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Transportation
 Reduce Congestion Now In the Puget Sound region, 97% of our daily person-trips are in private vehicles. Transit carries about 3% of daily trips. Even with completion of all the planned improvements, in year 2010 transit will still carry about 3% of daily trips. Yet the majority of transportation improvements planned for the region are for transit, and no congestion relief is promised. This report outlines a program to reduce traffic congestion by 25% from today’s level for this "other 97%", while increasing mobility. It would be done by the year 2010. While this report focuses on the three-county are of King, Pierce, and Snohomish Counties, the principles apply State-wide. Prepared for: KEMPER DEVELOPMENT COMPANY, October 1, 1999 What are the Issues?
TDA Inc., 5/11/99 During the 1980s, person miles of travel increased at a rate several times higher than that of population for the Puget Sound Region. In the 1990s, this trend has continued (although at a somewhat slower rate). That means we can’t blame all of the growing traffic congestion on new population. All of us are driving more and more. This growth is in private vehicle travel. Transit’s market share of urban travel continued to decline, both nationally and locally. Transit is important to some specific locations and some specific market segments. But in the big picture, transit is declining as an element of our transportation system. Also, in spite of all the efforts to encourage ridesharing, the average number of people per vehicle continues to decline. More issues:
TDA Inc., 5/11/99 No local agency appears to have a mission to improve mobility, with the exception of the transit agencies. However, as will be shown later, transit’s contribution is a very small part of the total. PSRC does not have a program for mobility improvement. Neither does Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT). Capacity improvement comes last in WSDOT’s priority system. Capacity improvements are funded only after all of the other claims are satisfied. PSRC’s MTP gives up on mobility. It describes a projected increase in desire to travel, but provides no means to satisfy that demand. For example, the MTP says, "By the year 2020, if major changes in the attitude and behavior of the traveling public do not occur, the congested portions of the region’s freeway and arterial network will be far more extensive than they are today..." [emphasis added] In other words, rather than responding to our needs, the MTP says we all should change our behavior. In the Puget Sound region, over half of our public transportation funding is allocated to transit (Puget Sound Regional Council [PSRC], Metropolitan Transportation Plan [MTP], 1995). Almost no funding is available for capacity improvements in our street and highway system (which is carrying 97% of the trips). Roads Will Carry 97% of the Travel Demand Increase
Source: PSRC, US Census, TDA TDA Inc., 5/11/99 It’s unrealistic to expect that transit will solve our congestion problems. In spite of the massive funding increases to transit over the last three decades in the U.S., there has been no favorable impact on congestion, with the exception of a few isolated locations. This slide illustrates the three-county picture. Total person-trips per day are projected to increase from about 7.4 million in 1990 to about 11.8 million in 2010. In 1990, transit carried about 260,000 daily person-trips, or about 3.5% of the total daily person-trips. With some growth related to population increase and the Sound Transit program, transit ridership will increase by about 130,000 daily rides and bring the market share almost back to where it was in 1990. Data for the year 1995 (the most recent year for which data were available), indicate that transit has lost share in the five years since 1990. Even if Sound Transit were to achieve double its expected transit increase of 66,000, transit’s market share would still be less than 4% of the daily total. In either case, transit is such a small part of the total that without additional transportation programs, congestion will increase. Transit’s impact in holding back that increase will be nearly insignificant. Three Linked Objectives... 1. Reduce Year 2010 congestion by 25% from today’s level. 2. Increase the region’s mobility 3. Boost performance and reduce costs of our transportation investments. TDA Inc., 5/11/99 The first objective of Reduce Congestion Now would be to reduce year 2010 roadway congestion by 25% from today’s congested levels. The second objective is critical to the first — the region’s personal and freight mobility would be increased, without penalties such as those found in "congestion pricing" strategies. The third objective has two elements: to boost the performance of our existing transportation investments and to reduce the cost of new transportation facilities. The following pages detail the implications of these objectives.
