Train of Dreams II

As we just said, trains have a door into the psyche for many of us and create an emotional pull.  Forbes blogger Kai Petainen acknowledges this in his blog post when he tells the story of his father taking him to watch the trains at the Soo.

 I was fascinated by trains.  Soo, Ontario had the wonderful Agawa Canyon Tour Train, and I loved watching it go by.  When I was older, I was able to take a national trip and visit some of the famous train hotels — the Fairmont Hotels.  Now, I still watch the trains and that childhood train fascination is still in me.

But Petainen, who is a stock picker, mentions that he is also aware of the behavioral aspects of investing.  And then he segues into a meditation about his hometown of Ann Arbor.

“Ann Arbor has found itself in somewhat of a controversy, as there are discussions to cut police and fire department personnel, and yet decisions are being made to build a $100 million “transit center”/train station/parking lot.  Cut public safety, build a parking lot.  Cut the fire department and build a train station.  Cut the police department and build a transit center.  Opponents of the “transit center” argue that it isn’t much more than a glorified parking lot for hospital employees.  Others point out that a new transit center will bring more people into Ann Arbor from Detroit and Chicago, and it will function as a bike/bus/train station.  Although Ann Arbor already has a train station (the busiest station in Michigan), and a recent Ann Arbor news article confirms, “Stations are already built in Detroit, Dearborn and Ann Arbor”; they still want to build a new station a few blocks to the east of the existing station.  With the new intermodal station, officials hope to encourage more people to visit this top 10 city.  The situation is pitting the folks who believe ‘It’s an expensive parking lot for employees, located next to a river, replacing parkland’ against those who believe ‘It’s an intermodal station and it will bring people to Ann Arbor and Detroit’.  “

Petainen’s post is well worth reading in its entirety (it also discusses a couple of pollution problems), but the quoted text makes an important point, that we are making an enormous investment (at the municipal scale) in this dream of trains at a time that our city is under many financial strains.

As his post also highlights, it is not just the possibility of reconfiguring AATA to accommodate the trains, but the continuing Ann Arbor City investment in the Fuller Road Station that is based on the belief that somehow, our dream (train) will come.  Talk about behavioral investment – this is a prime example of spending money from an emotional motivation.

The Fuller Road Station Phase I is proposed at $43 million, according to a recent story on AnnArbor.com.  But whether it is just a parking garage for UM employees or really the first step in developing a crucial node for both the  commuter rail and intracity high-capacity transit system as outlined in the Transit Master Plan depends in large part on whether it is really possible to bring in that rail service.  As Ann Arbor’s Mayor, John Hieftje, is quoted by AnnArbor.com,

“It is the most exciting time for rail in Michigan in 100 years,” Hieftje said. “This is a very exciting time and actually things are moving forward.”

But is this real?  We need to know before we make big investments as a city.  The Council is slated to have a work session to review plans for the Fuller Road Station on July 11.  It is important for the Council to know whether the dream of trains is a realizable vision – or just a delusion.

UPDATE:  The July 11 work session will not touch on the Fuller Road Station.  That understanding was evidently spread by a guess in a brief article by the Ann Arbor Chronicle.

Train of Dreams

Discussion of the future of Washtenaw County transit systems (see our previous post on the AATA) has been complicated by a particularly compelling narrative that really has little to do with transit in the county.  The idea of an expanded commuter train system informs both the plans for the Fuller Road Station and the Transit Master Plan (TMP).   This dream of trains charms and confuses because it reaches so deeply into the psyche.

Trains occupy a singular place in our culture’s mind’s eye.  There is a romance, a jumbled set of personal and relayed memories that combine to make just the idea of a train the cause of an emotional rush.  I have those myself.  As a very young child, I traveled from Iowa to Oklahoma on a train at a time that black train porters were still exclusively serving refreshments on trains.   A very kindly man, the first black person I had ever seen, served me hot chocolate with real whipped cream and thus won my undying affection.  About that time there was a train track that ran near a field where I played. It must have been a steam locomotive.  We used to pick up cinders along the track, and sometimes we would hear the train toot as it drew near.  The driver would wave to us as he pulled by, the very picture of the friendly engineer.  Images of some great old trains

Trains have been important in many works of fiction.  Movies like  Murder on the Orient Express and From Russia With Love are still being joined by newcomers like the recent Water for Elephants (where the lost boy hops a boxcar and eventually makes it to the stateroom).  There are stories about ghost trains like the classic by Manley Wade Wellman and ghosts on trains (the movie Ghost).  A train is its own little world, secure and contained, and it takes you from one realm to another.

Local light rail or other intracity trains have become the modern dream of effortless travel. I’ve loved using the Metro in Washington D.C. and  the Bart system in the Bay Area, and the light rail connections running into downtown Portland, Oregon.   Anyone who has ridden a “trolley” or light rail automated system in a large city must have a glowing memory of that experience. For all these reasons and because of numerous positive personal experiences, it has been very easy to sell Ann Arbor area residents on the beauty of an improved rail system here.

And the TMP certainly calls for trains.  Two commuter rail lines (WALLY and the East-West commuter line to Detroit) are supported by the plan.

Proposed commuter lines in TMP

The plan also calls for local high-capacity lines that could be light rail, though other possibilities exist.  These are the Ann Arbor Connector and the Washtenaw Corridor, presumably based on the Reimagining Washtenaw project.

