Former ASUO Transportation Policy Adviser sent out the following e-mail scathing Emma Kallaway for not including him in her administration. The e-mail was a response to a request for information by one of Kallaway’s recent Programs Finance Committee appointments, Kamal Ararso. I don’t have much further information yet, but it will be available in Monday’s Emerald.
I really must ask the following question: why is this still not my job, if even partially? I don’t belong to ASUO political parties. I offer my services and knowledge for free to serve the university because I am a student that cares about this issue deeply. I have spent 15 years of my life researching transportation policy and systems around the world, and have traveled and ridden systems on all but two continents. Transportation is my passion, my major, and my one key interest. My only goal at UO is to make Lane Transit District not an embarrassment… something that UO can be proud to say it teams with to serve students and community alike. There are decades of information on this issue. I just do not understand the ASUO rationale for not inviting me to help with this problem. What is there to lose?
To be honest, I believe it is unfair for ASUO to ask me anything about this issue. My emails about the executive transition were all ignored, and it will now cost me extra of my own time and/or money to pass on information now that it is not accessible. It is regretful that I was never contacted to remain serving the ASUO. It is sad that I was overlooked or disregarded, especially after all I have accomplished in the short year that I worked under Sam.
I will answer Kamal’s questions directly, because I will be attending the University of Oregon this year, and probably next… possibly even long enough to get a masters degree. It is in my own best interest to ensure the LTD contract remains, even though I do not use it. It is the right thing to do.
Kamal asked:
–> their proposals,
–> their findings or data and what they suggested for students
transportation.
–> The information about LTD riding system and how the budget was
allocated…..and the shuttle services
–> What % of UO students use LTD and how often and how far do the UO
students live from main campus
–> Were there any other alternative proposals like the bicycle
riding….
–> The parking Lots and what they have suggested about the parking spot
shortages…Do we have unused parking spot on campus like that of
especial events….
–> Which top ten institution have they used and how UO doing
incomparison to those institutions and are they doing better….My responses are:
–> “their proposals”
–> I have already sent you my _unedited, text only_ report on transportation policy. My findings are that LTD is completely inadequate, underfunded, and generally doesn’t serve the best interest of students in all cases. I have many spreadsheets comparing the Association of American Universities and transportation systems in the colleges of their members. I have researched PAC10 institutions, west coast institutions, institutions larger than us, smaller than us, and both public and private colleges all across the country. All of this information is in storage until fall term.I have suggested that, in order for us to continue our single late night bus, group rate program, and expansion, a transportation fee must be enacted. This is not uncommon amongst universities around the country. I detail my suggested routes and included maps in the Transportation Policy Report that I sent earlier this week.
–> “The information about LTD riding system and how the budget was allocated…..and the shuttle services”
–> Lane Transit District (LTD) is a public-benefit corporation of the State of Oregon. It is owned by the state, run by the state, and has a board of directors all appointed by the governor of Oregon. Like every form of mass transit and transportation anywhere in the world (including roads), it loses money. It will always lose money, and its job is solely to serve the public. They do not try to tax us more than they have to, and their goal is not to make money. They, like many other agencies in the country, including Portland’s TriMet, have a farebox recovery ratio of only ~20%. This means that fares make up only 20% of their operational costs.Most LTD (and TriMet) revenue comes from a payroll tax levied in the county within LTD’s borders (Lane Transit District operates only in Lane County). This tax is deducted from every working employee in the transit boundary, and equals about 2/3 of their total operating costs. This means that in recessions, the transit agency’s revenue declines as unemployment rises. Unfortunately, this is often when citizens need transit most. It should be expected that LTD will again threaten to cut around 15% of services starting next year, as this year’s funding gap was only patched with federal stimulus money. This makes a partnership with LTD and UO even more important.
The University of Oregon students paid 1.21 million dollars to LTD for the 09-10 school year. This represents approximately 1/30 of LTD’s total revenue, but it does not include faculty/staff group rates, employee payroll tax deductions, etc. We are their biggest contract, their biggest customer, and their largest single source of revenue. It is in their best interest to keep us happy, but they cannot and will not give us discounts – the group pass rate is already heavily subsidized, and with the tax credits from the Oregon Department of Energy, we will never get a better deal.
As for shuttle services, there are several. The Designated Driver Shuttle (DDS) and Assault Prevention Shuttle (APS) operate as part of the ASUO, each consuming their own separate budgets. They are not designed to handle such massive amounts of riders. It is very important to understand that DDS/APS are completely different types of service than LTD. LTD creates fixed route, high-capacity transportation corridors to shuttle large numbers of students safely to their destinations. APS and DDS lack the capacity and funding to do this; but we wouldn’t want to expand them to this role, anyway. It is far cheaper to contract LTD to operate such services in addition to its current “regular system” routes and schedules. APS and DDS only act as a free taxi to students, which hypothetically would be used only when LTD is not and cannot run to the location a student desires. This is a key missing link: LTD rarely runs to a location students desire at night when DDS and APS are in operation, so they are constantly bogged down with several hour wait times.
There are also sports shuttles; these are completely separate from ASUO. The athletics department contracts LTD to operate these during game days as high-capacity people movers from around the metro area. They use a separate and higher fare system, which when collected, goes directly back to the athletics department. They are essentially “park and ride” services for Eugene-Springfield residents who wish to watch UO athletics.
Lastly, there is RideSource. This is operated by LTD to shuttle around people who are not able to ride the fixed route system, ie because of a disability or advanced age. It is the largest money loser because it is door-to-door, and is mandated by the federal government (but not funded by them). It would be like if the hours of APS/DDS were extended all hours of day, 7 days a week.