The Texas Transportation Institute annually calculates a "Congestion Index" for U.S. urbanized areas, through a federally-funded program. This Congestion Index is based on comparison of total vehicle miles of travel with lane-miles* of freeways / expressways and principal arterials. A Congestion Index of 1 refers to a system operating at capacity. Greater than 1, a system is over capacity. Less than 1, there is still remaining roadway capacity. The Congestion Index for the King / Pierce / Snohomish County area was 1.2 in 1996, (the most recent year available). This indicates a system operating at 20% over capacity. (TTI’s estimates are for the Seattle / Everett/ Tacoma urbanized areas. Their results have been adjusted to reflect the additional travel and lane miles in the balance of the three counties). Reduce Congestion Now Reduce Congestion Now would reduce the Congestion Index by 25% by the year 2010. That is, it would reduce the Index to about 0.9. That is approximately the Congestion Index for the Puget Sound region in the early 1980s and is equivalent to the current index for the Oklahoma City and Orlando urbanized areas. Those two cities are tied at 51st place of 70 cities ranked. The Seattle Urbanized Area ranks 6th in the TTI listing; the Tacoma urbanized area ranks 12th. * A lane-mile refers to one lane of a mile in length. For example, a six-lane road would have six lane-miles per mile. Objective #1. Reduce Congestion (continued) Requires:
TDA Inc., 5/11/99 Reduce Congestion Now requires:
As is shown in the following graphic, the freeway / expressway and principal arterial categories of roadways are a small percentage of the total roadways, yet carry a very large part of the total travel. [Increasing the roadway total lane miles by 4% would increase the lane miles of freeways / expressways and arterials by 34%.] *A lane-mile refers to one lane, a mile in length. For example, a six-lane road would have six lane-miles per mile.
In the three-county area, there are a total of about 32,000 lane-miles of all types of roadways. These include local streets, collectors, principal arterials, and freeways/expressways. The latter categories, freeways / expressways and principal arterials, comprise only 12% of our total lane-miles. The bar to the right shows vehicle miles traveled (VMT) for the three categories of roads (a car traveling one mile is one VMT). As the comparison shows, travel on freeways / expressways and principal arterials is out of proportion with their share of the lane-miles. Specifically, these 12% of the lane-miles carry about 65% of the daily VMT/. It is for this reason that Reduce Congestion Now focuses on additions to the freeways/ expressways and principal arterials. No additions to the local street system are proposed in Reduce Congestion Now.
This summarizes the additional lane-miles required for the 25% congestion reduction. For each of the roadway categories, the following are shown:
Example of ITS Programs
Source: Washington State Transportation Center TDA Inc., 5/11/99 Generally falling under the category of ITS programs are:
Shown above are three local examples currently under development. Costs of Congestion
Source: TTI & TDA TDA Inc., 5/11/99 Without Reduce Congestion Now, the annual cost of congestion is over $2 billion a year for the three-county area*. Over the 12 years from 1998 to 2010, the present value of this annual cost would be about $19 billion**. *This figure is based on the TTI estimate for the Seattle / Everett and Tacoma urbanized areas, but expanded to the additional travel for the entire three counties. Costs for the additional travel outside of the urbanized areas was included at 90% of that for the urbanized areas. **This assumes the cost of congestion increases at the same rate as VMT over the 12 year period, and is discounted at a 6% rate to a present value.
Based on PSRC projections for the year 2020, an increase of about 27% in person-miles was assumed for both freeways / expressways and principal arterials. This may underestimate the actual increase in person-miles, but was used in order not to introduce a new set of travel projections. These estimates of increased travel were incorporated in the estimates of additional lane-miles needed to achieve the 25% reduction.
As mentioned previously, automobile travel has been growing faster than population, but truck travel nationally has been growing at an even faster rate. Truck mobility can have a pronounced economic impact on local business and is an important factor in the need for additional roadway capacity. How about "you can’t build your way out of congestion"?
TDA Inc., 5/11/99 There is a myth that we cannot build our way out of congestion. We can’t eliminate all of it, but can make a dramatic improvement. Others have. In the Puget Sound region, we finished our major road system in about 1970. The only addition since then has been I-90. If it were true that roads "just fill up with new traffic", why did we not see significant congestion until about 1990, 20 years later? Now, after 20 years of neglect, would it be surprising that years of pent-up demand would quickly use new facilities. Some of this use of new arterial and freeway lanes would come from traffic that is now using neighborhood and other local streets because of lack of capacity in our major roadway system.
