how metro detroit transit declined

This article is a stark reminder that if we continue to bend our nee
to the corporate capitalists, the entire nation will one day look like
Detroit looks today. The Capitalist Parasites are just about done
sucking the marrow from the bones of what remains of a once proud,
prosperous city. Remember the old slogan, "As General Motor goes, so
goes the nation"? Well, As Detroit goes, so will go the entire
nation.
If we fail to remove Greed from our society, just check back in about
20 years and see if you can find America, the Beautiful.

Carl Jarvis

On 2/6/15, joe harcz Comcast <joeharcz@comcast.net> wrote:
> Hot off the press just minutes ago....\
>
> Joe
> How metro Detroit transit went from best to worst
>
> By Dan Austin, Detroit Free Press 12:04 a.m. EST February 6, 2015
>
> dfp public transit h.JPGBuy Photo
>
>
>
> One of Detroit's old streetcars passes by Hudson's Department Store
> downtown.(Photo: Detroit Free Press file photo)Buy Photo
>
> 27 CONNECT
>
> 16 TWEET
>
> LINKEDIN
>
> 7 COMMENTEMAILMORE
>
>
>
> At the turn of the 20th Century, southeast Michigan had the largest and one
> of the best mass transit system in the country. Today, we have one of
> worst.
>
>
>
> So what on Earth happened to our public transit system that would force a
> man to walk 21 miles to work each day?
>
>
>
> "You'd expect a conspiracy theory from the Big Three or something, but it
> was never as simple as just one thing," said Tobi Voigt, chief curatorial
> officer
>
> for the Detroit Historical Society. "But it's a much more complicated story
> than that."
>
>
>
> That story can be told in three chapters -- subways, streetcars and buses --
> and its major themes are cars, race and class divides, money woes and some
> good
>
> old-fashioned Detroit-suburb animosity.
>
>
>
> Subways
>
>
>
> Yep, Detroit could have had a subway. Several proposals were put forth
> starting in the early 1900s. A 1945 proposal even called for a subway-bus
> depot under
>
> Campus Martius.
>
>
>
> "With the clay we're sitting on, it would have been a wonderful place to
> build a subway," lamented Joel Stone, senior curator of the Detroit
> Historical
>
> Society.
>
>
>
> But for financial or logistical reasons, each proposal was shot down. Yes,
> the autos wanted their employees buying cars -- but, by and large, the
> automakers
>
> supported public transit because they needed their workers to be able to get
> to work.
>
> A 1945 proposal to build a subway-bus depot under Campus
>
>
>
> A 1945 proposal to build a subway-bus depot under Campus Martius in downtown
> Detroit (Photo: Detroit Historical Society)
>
>
>
> The streetcars
>
>
>
> "In 1903, southeast Michigan had the largest mass transit system in the
> United States," Voigt said. "From Imlay City to Rochester, it was huge. ...
> There
>
> were tracks on every little side street you can imagine."
>
>
>
> Detroit's streetcars were originally privately owned. Legendary
>
> Mayor Hazen S. Pingree
>
> sought to change that, saying that the companies charged too much, took
> advantage of the city and didn't care about the public interest. Though
> Pingree
>
> didn't succeed in putting the lines in the public's hands, the writing was
> on the wall -- and the streetcar companies knew it, too.
>
>
>
> On April 17, 1922, Detroiters voted to buy the streetcars, lines and all
> operations for $19.8 million, a whopping $276.5 million today, when adjusted
> for
>
> inflation. The streetcar companies, having anticipated the move, had
> basically stopped maintaining the rail system. Detroiters had inherited a
> giant money
>
> pit.
>
>
>
> Then the Great Depression hit, and money for maintenance and repairs dried
> up. A decade later, rationing during World War II brought more problems, as
> replacement
>
> parts and materials became scarce or impossible to acquire.