The high-capacity lines, from TMP

And what will this cost?  The financial plan for the TMP has not yet been released.  However, the Smart Growth summary released earlier this year estimated capital costs (only) over 30 years for these four systems as being $413.7 million.  (Summary table of capital costs from April report)  (This does not include the cost of the Fuller Road Station.) Operating costs are not really discussed, though the entire transit system is estimated to have an operating cost of $60.8 million by 2040.  For comparison, the budget for  the City of Ann Arbor General Fund (FY2012) is about $79 million.  The AATA’s capital budget for 2009 was $4.18 million and the 2009 operating budget was $24.45 million.  (More recent budgets could not be discovered on the AATA’s website.)

So how realistic is this plan and how will we resolve desire and reality?  More to come.

AATA Yesterday and Tomorrow

Last night (June 16, 2011), the Ann Arbor Transportation Authority board took the first step toward implementing its Transit Master Plan (TMP) for a countywide or regional transportation authority.  Links to pdf files of Volumes 1 and 2 of the TMP are available in the short notice on the Ann Arbor Chronicle. Volume 1 is a very large file; it is titled “A Transit Vision for Washtenaw County” but contains many full-page and full-color photographs from unnamed cities that are not located in Washtenaw County.  Volume 2, “Transit Master Plan Implementation Strategy”,  is thin on actual procedural steps and strong on sweeping statements about land use planning.

If fully implemented, the TMP will result in a new (yet unnamed) county-wide or regional transportation authority and the current AATA board will be translated magically intact into a new board, currently known only as the Act 196 board.  As we detailed in a previous post, AATA’s Uncertain Future, the objective is to incorporate under a different state law, Act 196.  Currently, AATA is incorporated under Act 55, which is for a local municipal authority.  They are able to offer service outside the city limits (and do) under Purchase Of Service Agreements (POSAs), by contract.  As an Act 196 authority, they can also offer service outside the county lines – as in commuter rail.

So what will happen to the old AATA?  Will it simply be left behind as a lifeless husk once the brilliant butterfly has emerged?  And most importantly, what will happen to the perpetual millage that Ann Arbor citizens currently pay?

It is worthwhile to recall how AATA began and what its legal basis is, in considering that question.  As we spell out in detail on our Transportation Page,  AATA was incorporated in 1968.  It purchased buses with the help of Federal money, helped out by a donation from the city Sewer Fund.  (Don’t ask me to explain that.)  Then, a citizen initiative, led by (of course!) the League of Women Voters, successfully ran a ballot initiative in 1973 that placed a 2.5 mill tax on Ann Arbor property in perpetuity to support the public transportation system.

But, as usually happens when money is involved, trouble was on the horizon.  According to the history recounted in a citizen’s lawsuit against the City of Ann Arbor, the acting city administrator sent AATA a bill requesting repayment of the city’s subsidy in past years. Further, he informed the authority that it would be levied a “municipal service charge” amounting to nearly 10% of the revenue from the millage. (Ah, how little things have changed.)

The enraged citizens who had supported the millage brought suit against the City in January 1974 and won.  The righteousness of their cause fairly drips from the brief.  Here is how the lead plaintiff described herself:

Sally Vinter, 603 Sunset Road, Ann Arbor, Michigan, is and has for several years…been a resident and a taxpayer of local property taxes and of state income, sales, and motor vehicle taxes.  She has been the chairman of a committee designated “Citizens for a Better Transportation System”, which successfully promoted the 1973 referendum to provide a annual 2 1/2 mill tax levy for mass transportation, as set forth hereinbelow.

In a series of partial judgments (January 10, 1975  ; January 29, 1975; July 24, 1975), Judge Patrick J. Conlin found for the plaintiffs. In a final partial judgment, he indicated that the parties had come to a settlement (we aren’t told the terms) and that no further action on the suit would be taken.

The AATA has been an independent authority ever since then, and the City Council and Mayor have been very little involved, except to appoint board members (who were often long-serving).  But in recent years, Mayor John Hieftje has taken a strong interest in transportation.  He laid this out in a remarkable document, the Mayor’s Model for Mobility, in 2006. As we described in an earlier article, it included a strong focus on two commuter trains, one to Howell and one to Detroit.

Hieftje has molded the AATA board to match his vision.  In a conversation some years ago, he specifically stated to me that he had appointed David Nacht (a Scio Township resident) to the AATA Board in order to promote regional transportation.  Under Nacht’s leadership as the then chair, the board took a straw vote in May 2008 to become a regional authority.  The TMP, if achieved, would complete that ambition, and fulfill many aspects of Hieftje’s vision of a complex transit system, with two commuter trains, in-city routes utilizing light rail or bus rapid transit, and major new infrastructure, including a new train station.

But there are many unanswered questions about the fate of the AATA as a city bus service, and about how that hard-won perpetual millage will be used.  They’ll be in future posts.

Ann Arbor’s Hot Summer

Yes, there is snow in Liberty Plaza, but based on early indicators, this is going to be a very hot summer in Ann Arbor indeed.

But the “heat” is not limited to our own local experience of global warming. It is also in the several transformational activities going on at the local government level.

Here is a short list of the issues we’ll be keeping an eye on over the summer.

1. Fuller Road Station

2. The DDA’s downtown planning to determine the fate of city-owned parcels

3. The AATA’s move away from a city transit (mostly buses) system to a regional system that includes passenger trains.

Now that the budget marathon is over, these look like the hottest, though not the only, big issues that may show major movement by the end of the summer.

UPDATE: Check out the revised Transportation Page.  More history and links.