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July 2008
By Angela Cotey, Associate Editor
To put the Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority’s (MARTA) past, present and future into context, General Manager and Chief Executive Officer Beverly Scott often refers to what she calls the “Tale of Three Cities.”
In the 1970s, Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART), the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA) and MARTA each launched operations on new heavy-rail systems. Featuring automatic train control, the systems were hyped as being fast, efficient, modern-day subway systems, and “hailed nationally and internationally as being the resurgence of quality rail transit in the U.S.,” says Scott, a 30-year transit industry veteran who joined the agency last October.
But in the years since, the BART and WMATA systems have continued to expand, while funding issues have caused MARTA’s 48-mile system to fall far short of the five-county operation it was originally intended to be. And today, the San Francisco and Washington, D.C. systems are more than double the size of MARTA, even though Atlanta’s population and employment have exploded in recent years.
How big of an explosion? Metropolitan Atlanta just ended a years-long reign as the fastest-growing region in the United States, and currently holds the No. 2 spot behind Dallas-Fort Worth, according to U.S. Census Bureau data. The growth spurt has resulted in gridlock on the city’s double-digit-lane highways and is taking a toll on the region’s quality of life.
“We have become the poster child in the U.S. for horrible air quality and terrible traffic congestion, and that is inconsistent with the vision and persona of Atlanta as the epicenter of the Southeast,” says Scott.
To get back on track, Atlanta needs to expand its transit system. Not that the thought is just occurring to regional transportation planners now — they’ve been discussing and developing transit expansion plans for years. They just haven’t gotten beyond that initial step.
“We have ‘plan-itis,’” says Scott. “As a region, we have a penchant to do quite a bit of planning and talking, but we have yet to pull it together and move forward with a real action plan.”
Scott and other regional transportation officials hope to finally turn talk into action. They’re working together on a task force charged with developing a regional transportation plan and, more important, recommending ways to govern and finance it. If the plans are carried out, MARTA stands to gain a significantly expanded system that includes commuter- and light-rail components, as well as a larger role in overseeing regional transit operations. Both are long overdue.
“We have people who need to move within a five-county, 10-county, 20-county area, and right now we don’t do an effective job of knitting that all together,” says Scott. “I think we’ve lost our way over the last 10, 15 years in terms of continuous and bold investments in infrastructure.”
And there’s no better example of that lack of investment than the MARTA system itself.
The agency’s rail system originally was designed to serve the city of Atlanta and five urban core counties: DeKalb, Fulton, Clayton, Cobb and Gwinnett. To join MARTA, the counties first had to sign an intergovernmental agreement; Cobb County didn’t take the initial step. The remaining four counties had to vote on a referendum to allocate a half-cent sales tax to provide operating and capital support for the agency; Clayton and Gwinnett county voters never passed the sales tax.
“The last votes were taken in the early 1980s,” says MARTA Board Chairman Michael Walls.
As a result, MARTA is only a two-county operation that receives funding from the city of Atlanta, as well as DeKalb and Fulton counties, and its 48-mile system is significantly smaller than originally planned. Other metropolitan Atlanta counties since have established their own bus systems.
Moreover, MARTA is the largest transit agency in the country that doesn’t receive any state funding, agency execs say.
“Georgia is predominantly a rural state, so traditionally the state government has been under the control of a primarily rural legislature, and there’s been a lack of understanding of the need to support certain projects,” says Walls.
But there are signs that elected officials are beginning to understand. Earlier this year, the state legislature debated a bill that would have placed a constitutional amendment question on the November ballot asking voters if designated regions (including metro Atlanta) should be allowed to hold a referenda to implement a one-cent transportation sales tax. If the initiative had passed, regions could have put together a list of projects to be funded and held a referendum to impose the tax.
The bill passed Georgia’s House but failed by three votes in the Senate on the last day of the 2008 session; however, MARTA and other regional transportation officials were encouraged by the close vote and believe a similar bill will be introduced in the next legislative session.
If it passes, regional transportation officials will be armed with a long-range plan that includes plenty of projects that could be funded through a sales tax.
In 2005, regional planning organization the Atlanta Regional Commission (ARC) conducted the Regional Transit Institutional Analysis, examining the metropolitan area’s various transit services. The conclusion: Those services were inadequate.
So, ARC established the Transit Planning Board (TPB), which is charged with developing a big-picture transportation vision for the Atlanta region, as well as recommending how to govern and finance it.
