Op-Ed: Support TSPLOST, Breathe Easier
Decatur Metro | June 12, 2011Submitted by: Rebecca Watts Hull, City of Decatur resident, Director of Mothers & Others for Clean Air and Board Member of Citizens for Progressive Transit
Light rail…commuter rail…bike paths… or more sprawl?
For Decatur residents who care about metro Atlanta’s transportation infrastructure and want to see more of the 10-county area connected by public transit, sidewalks and safe bicycle routes like our hometown, now is the time to speak up! The clock is ticking—we have until August 15 to shape the first draft of the list of transportation projects that, if voters approve, will be funded by a 10 year Transportation Special Local Option Sales Tax (TSPLOST).
The Atlanta Regional Commission (ARC) already has sponsored an online public poll that showed widespread support for transit, bicycle and pedestrian projects through our region. Many metro area polls administered over the past five years show that most of us want a 21st century public transportation system. Public opinion in the suburbs has changed dramatically since Cobb, Clayton and Gwinnett refused MARTA rail service several decades ago.
The Executive Committee of the Atlanta Regional Transportation Roundtable is charged with boiling down a $22 million transportation wish list to $8 million (the estimated amount the tax would raise over 10 years), and Decatur citizens should take note that our Mayor, Bill Floyd, is a member of that small and powerful group. After the project list is finalized this October, voters will have only a “yes” or “no” option at the polls in July 2012. Let’s vote “yes” on a good list of projects that helps Atlanta move toward a 21st century transportation system, rather than having to say “no” because the list represents business as usual-– more road widening projects and the sprawl that results.
HOW TO SPEAK OUT
From June 13 – 22, the Roundtable will host telephone Town Hall meetings to solicit public input on the transportation project list. In addition, the Executive Committee and full Roundtable host public information sessions as well as their own meetings that are open to the public and include a public comment time—just show up and sign up (two minute limit). Finally, Decatur citizens should to ensure he knows we expect him to fight hard for the great transit, bicycle and pedestrian projects on the transportation wish list.
Visit Mothers & Others for Clean Air for background information and links to the full proposed project list, project criteria suggested by Citizens for Progressive Transit, meeting information and telephone town hall information.
Why should we care?
City of Decatur residents already enjoy ready access to three MARTA rail stations, Emory shuttle service, and pedestrian friendly commercial and residential neighborhoods. Plus, Decatur residents, along with other DeKalb County residents and our neighbors in the City of Atlanta and Fulton County, have been paying a one-penny sales tax for 40 years to fund MARTA. Why would we want to add another penny tax?
The air we breathe, for one, needs that penny. While Decatur has been investing in active transportation for some time, we share the air we breathe with 20+ metro counties, many of which have been making different choices. The limited scope of our public transportation network is the greatest barrier standing between metro residents and clean air. Children growing up in metro Atlanta are at increased risk of many serious health problems, including wheezing and asthma, reduced lung function that persists into adulthood, and heart problems as a result of air pollution. It can be a real challenge for some adults, as well, who suffer health effects ranging from frequent sinus infections to cardiac arrest. The TSPLOST offers Atlanta an opportunity to expand the region’s public transit, bicycle and pedestrian infrastructure so that more residents have good alternatives to polluting car travel.
We all pay for the health burden associated with air pollution, as well as another growing health problem is associated with metro Atlanta’s car dependent lifestyles—obesity. The health benefits of walking and cycling to work or school seem pretty obvious, but using transit also adds physical activity to the commuter’s daily pattern, even when using a park ‘n’ ride lot. The couple of flights of stairs and limited walking that goes along with a rail trip versus door-to-door car travel add up, studies show, producing measurable health benefits. When we account for the millions in healthcare costs, and their effects on insurance rates, associated with respiratory and heart diseases and obesity, expanding public transit to serve the whole metro Atlanta region looks like a bargain in comparison.
Latest from Decaturish
I think you mean 8 billion not 8 million.
Russ, you are correct, mea culpa– the figures should read billions, not millions.
I already pay a penny sales tax for MARTA. Unless all the other counties find some way to kick in years and years of makeup payments, I cannot see this passing in Fulton or DeKalb.
We all know the public transit story: everyone’s unhappy for whatever reason they choose as “topic of the month,” but this time around though, I found something a tad more interesting, and that’s Bombardier’s latest multibillion dollar victory. Maybe I’m just a sucker for corporate drama, but this may be worth a glance for you as well: http://www.pressdisplay.com/pressdisplay/showlink.aspx?bookmarkid=LH6VO8R7RKC1&preview=article&linkid=f304d9c0-23d7-4a4a-8941-4885a2d11ee2&pdaffid=ZVFwBG5jk4Kvl9OaBJc5%2bg%3d%3d
In any case, enjoy
I believe the reality is quite different. Additional lane miles of roads will increase vehicle miles traveled, which will worsen air quality. Rail transit atop existing land use patterns – exurban rail lines especially – supports sprawl and worsens air quality.
Regarding “just show up and sign up,” be advised that meetings are few and oral comments are limited to 10 slots per meeting.
Regarding Citizens for Progressive Transit and other well-intentioned non-profits lending their names to the Livable Communities Coalition, branding any split as a ‘Fair Share for Transit’ is just that… branding.