–> “What % of UO students use LTD and how often and how far do the UO students live from main campus”
–> This is the wrong question to ask for two reasons. The first one is there is no perfectly efficient way to count riders. For example, LTD can count people that show UO ID cards, but certainly people who have them are not students since they are never confiscated after graduation. Some buses do not require a UO ID to board and thus cannot be counted, like EmX and 79x during the day. These routes are high-capacity, often using 16 meter buses that are packed wall to wall (often with students). Additionally, any manual survey the ASUO sends out to students will be completely voluntary and thus not accurate. I have ridership statistics, but they are for informational use only, and cannot by any means be considered accurate. Also, trips by bike or walking may never be counted in favor of transit; I argue that without a bus system, bikers and walkers would likely have a vehicle because they know they would need one to get long distances in the city. If they do not have a vehicle because LTD exists, they are more likely to walk and bike short distances and take the bus to ones further away. For example, if I live in an area with transit, and do not own a car because the transit exists, any trips I choose to take by foot or bike are likely mass transit-influenced.The second reason this is the wrong question is because system is not convenient for so many students. Of course students are not going to ride something that is inconvenient. “If you build it, they will come,” meaning that if a highway is full, you can add lanes to the highway. If you do this, it will fill up again. If you never build the freeway at all, it will not exist and cannot fill up.
The same is true for buses: routes like the 79x that are frequent, convenient, and run late into the night can serve students at all hours. Indeed, if buses ran frequently all over the city late into the night, one could expect most students living in the Kinsrow area and around campus to not even bring their cars to Eugene at all. Why would they need to? It would be more convenient to leave them at home. And so, if you look at ridership or pick out buses that are consistently empty on a route, you cannot accomplish the true goal of transit: the lifestyle change. Buses must be running in order for people to take them – and so, ridership in our sense is often times irrelevant (and definitely in the case of the 79x). UO provides a massive opportunity for transit ridership that is not tapped into. Students will ride the bus when it is convenient… but if you have the option of driving to the VRC to watch a movie ending past 10pm (past when the Breeze stops running), you will not risk getting stranded at the mall. You will choose to drive.
As far as where students live, they live all over. Some areas are denser than others, and my corridors I suggest in the Transportation Plan highlight them. A full statistical map of this information was researched by the university. Unfortunately, the name of the contact for this information is stored away in Eugene where I cannot get to it before September.
–> “Were there any other alternative proposals like the bicycle riding”
–> Yes, there are other projects on campus. The bike loan program could also be permanently funded by the proposed transportation fee. There are no restrictions to what we could do with the fee in the future, although the largest by far should be LTD.Because all of Eugene is completely obsessed with biking, I chose to focus on the long neglected issue of mass transit instead. Not everyone has a bike, but everyone can ride the bus. Further, bicycle parking on campus is limited, just as parking is. All forms of transportation must be viewed as equal in importance.
–> “The parking Lots and what they have suggested about the parking spot shortages… Do we have unused parking spot on campus like that of especial events”
–> It has been said many times before: the University of Oregon has one of the lowest parking/student ratios in the country. Everyone has their own opinion as to whether this is a good or bad thing, but no one can argue that the air quality and traffic levels around campus are better because of the low amount of parking. However, many students just park in the neighborhoods surrounding campus and walk in from there – they do not need to purchase a parking pass to do so because it is free.My transportation report touches on the possibility of a parking shuttle that could run between Autzen Stadium and the university during the weekdays. This has been discussed lightly as a possible relief… that is, to create a “park and ride” for the university. The important thing to remember about transportation is that there must be multiple well developed options for travel: driving, transit, biking, and walking are all important. None must be completely eliminated.
–> “Which top ten institution have they used and how UO doing incomparison to those institutions and are they doing better”
–> As mentioned above, I have many charts comparing systems across the country. Many more systems are in my head. If the question is meant to compare LTD to systems around the world (and not just the United States), then LTD is not even worth mentioning. My official report contained a short list of peer institutions to compare to. All of this information is stored until fall, unless it was recovered from my email account that was deleted.Early winter term, the Oregon Daily Emerald quoted me saying that LTD’s service to the university is definitely in the bottom 5% of all service in the entire country, mainly due to their complete lack of late night service. Since the addition of a single bus at night, this might be up to about 7%.
Plain and simple, LTD is not given the resources to serve us. We were one of the first universities in the nation to offer free bus rides to all students, but no one at ASUO ever thought to supplement the bus routes and extend them into the night. However, reports in the past by students that revolve around transportation on campus have come to the same conclusion: LTD buses should operate later and more frequently. These reports all mention how LTD is 100% willing and ready to work with students to extend bus routes to serve educational and recreational destinations. This still remains true: we can choose when, where, and how often a bus will run and LTD will take care of drivers, maintenance, diesel, etc. all for a flat rate per hour. Buses are safer, dry, more comfortable, faster [than biking and walking, many times], more efficient, temperature controlled, and better for the community than driving.
There is no specific direction, no perfect way to solve this hole in transportation. It is entirely up to the creativity and intelligence of campus leaders. This is an immensely complicated project, and ASUO’s largest. It may take many months to begin understanding it all properly, and the entire university must be included. And even with it’s size, there is so much more that could have been included in this email.
I give you all of this information because I care, and because it is the right thing to do. But I will NOT be a resource that is disrespectfully used. The ASUO should have discussed this with me when it had the best chance to, not when it became most convenient to do so. It is shamefully disrespectful to me that I was thrown like a scrap of meat from Sam’s administration to Emma’s. It is not my job to serve students anymore, and what ASUO did [is doing] was [is] hurtful and rude. Organization would have benefited all involved parties.
Happy Travels,
Nick