This chart illustrates the point that our roadway system hasn’t kept up with the growth in travel demand. It compares lane-miles with vehicle miles traveled (VMT) for the freeways / expressways and principal arterials in the Seattle / Everett & Tacoma urbanized areas. Between 1982 and 1996 VMT increased by about 62%. In the same period, lane-miles increased by only 21%.* *This neglect of our street and highway system goes back to about 1970, but comparable data were not available for years prior to 1982. Objective #3. Boost Performance and Reduce Costs... Maximize efficiency of existing system employing intelligent transportation systems. Bring lane-mile costs closer to national urban area averages. Programs to improve the performance of our existing transportation investment should be continued and enhanced. This includes extensive application of the principals of ITS. Reducing lane mile costs is a secondary objective of Reduce Congestion Now. Costs per lane mile in the Puget Sound region are significantly higher than national average urban area costs. There may be some understandable causes for this. For example, it is possible that right-of-way costs in this area are higher than the national average. However, there may also be requirements that have unnecessarily lengthened the process and the cost of developing improved capacity. A significant effort should be made to weed out the unnecessary contributors to delay and higher cost. Target Costs per Lane-mile (including Rights-of-Way)
Sources: FHWA, WSDOT, TDA TDA Inc., 5/11/99 The 50-state average figures shown in the chart above are from the Federal Highway Administration’s HPMS data file. These represent average costs for urban areas for the year 1995 (rural area figures are lower). These have been adjusted to recognize inflation to 1998. Right-of-way costs are included in the 50-state average figures. The Puget Sound average figures were derived from information provided by the WSDOT Office of Urban Mobility. While there may be some good reasons for higher costs in the Puget Sound region, should our costs average 2.5 times the national average? Are our topographic limitations that much more severe than elsewhere? And / or are our right-of-way costs that much higher than elsewhere? Estimated Capital Cost
TDA Inc., 5/11/99 Applying the per lane-mile costs to the previously listed needed lane-miles results in a cost range, in 1998 dollars, of $5.2 to $12.8 billion. (Of the needed increase in lane-miles for freeways and expressways, 75% were assumed to be widening of existing facilities and 25% for new facilities. All of the currently planned WSDOT improvements were assumed to be on existing facilities. for principal arterials, 60% of the needed increase in lane-miles was assumed to involve widening of existing facilities. As with freeways and expressways, all of the currently planned state improvements were assumed to be on existing facilities.) Local and State Funds Needed
TDA Inc., 5/11/99 Local and state funding requirements would be reduced by contributions from:
Reduce Congestion Now Reduce Congestion Now does not yet include a specific financing program, but some or all of the funding could come from reallocation of existing revenue sources. Any remaining balance would require additional funding. We realize that the public has been resistant to tax increases. Perhaps this is understandable because not much has been offered in return. It is somewhat of an oversimplification that the public has been told "we need more money, but congestion will only get worse." Is resistance on the part of taxpayers a surprise? We hope that in this case, a specific promise to provide significant improvements in congestion will modify public attitudes toward expenditures for transportation. For this, what do we get?
TDA Inc., 5/11/99 Probably most of us would feel that going back to the congestion levels of the early 1980's would be real progress. Compared to the 150% to 250% increase in congestion projected by the Metropolitan Transportation Plan, this reduction in congestion would save wasted fuel and reduce the resulting contribution to air pollution. Not only would we be serving about 40% more motor vehicle trips, at a significantly reduced level of congestion, transit would benefit too. Even with Sound Transit’s rail program, 65% of transit riders will be on buses. These buses will also enjoy the benefits of reduced congestion. Summary - A combination of:
...would reduce congestion by 25% from today’s level ...would serve 39% more trips. TDA Inc., 5/11/99 In summary, by adding 4% to our existing and future roadway system, at a cost of $5.2 to $12.8 billion, Reduce Congestion Now would:
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1 Part Honesty; 2 Parts Arrogance At a March 23, 2005, House Appropriations hearing on a bill to gut the voter-approved I-601 spending limit, Rep. Jim McIntire (D) asked a supporter of I-601’s two-third supermajority requirement for the legislature to raise taxes the following question: "Can you name a time when we [legislators] have actually not just set it [supermajority requirement] aside by majority vote? I mean, this is in many respects a procedural motion that has no bearing. It’s a statutory constraint that cannot constrain any legislature that chooses as a majority to set it aside . . . have we ever used a supermajority [to raise taxes]?" - Rep. Jim McIntire (D - 46) Despite the arrogance of some state officials, Washington's constitution is clear: "All political power is inherent in the people..." |