Bobby is correct that, in some cases, exurban rail can lead to car dependent development (sprawl). If the rail station is surrounded by parking lots, then it will only be accessible by car or bus.
However, it does not have to be this way.
Decatur is a good example. It’s downtown station is designed to be walked to. While station construction disrupted many businesses in the 1970s, the station has since been a driver of compact, walkable development. Because some employees and visitors access downtown by rail, less land has to be set aside for parking. Much of the land that would have become parking lots can instead be businesses or residential buildings. Businesses and residential buildings generate far more tax revenue than parking lots and this improves Decatur’s overall economic health.
Compared to most suburban malls, the businesses surrounding Decatur MARTA station have done a remarkable job of weathering the recession.
Walkable or semi-walkable MARTA stations are also having a positive effect in Midtown, Downtown, Lindbergh, Chamblee, East Point, and College Park.
Eastlake and Avondale MARTA stations are a different story. They generate some walkable development. But because parking lots surround the stations, the stations generate much less walkable development than they could.
But car oriented transit stations in suburban areas do have some positive effects. First, they support transit oriented development at the walkable stations. If a car oriented light rail station gets built in Cobb County, it increases the number of Cobb Countians traveling to Downtown Decatur via rail rather than car. That means fewer parking lots and more pedestrian oriented businesses in downtown Decatur and more tax revenue for the city.
Second, you can always convert a car-oriented station to a development-oriented station later. Parking lots can be sold to developers to generate walkable development.
Regarding Citizens for Progressive Transit, you should note that the organization has made no endorsement of the TSPLOST referendum. While it supports the Fair Share Campaign, CfPT has adopted additional criteria for grading the final project list: http://www.mothersandothersforcleanair.org/documents/CFPT_HB277Position.pdf
Bobby’s point is that adding transportation capacity that extends for miles will add people and their cars in exurban areas and beyond (and won’t improve air quality).
Regarding “Decatur is a good example,” what’s the transit ridership? What about car ownership?
Regarding “car oriented transit stations in suburban areas … support transit oriented development at the walkable stations,” if there’s a retail business owner in Decatur that supports an additional 1% sales tax in hopes of attracting customers from Cobb county that arrive at their store after driving to transit in Cobb, transferring at Arts Center Station, and transferring through Five Points Station to arrive at Decatur Station by rail, I’d be interested to have them make that case.
Regarding “you can always convert a car-oriented station to a development-oriented station later,” practice, not theory, indicates substantial challenges to such a conversion.
This is going to be the most crucial vote that we as a region, let alone the rest of the state as well, will be taking for a long time! Therefore, we’d better get it right the first time.
We need good transportation projects on the final project list, and we need to support the transportation sales tax if it does contain such projects! Thus, everyone needs to get to work and tell their electeds to put transit, sidewalks, and other mobility-enhancing projects on the final list!!!
Complaining about DeKalb and Fulton not getting a fair shake isn’t gonna cut it, either, since we in these counties are always the first to say when we vote on other SPLOST’s here, “….you know, half of the tax is going to be paid for by out-of town-folks, so let’s support the tax.”
Truly, we can’t have it both ways. Either they do or they don’t pay the tax when they live outside Fulton and DeKalb, and I would maintain that they DO, since a number of studies have shown this to be the case.
So let’s work to getting good stuff on the project list, and stop squawking about al the so-called “inequities” of getting ripped off by those ‘evil suburbanites’ — the very ones we always maintain will be paying half of it when other, non-transportation purpose, SPLOSTs are put on the ballot! Thank you.
Its not an issue of if the out of towners pay part of the 1% tax. Its that I as a DeKalb Resident who shops almost entirely in DeKalb or Fulton will then have to pay 8% in DeKalb and Fulton and 9% in the City of Atlanta. And its money that we can’t collect for other purposes.
For example if we are willing to add a 1% tax why not increase the MARTA tax? Heck raising a MARTA tax from 1% to 1.5% will be less in taxes and result in greater transit funding.
I question if just getting 50% of the projects on the list for transit worth it – the additional 50% of projects for roads would seem to erase the benefits from a little new transit. Bottom line until the region gets serious about better land planning and land use practices throwing money at transportation could just make things worse. We have several underutilized MARTA station areas where substantial development could go.
Its congestion that’s been getting people to realize the value of the MARTA system and to encourage better land development practices.
Also, HB87 leaves silent what happens if a project doesn’t get built. Since the transit projects are farthest away from being shovel ready the road projects will largely go first. The hurdles facing the transit projects will likely mean some never get built. There is no restriction preventing them from shifting funding from a scrapped transit project that was put on the list to a road project that is on the list. Alternatively the HB87 states that the funds get distributed back to the various counties based on the LARP funding formula.
And before anyone discounts the above scenario, take a look at the history of Regional Transportation Plans, they have historically been somewhat balanced on paper, problem is the transit projects never got built so when actually implemented it turned out to be very road oriented. For example Commuter Rail has been in the Regional Plans for well over 10 years, maybe 20 years, but this substantial funding all ended up getting shifted to cost over runs to roads or sent back
As a long time Decatur resident, and bicycle commuter, I fully support a penny sales tax for projects that would lead to enhanced transit and active transportation options in the Atlanta metro area.