Keith Benman, Times of Northwest Indiana
keith.benman@nwi.com
The nuts and bolts of consolidating transit systems running in four northern Indiana counties would be a massive undertaking and would create a bus/rail transit system unlike anything in the state.
The regional transportation district, or RTD, legislation passed by the General Assembly in June calls for just that -- but with little in the way of instructions on how to go about it.
For bus service consolidation in Lake and Porter counties, there is some guidance in expensive studies that already have been commissioned and completed.
But there are no studies of how a seven-member superboard authorized by the legislation would oversee the South Shore commuter railroad and bus service. Nor does it say how their services could be merged or better coordinated.
For that reason and others, some community leaders have called the new law deeply flawed, while others say it is at least a start.
Consolidating and enhancing all the various bus systems in Lake and Porter counties could take years but is doable, according to the two recent studies. One was done by TranSystems of Kansas City, Mo., and the other by Parsons Brinckerhoff, of New York.
Much of the infrastructure -- buses, garages and maintenance -- are in place, according to both studies. The crucial missing piece is funding.
"No matter how hard we work and how good we get, it just won't work if we don't get a funding source," said Darryl Lampkins, the general manager at Gary Public Transportation Corp.
GPTC, the largest bus provider in Northwest Indiana, is threatened by deficits that could grow to more than $4 million by 2012, according to its own business plan. Hammond Transit and East Chicago Transit are similarly threatened.
The RTD legislation attempts to solve that problem and also fund the South Shore commuter railroad by giving the new seven-member transit superboard authority to impose an income tax of up to 0.25 percent in counties where it is approved.
A fiscal note attached to the original legislation shows the tax at its maximum rate in all four counties is projected to raise about $57.5 million per year. Proponents have said that could pay for the projected local share of the South Shore extension, other South Shore projects in Michigan City and South Bend, and the operating costs of a regional bus system.
A comprehensive bus system with fixed-route buses running as far south as Dyer and Crown Point and dial-a-ride service farther south would need about 70 percent more buses than there currently are in the region, according to the Parsons Brinckerhoff report. The new system would have about twice the budget of current providers.
GPTC, Hammond Transit and East Chicago Transit currently have a combined budget of $11.95 million.
Both studies also concluded a shorter-term fix could take place much more quickly and without much more revenue than bus companies currently take in.
But the Parsons Brinckerhoff report pointed out that revenue even for a bare-bones consolidation is threatened by the fiscal crisis in local communities.
That crisis has caused local bus companies to cut services, which reduces ridership and bus miles, which in turn reduces federal and state aid, said RBA Executive Director Tim Brown. The cuts in federal and state aid in turn lead to further service cuts.
"It's just a downward spiral," Brown said.
Gary Transit's Lampkins sees that scenario playing out at GPTC.
"We can survive individually," Lampkins said. "But it's at a much reduced size. We don't want to survive individually at a much reduced size. We want to be part of the regional transit solution."
Hammond is the first of the three Lake County city bus systems to take concrete steps toward wholesale consolidation, with the City Council considering a resolution this month to pay the Northwest Indiana Regional Bus Authority $1 million to take over its bus system.
"If Hammond gives the RBA money to run our buses, we would be the first community under that scenario to regionalize," said Hammond Mayor Thomas McDermott Jr.
Hammond's move is basically what is called for in the Parsons Brinckerhoff report. Under the plan outlined in the report, individual bus companies would turn their equipment and revenue over to a single transit operator that would run the whole system.
That alone could result in $250,000 to $500,000 per year in savings, according to the report.
That single transit operator is dubbed a "Consolidated Transportation Operator," or CTO, in the report. The report states the CTO could be the RBA, which already exists in the region, or a private company could be hired to do the job.
The report recommended using a public provider like the RBA or an existing public bus agency but left the door open to considering contracting the job out.
The RTD legislation does lay out a roadmap for appointing directors to sit on the seven-member superboard that would oversee operational boards for both the South Shore commuter railroad and regional bus service. The superboard would have seven members. Four would be drawn from the current Northern Indiana Commuter Transportation District board that oversees the South Shore. Two members would be mayors serving on the new bus service board. And one would be a county elected official who serves on the bus service board.
Incorporating the South Shore into a regional transportation system would dwarf the task of merging bus systems, as the 90-mile commuter rail system's assets are much larger. The South Shore's rolling stock alone is worth $197.9 million and its infrastructure -- tracks, electric system and signals -- is worth $82 million, according to NICTD's balance sheet.
The NICTD board would stay in place under the RTD legislation. It would be the direct operator of the rail service. But the RTD superboard would have final say on priorities and the long-term direction of both commuter rail and bus services, according to NICTD Planning and Marketing Director John Parsons
Bus systems and the South Shore already operate with some degree of coordination, Parsons said. GPTC's Metro Center hub is also the main South Shore stop in Gary. Hammond Transit's main bus route serves the Hammond South Shore station. East Chicago Transit buses stop at the South Shore station there.
When GPTC expanded service on its regional routes last year, it matched up arrival times at the Metro Center with those of South Shore trains.