>
> DetroitFreePress/635583252081774424-012915-james-the-walker-rg-11
>
>
>
> DETROIT FREE PRESS
>
>
>
> Awful transit policy fails everyone in metro Detroit
>
>
>
> But at the same time, ridership of Detroit's streetcars doubled during the
> war, from 30.8 million in 1940 to a whopping 57.2 million four years later.
>
>
>
> "You couldn't get cars, you couldn't get gas, you couldn't get tires," said
> Joel Stone, senior curator for the Detroit Historical Society. "That meant
> everybody
>
> rode public transportation."
>
>
>
> But the post-war years brought not only the end of rationing, but also the
> advent of the highway system and an increase in wealth that led more
> Detroit
>
> households to own a second car.
>
>
>
> And driving became a way for some white commuters to avoid intermingling
> with black Detroiters, who made up a sizable chunk of streetcar ridership.
> Keep
>
> in mind, Detroit had a race riot in 1943. Racial tensions were fanned by
> white people angry about the number of black Southerners moving to the Motor
> City
>
> and taking prized factory jobs. Neighborhoods were racially segregated.
>
>
>
> With the rundown streetcars and decreasing ridership, it just made more
> sense to scrap the system all together than try to fix them.
>
>
>
> The last streetcar plied Detroit's streets on April 8, 1956.
>
>
>
> Buses
>
>
>
> After the streetcars, buses were hailed as the future of public transit in
> metro Detroit. They were said to be cheaper to maintain and could go
> anywhere
>
> streetcars could -- plus they weren't bound by tracks.
>
>
>
> Much like today, there were two transportation departments running the show
> in the post-streetcar era. The Detroit Department of Street Railways became
>
> the Detroit Department of Transportation. The suburbs were run by the
> seven-county Southeastern Michigan Transportation Authority, or SEMTA, which
> was
>
> created by the Legislature in 1967. SEMTA -- the forerunner of SMART, the
> Suburban Mobility Authority for Regional Transportation -- bought up the
> privately
>
> run bus lines in the burbs in the early '70s and combined them under one
> umbrella.
>
> 04/B9316123384Z.1_20150204154022_000_G259S8CHH.1-0
>
>
>
> DETROIT FREE PRESS
>
>
>
> Metro Detroit needs a transit revolution
>
>
>
> In the background of the racially tense battle over transit was a fight over
> school buses.
>
>
>
> In the early '70s, after U.S. District Judge Damon Keith had ruled that
> Pontiac schools had drawn their attendance lines to separate black and white
> kids,
>
> he ordered the school district to be integrated. Boycotts and marches filled
> the streets. Ku Klux Klan members firebombed Pontiac school buses in 1971.
>
> Two years later, Judge Steven Roth became "the most hated man in Michigan,"
> when he ruled that Detroit Public Schools was guilty of intentional
> segregation
>
> and ordered inter-district busing to achieve integration. The U.S. Supreme
> Court overturned Roth's ruling in 1974.
>
>
>
> And that was the same year the fiery Coleman Young took office as Detroit's
> first black mayor.
>
>
>
> There was no way, in that environment, that a move to fund regional public
> transit -- and possibly make it easier for the poor or African Americans to
> enter
>
> the suburbs -- was going to pass. The Detroit News wrote about a SEMTA
> planning meeting where suburbanites protested over the "undesirables,
> transit crime
>
> and low-income housing" that they believed public transit would bring to
> their communities.
>
>
>
> "People just wanted to get as far away as possible from Detroit," said Bill
> McGraw, a former Free Press writer and co-author of "The Detroit Almanac."
>
>
>
> Of course, it wasn't just the suburbs fighting against a regional transit
> system. Young feared losing autonomy of public transit in the city. "You'd
> have
>
> to be pretty damn stupid to give up 90% of the action in exchange for less
> than one-third of the power," he said in 1984.
>
>
>
> Detroit also made things worse by not allowing inbound SEMTA buses from
> stopping for passengers within the city limits, even if they were going
> where transit-dependent
>
> Detroiters needed to go. Even if they were on time when city buses weren't.
> Even if there was plenty of room on board for them to snag a seat.
