Move it, L.A.!
By Frank Gruber
When Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa dropped by to make some
lunchtime remarks at the "It's Time to Move L.A." conference
that the new Los Angeles Country Transportation Funding Collaborative
(LACTFC) sponsored last Thursday in downtown L.A., he told a campaign
story that unfortunately summarized why we're in such a mess when it
comes to mobility in the region.
It's all about easy fixes that please motorists but that won't work
versus expensive, difficult changes that will.
The mayor recounted that when he was first running for mayor (i.e.,
when he lost to James Hahn) he tried but failed to get the attention
of voters by talking about real solutions like mass transit and changing
land use patterns. Only when he imitated the other candidates, and talked
up measures that would have at best trivial results -- measures like
synchronizing lights, or adding left-turn signals, or limiting construction
during rush hours -- did voters pay attention.
Now that he's mayor, Mr. Villaraigosa said that he's been diligently
fulfilling his campaign promises. Construction has been curtailed during
rush hours. Hundreds of lights have been synched. Hundreds of left-turn
arrows have been installed and hundreds more are on their way. (Comment:
left turn arrows degrade the environment for pedestrians and make through
traffic worse.)
But the mayor said that when he's finished fulfilling these promises,
no one stuck in traffic will notice the difference. Traffic will still
be bad and getting worse. He expressed the hope, however, that at least
when all the simplistic solutions have been tried, people will realize
that the only way to improve mobility will be to bring housing closer
to jobs, and to provide mass transit and other alternatives to driving.
How to find the money for transit was the focus of the conference.
There were panels at Thursday's conference that considered the possibilities
of using federal and state funding, private capital, tolls, parking
revenues, a national container fee, carbon taxes, assessment districts,
etc., etc., to fund transit. The ultimate question, however, considered
in the final panel of the conference and given the most prominence,
was whether L.A. Metro should ask the voters to tax themselves, probably
by way of a half-percent increase in the sales tax, to fund much of
the 60 billion dollars the county will need for both transit and road
projects over the next twenty-five years.
Although pollster John Fairbank reported that preliminary polling is
not bad, and notwithstanding that the presidential election in November
is sure to attract a large turnout favorable to a tax proposal, such
a tax will be a dicey proposition unless the legislature and the voters
approve a proposal by Assembly Member Mike Feuer to reduce the threshold
for passing transportation tax measures to 55 percent from two-thirds.
Unfortunately, notwithstanding that L.A. Metro would include in the
measure projects, including road projects, designed to appeal to voters
throughout the county, a stumbling block could be the project that would
do the most good for us on the Westside -- the $7 billion extension
of the Wilshire Boulevard subway.
Wilshire may be the best corridor in the country for routing a subway,
but a member of the Metro board from Duarte told the conference that
his constituents might balk if they thought subway might soak up all
the money. And according to a report on the conference in the L.A. Times,
a spokesman for County Supervisor Mike Antonovich, who represents the
northern part of the county, said that the supervisor would probably
oppose a transportation tax for the same reason.
To be honest, I understand the impulse. I have no interest in paying
good money to widen the Pearblossom Highway, or whatever road projects
they may want up in Santa Clarita.
But one thing we know from history is that projects that motorists
like -- even if they're useless, like HOV lanes for two-person "carpools,"
or synchronizing streetlights and adding left-turn arrows -- will somehow
get the money and transit projects, in the absence of extraordinary
efforts, won't. For that reason I'd vote yes for a well-decorated Christmas
measure if one of the ornaments is the subway.
One point I've been trying to make, though, is that we on the Westside,
where there has been extraordinary enthusiasm for the subway extension
(just ask the Beverly Hills City Council), need to prepare a back-up
plan. If the county as a whole won't fund the transportation improvements
we all need, then we on the Westside -- and by Westside I mean everything
from Santa Monica to downtown L.A., and from Hollywood to Culver City
and the Marina -- need to take our money (we are the richest part of
the county) and spend it on the projects that we need, now.
I don't know (i) if the City of L.A. could enact a special sales tax
for its part of the Westside, and join with the other Westside cities
to do so, (ii) if an assessment district is feasible (Assembly Member
Feuer is also proposing legislation that would make it more feasible
to form what are called "Infrastructure Financing Districts"),
(iii) if there could be a role for private capital, or (iv), if significant
money could be raised by way of a Westside employee parking tax, but
I would not put all our eggs in the county-wide basket.
If we don't want to be locked in by the great wall of the 405, we have
to be willing to pay for a solution.
* * *
Three relevant digressions:
Relevant digression I: I know that all this talk of more funding for
transportation must sound crazy when California is facing a $14 billion
deficit, but this latest crisis reminds us of the root of our difficulties:
Prop. 13. California is a wealthier state than ever, with one of the
more productive economies in the world, but its finances careen from
boom to bust because they are based on taxes on income, capital gains,
and sales taxes.
Because of Prop. 13, a large portion of California's wealth is immune
from taxes. Each year a large number of Californians, among them many
of the most wealthy who have sat on real estate for decades, and many
of the largest and most profitable corporations, get a tax decrease
in relative terms, while all the while Republicans block any consideration
of tax increases, even if the money would go for purposes they support
(like transportation).
Yes, I agree, people with modest incomes might need tax relief, and
moderating increases in property assessments can help with the stability
of neighborhoods. But Warren Buffet, who has a certain insight when
it comes to money, wasn't kidding when he said that California needed
to fix Prop. 13.
Relevant digression II: At Thursday's conference there was a lot of
talk about marshaling private investment to build transportation projects.
This is done a lot in other parts of the world, and even in the U.S.
it's becoming more common for road or bridge projects, where there is
less resistance for charging meaningful fees for use (i.e., tolls) and
operating costs are low compared to transit.
Private capital could be attracted to transit projects, too, but it
won't happen if we continue to treat transit as an extension of the
welfare system. As I have written before, we need to develop a rational
fare system that charges closer to what the market will bear for the
first class service everyone says the people deserve. Subsidies for
the poor, unemployed, disabled, et al., in the former of discounted
monthly passes, need to come from a different pot of money.
Relevant digression III: My Santa Monica pride overflowed at the conference,
because so many SaMo residents were involved. Former mayor Denny Zane
has been the lead organizer of the Subway to the Sea Coalition and the
LACTFC, and Planning Commissioner Terry O'Day has also taken a big part.
Council Member Pam O'Connor is the current Chair of the Metro board.
Former Planning Commissioner Darrell Clarke has been a principal organizer
of Friends of Expo, which inspired the formation of the LACTFC. Allen
Freeman, of Santa Monica-based JSM Capital, LLC, has also been involved,
and JSM is a sponsor of LACTFC.
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