A joint venture between MARTA, ARC and the Georgia Regional Transportation Authority (GRTA), the 19-member board includes all of the metropolitan Atlanta county chairs, three business people appointed by the governor, the mayor of Atlanta, the board chairs of MARTA, GRTA and the Georgia Department of Transportation, and MARTA’s general manager.
“We have all the right people in the region at the table to make some decisions,” says TPB Staff Director Cheryl King, a 30-year transit industry veteran herself, who has worked for engineering and consulting firms on transit projects throughout the country.
Prior to the TPB, getting those “right people” together was difficult.
“This was a region that had never really worked together for an extended period of time to discuss some of these [transportation] issues,” says King. “And we need to move forward with a coordinated regional transit system.”
One thing was clear from the get-go: This would not be another planning exercise.
“We’ve been planning for over 30 years,” says King. “We looked at about 60 different plans that had been reviewed, but very few advanced past the planning stage.”
And the TPB did use some of those plans to help create Concept 3 (“We looked at two other concepts before this one,” King says), a long-range, regional transportation plan. Completed in October 2007, the plan calls for expanding upon the existing transit services currently offered by MARTA and other county agencies, as well as adding light- and commuter-rail service.
For MARTA’s part, Concept 3 includes plans to expand heavy-rail service west from the H.E. Holmes Station to the interchange of I-285 and Martin Luther King Jr. Drive, and from the airport south; add light-rail service along the I-75 corridor to the Cobb County town center, the I-85 corridor into Gwinnett County; and implement commuter-rail service from Atlanta to Lovejoy, as well as a line running west through Douglas County, and southwest to Senoia, and lines to Athens and Gainesville.
MARTA also plans to build the Peachtree Streetcar system, and the long-discussed BeltLine project, which calls for operating light-rail or streetcar service along 22 miles of abandoned rail right of way that loops around Atlanta’s inner core. The BeltLine would include parks, and jogging and walking trails in the city.
“It’s the main transit project for the city of Atlanta and also a MARTA priority,” says Walls.
Last month, TPB staff completed a four-month public tour for Concept 3. Staff members conducted about three briefings per week, showing the plan to community groups, civic organizations, chambers of commerce, shoppers at local malls — “anyone who would talk to us,” says King.
The board currently is refining the plan based on feedback it received (for example, some people mentioned they would like cross-county transit service in addition to service directly into Atlanta) and hopes to sign off on a final version by August.
Now comes the hard part. TPB members have to agree on a way to govern and finance the plan — and then convince the public to pay for it.
The most logical option would be putting MARTA — or some version of it — in charge of the regional transportation system.
“Certainly, MARTA is the only system in the state that is a complex, multi-modal system where people have experience designing, operating and maintaining a rail system, bus system and paratransit system,” says Scott. “Wherever things go, we’ll will play a big part, whether it’s MARTA, or a son or daughter of MARTA.”
King agrees, but it not might be so easy to convince other local transit agencies to relinquish control over their systems.
“Governance is a tough issue because it gets into ‘what’s in it for me’ and ‘what control will I have’ — it gets to be emotional,” she says. “But all these agencies could work better and more efficiently together, so we’re looking at a potential governance structure that would be a modification of MARTA. We’re looking at possibly changing the board structure and who’s on it.”
Equally tough will be obtaining the money to fund Concept 3. The TPB believes a dedicated sales tax would be the best funding option, as it has the greatest potential revenue yield, says King.
In March, research firm Ayers McHenry & Associates conducted a survey on behalf of the TPB, and asked more than 4,000 metropolitan Atlanta registered voters if they would support funding strategies to expand rail and bus service. The result: 85 percent said yes. And 74 percent believed their community needs transportation options, such as commuter rail, light rail, buses and trolleys.
While two of the five counties that were originally included in MARTA’s service plan wouldn’t tax themselves for the service 30 years ago — and one didn’t even vote on the tax — TPB members say circumstances have changed dramatically, and believe voters in those counties today will favor public transit.
“With the increasing gas prices, it’s getting to the point where it’s not affordable to drive your car, and that reality is sinking in,” says King. “A lot of people moved to the outlying counties because housing was cheaper and before, people didn’t even think of driving 60 miles to and from work. Now, they’re spending all this time and money to do it and it doesn’t make sense.”
Not to mention the counties have grown substantially, so while 30 years ago it might not have made sense to offer public transit service from Cobb, Clayton or Gwinnett counties into Atlanta, today it’s a must.
