Capital Metro unveiled its streetcar circulator route for Down-town and
Mueller at its board meeting this week, but the agency managed to see
that announcement upstaged by a proposal to double current bus fares
and a likely impending labor squabble.
Timing
has never been Capital Metro's strength, and Monday afternoon's board
meeting was no exception. The circulator route – while a bit of a
letdown given that most of the plan had been floating around local
groups for months – represented 18 months of critical dialogue between
the agency and the community, including the University of Texas. If
this $230 million addendum to the commuter rail line is approved, it
would provide easy access among UT, Downtown, and the master-planned
Mueller community. A researcher at the J.J. Pickle Center could jump on
a train, hit the Manor Road rail platform, and use a streetcar to get
to the proposed UT Health Science Center or Dell Children's Hospital in
Mueller. Mueller residents who wanted to see a Longhorn home game would
no longer have to worry about where to park their cars. And anyone
working Downtown who wants a quick lunch could hop on a streetcar
without the worry of losing a coveted parking spot.
This
is not a rapid bus into Downtown, said planner Lucy Galbraith. This is
a slow circulator route, with stops every three blocks or so, intended
to provide maximum local access. If this streetcar option catches on
with potential users, ridership is estimated to be about 3.5 million
riders per year by 2017, with an average estimated operating cost of
$1.63 per rider – on par with the cost of bus ridership. Capital Metro
indicated that it would seek funding from federal sources – as well as
financial partnerships with the city, county, state, and developers –
before turning to the voters to pick up the cost. The bow on the
package is an estimated $362 million in additional development the
circulator system could bring to Mueller and the Manor Road corridor.
Galbraith says that comes from the balance that people usually split
between housing and transportation. The less someone needs to spend on
the commute to work or school, the more that person is willing to spend
on housing. More money for housing means more investment in housing and
retail. Charles Heimsath of Capitol Market Research will present a
report on the streetcars' impact on Downtown at Thursday's council
meeting.
The
big benefits of streetcars, however, were overshadowed on Monday by a
discussion of the first fare increases the transit agency has proposed
since 1985. Even as Cap Metro considers new spending for additional
mass-transit options, it is proposing to double fares, from 50 cents to
$1. Actually, the proposal put forth to the board this week was to
eventually quadruple the fares to $2, to be more in line with the
board's preferred revenue-to-cost ratios, but board members balked at
the long-term outlook. Right now, it's still just $1, a proposal likely
to get much vetting before a vote.
And
no Capital Metro board meeting is quite complete until there's some
type of labor dispute in the air. This month, it was how a proposal to
outsource the commuter rail operations to an outside vendor is being
structured. Council Members Lee Leffingwell and Brewster McCracken were
inclined to lean toward the union, requiring contractors to give first
dibs on jobs on the anticipated six commuter rail trains. The rest of
the board was more inclined to send the proposal out to potential
vendors with no encumbrances. Chair Lee Walker noted the concerns that
were being presented – that another vendor could mean another class or
category of employees – but said it was unlikely such a discussion
could be hashed out at a single board meeting.