>
> DetroitFreePress/635583252081774424-012915-james-the-walker-rg-11
>
>
>
> DETROIT FREE PRESS
>
>
>
> Heart and sole: Detroiter walks 21 miles in work commute
>
>
>
> Further complicating the issue was the fact that there was never supposed to
> be two separate transit agencies in the first place.
>
>
>
> "The original goal was for SEMTA to take over DDOT, but with Coleman Young
> saying 'that'd be like a minnow swallowing a whale,' it didn't happen,"
> said
>
> Dan Dirks, who just wrapped up his first year as DDOT's director. Dirks
> spent more than 30 years working at SEMTA and SMART, retiring as the
> agency's general
>
> manager in 2007. "It was a shame because (SEMTA) had some glorious plans for
> regional transit."
>
>
>
> SEMTA tired targeting commuters with its ads.
>
>
>
> SEMTA tired targeting commuters with its ads. (Photo: Detroit Historical
> Society)
>
>
>
> Funding woes
>
>
>
> If you're going to have good transit, you're going to have to pay for it.
> And when you don't, you have to keep cutting. Cut too much and the only
> people
>
> who will ride are those with no other choice.
>
>
>
> With fewer riders, SEMTA had no choice but to slash its service, by some 30%
> in 1983. Even standing room became scarce. In some cases, nearly 100
> passengers
>
> crammed into buses that seated 44, the Free Press reported. The overcrowding
> only pushed away more riders.
>
>
>
> Then President Ronald Reagan put the kibosh on federal operating funds for
> transit authorities starting in 1985. At the time, 25% of SEMTA's budget
> came
>
> from Uncle Sam. Because SEMTA lacked the authority to ask voters for
> operating funds, the transit agency had no choice but to cut even deeper,
> eliminating
>
> certain routes and rail service.
>
> Semta came out with flashy new ads in April 1983 but
>
>
>
> Semta came out with flashy new ads in April 1983 but they didn't lure enough
> new passengers to make the commuters runs profitable. (Photo: Detroit
> Historical
>
> Society)
>
>
>
> In 1989, SEMTA was taken over by Oakland, Wayne and Macomb counties and
> renamed SMART. It was billed as "a new beginning," but the '90s saw the
> Legislature
>
> give suburban communities the ability to opt out of paying for SMART service
> all together. Today, there are
>
> 50 suburbs in Oakland and Wayne counties
>
> that sit out, further widening the gaps in funding and service.
>
> 03/B9316109157Z.1_20150203114232_000_G9E9RTI6M.1-0
>
>
>
> DETROIT FREE PRESS
>
>
>
> Take action on transit in metro Detroit
>
>
>
> No major transit system in the country runs on the fare box alone. Metro
> Detroit is one of the only regions in the country that doesn't get some sort
> of
>
> dedicated financial help from state taxes, such as a sales tax, said Megan
> Owens, executive director of Transportation Riders United, a nonprofit
> advocating
>
> improved transit.
>
>
>
> But Owens hopes that might be changing. The new Regional Transit Authority --
> which acts as an umbrella organization for transit agencies in Detroit, as
>
> well as Wayne, Oakland, Macomb and Washtenaw counties -- has the ability to
> put regional funding measures on the ballot, but only as a property tax or
> vehicle-registration-fee
>
> measure. Could there finally be a solution to the financial crisis that has
> plagued the region's public transit for nearly half a century?
>
>
>
> Let's hope, so Owens said, because "just merging (transit agencies) won't
> solve our problems without a new source of revenue."
>
>
>
> Dan Austin, assistant editor for opinion digital/interactive, also runs the
> Detroit architectural resource HistoricDetroit.org. He has written two
> books,
>
> "Forgotten Landmarks of Detroit" and "Lost Detroit." Follow him on Twitter
> @HistoricDET and on Facebook at
>
> www.facebook.com/HistoricDetroit.
>
>
>
> Source:
>
> http://www.freep.com/story/news/local/2015/02/06/michigan-detroit-public-transit/22926133/
>