“Twenty years ago, Gwinnett County had 100,000 people; today, It’s 800,000 people and the second-fastest growing area in the state,” says Scott. “Also, the capital city used to be where everybody was, and there now are regional activity centers that have mini employment centers — and they’re not that mini.”
While there might be a good amount of public support for public transit, it’ll still take a lot of convincing at both the state and local level to finance the Concept 3 plan. First, the state legislature has to pass a bill enabling the region to take the plan before voters.
“Everybody’s very much focused on this upcoming session,” says King. “The business community also has weighed in on this because they think the lack of mobility is a deterrent to commerce, and they have influence with politicians, so it’s really helping to drive the conversation. Now, we have to talk to legislators and let them know what we found in our study and show them our regional model.”
If the funding proposal goes before voters, Scott knows it’ll be just as hard to get voters to approve it.
“These are difficult times and we’re asking people to contribute an additional sales tax,” she says. “But meanwhile, we have a highway trust fund that’s broken, so we know there has to be a large local self-help effort.”
Another potential bump in the road: The TPB is set to expire at 2008’s end, so members are working against the clock to ensure the regional transportation plan is as far along as possible before the end of the year.
“We were never supposed to be a permanent entity; we’re more of a special purpose task force,” says King. “We’ve provided a forum for people to discuss these issues, and people are afraid that if the TPB goes away, who will do that?”
So, TPB staff currently is working on an exit strategy to ensure regional transportation discussion continues long after the regional transportation board expires.
“Maybe this is too Pollyanna, but my hope is that the recommendation is adopted and some entity will be put in place to oversee it,” says King. “More likely, an existing entity will morph into [the TPB] and we’ll make sure our key functions have a home and that the progress we’ve made doesn’t get lost.”
Scott, for one, believes the progress will continue, partly because the TPB comprises a few new Atlanta-area transportation officials who can bring a fresh set of eyes to the regional transportation issues — hers included.
But even more than that, progress will continue because it has to. There’s too much at stake for Atlanta — the global competitor, the capital of the Southeast — to be constrained by an inadequate and inefficient transportation network. And that’s a realization that transportation officials, state legislators, business executives and residents finally are coming to.
“Sometimes it’s better if you truly have an urgent need, because then everyone is forced to turn things around,” says Scott. “Crisis does a lot of things; it really propels you into action.”
Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority (MARTA) officials might be in the throes of developing long-term expansion plans, but that doesn’t mean efforts to maintain the existing system are taking a backseat. The authority currently is carrying out a handful of initiatives aimed at bringing the system to a state of good repair and improving operations.
“We need to occupy the ground we stand on,” says MARTA General Manager and Chief Executive Officer Beverly Scott. “No matter what happens in the future, we are the regional backbone for transit.”
To stay that way, Scott is rallying her employees to “be as good as we can be every single day” — and that goes for everyone, from operators to managers to station and train cleaners.
“We’ve become an organization for which it has been OK to be OK,” she says. “We’re a sturdy system, we’re satisfactory, but sometimes that makes it much more challenging because you don’t strive for excellence.”
How is MARTA striving for excellence these days? For starters, the agency is in the process of rehabilitating its 338 rail cars with Alstom Transport and implementing a preventive maintenance program. Stations are getting a makeover as well, and MARTA plans to soon begin upgrading its train-control system.
“We’re part of the aging New Starts, these systems that were developed 20, 30 years ago,” says Scott. “When you’re new, there’s always this big rush to expand service, but unless you’re very careful, everything gets old and starts showing its age around the 20-year mark.”
On the operations side, MARTA launched Making Operations Very Efficient, or MOVE, in March. MOVE is an 18-month study under which the agency will assess current operations and obtain feedback from passengers on ways it can improve the customer experience.
MARTA’s also doing some work in the maintenance-of-way arena. In December, the agency expects to complete the $76 million Trackway Renovation Phase II (TR-II) project, which included renovating a portion of the north/south line. The project is a follow-up to a similar program conducted several years ago on the east/west line.
The project calls for replacing rail, fasteners and ties in 60 turnouts, sealing concrete ties, and replacing bridge bearings and expansion joints on a 22-mile segment between Doraville, Ga., and Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport. Now, the agency is planning the TR-III project, which calls for replacing 90,000 linear feet of running rail.
“You’re only as good as your product, and no matter what, it always goes back to those basics,” says Scott.
— Angela Cotey
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