metrics – Investing in Place

As Los Angeles County considers a fourth transportation sales with potential to generate tens of billions of new transportation dollars, we look to best practices to guide the framework and metrics used to prioritize investments. And the City of Los Angeles Safe Routes to School Strategic Plan provides just that. It is an example of transportation policy that is based on data and need, taking precedence over political boundaries and supports a citywide vision.

In 2012 the City’s department of transportation (LADOT) launched the Safe Routes to School Strategic Plan to make the most of the city’s resources to address mobility needs for students and families and the 500 public school within the city limits. This strategic plan developed a prioritization and methodology for targeting the top 50 highest Los Angeles Unified District Schools (LAUSD) schools using the criteria:

Collision rates
Number of enrolled students living within walking distance and bicycling distance of the school (thanks to a critically valuable partnership the City of Los Angeles has developed with LAUSD)
Percentage of students eligible for free and reduced lunches
Determination if the school has previously received a Safe Routes to School State or Federal grant before

As a result of this data based strategic plan that addresses public health and social equity goals, in 2014 LADOT was successful in being awarded over $20 million from the State Active Transportation Program (ATP) to increase safety through street improvements around nine of the highest need schools, develop complementary safety and education campaigns and create school travel plans for the remaining top 50 high need schools. And the Safe Routes to School strategic plan is also a critical part of the City of Los Angeles Vision Zero efforts, enabling the city to layer on data, need, and prioritization methodology to address social equity and public health in not only in its policies but in its funding decisions.

This local example is a powerful story on how regional transportation funds could be allocated on need and desired safety and mobility outcomes using public health and social equity metrics, data, prioritization methodology and partnerships.

Metro is writing a new comprehensive Long Range Transportation Plan (LRTP). Under the existing LRTP from 2009, Metro hopes to increase the farebox recovery rate of its bus and rail systems. Farebox recovery is the percentage of transit operating expenses that are covered by revenues from transit fares. The current rate is 29%. Metro hopes to increase the rate to 33%. Under current circumstances, this probably means raising the price of bus and train tickets. Here I’d like to explain why I think a different goal is more appropriate for the new LRTP: maximizing ridership.

Screen Shot 2015-08-18 at 4.50.33 PM — What would this kind of breakdown look like for other transportation modes?

Charge More?

But first, you might ask: “What’s wrong with charging a bit more?” It’s an understandable question. In order to keep things going, Metro has to match expenditure with revenue. Any organization that keeps running deficits eventually becomes insolvent. So farebox recovery would ideally be 100% and Metro would be in the black, right? Under this scenario, the subsidies keeping the buses and trains rolling are the problem. Society may begrudgingly pay out of a sense of moral obligation to the poor, but users should pay more so that we can keep this handout as small as possible.