metro’s budget difficulties are certainly not unique among the nation’s transit systems. A recent study released by the American Public Transit Association noted that 84% of transit systems in the United States are planning to raise fares and/or decrease service, or have already done so. Metro does provide uniquely direct value to the federal government, and therefore we hope Congress and the states can work together to explore long-term funding sources.

In the midst of all of these challenges, WMATA must also find a new, permanent General Manager. The Council hopes that as the Board begins its search it will solicit input from all of Metro’s stakeholders, including its riders and its employees.

Riders have expressed their vision for improvements at Metro. They want more reliable service, greater focus on customers, and clearer, more direct and more frequent communication from Metro, especially when things go wrong. While the General Manager must ensure a safe system, the region also needs a GM able to improve service quality and communicate effectively with the public to restore confidence. The Board should seek a candidate able to address Metro’s long-term as well as short-term challenges and listen to stakeholders’ views about those challenges.

Safety should top the list of Metro’s core values. Effective oversight is also critical to maintaining safety and customer confidence in transit. Still, safety cannot exist in a vacuum. Statistics show that commuting by rail is approximately 34 times safer than driving, and many riders make a daily decision between the two.

Mandates that improve safety while maintaining service quality can greatly enhance transit; mandates that impair service in the long run in the name of safety will only drive commuters to other, more dangerous modes of travel. Transit must be safe; it also must not be permanently hamstrung in ways that actually make travelers across all modes less safe.

We are pleased that Congress is taking a strong interest in the safety and success of the Washington area’s transit system. At the same time, safety for commuters in our nation’s capital does not start and end with Metrorail. A US Department of Agriculture employee was killed by a driver after the recent snowstorm when the employee tried to walk to the Branch Avenue Metrorail station in Prince George’s County, Maryland, where the sidewalks had not been cleared. A military truck closing roads for the recent nuclear security summit killed a bicyclist last week right in downtown DC.

WMATA safety issues have received considerable press recently, but the degree of press attention has been so great specifically because Metrorail fatalities are so rare, while fatalities on roadways are common to the point that we have become inured to these tragedies. This Congress should not ignore these larger safety concerns, and could draw needed attention to them by also conducting oversight into the ways in which our roadway designs, snow removal policies, and traffic law enforcement succeed or fail at maximizing the safety of commuters on all modes.

A safe, reliable, well-maintained and adequately funded Metro system will enrich the entire region, notably including the federal government. I thank you for the opportunity to provide testimony and would be happy to answer any questions you may have.