Investigators: $10 million spent on extras for group of state employees
Michael Ennis is interviewed by Susannah Frame for KING 5's continuing investigative series on financial waste in the state ferry system, June 24, 2010
Back room deal puts true ferry reform in question
Michael Ennis is interviewed in story about union influence at the negotiating table, June 17, 2010
Government Takeover Of West Seattle Ferry Triples Costs
On May 26th, KIRO 7 (CBS) news in Seattle aired a special investigative report based on our new study “King County Ferry Service Not as Efficient as Private Operator,”. Michael Ennis, Director of WPC’s Center for Transportation, is the source of KIRO’s story (See Policy Note below). You can read the story online here, and watch the video here.
King County Ferry Service Not as Efficient as
Private Operator
Argosy Cruises operates same service for three times less money
Since 1997, King County has operated the West Seattle Water Taxi across Elliott Bay. The ferry route connects Pier 55 on the downtown waterfront to Seacrest Park in West Seattle. The route has been seasonal, operating April through October.
In 2007, the King County Council voted to create a ferry district and levied a special property tax increase on all county residents to expand its ferry operations. The higher property tax generates about $18 million per year and pays for the Vashon Island passenger-only ferry abandoned by the state in 2006, and for yearround operation of the West Seattle route.
Read the full Policy Note here >>
Michael Ennis on TVW's The Impact discussing the high cost of high speed rail
Want a transportation system that works? Vanpools.
For an efficient way to move people and protect the environment, vanpools greatly outperform all other transit modes. Let's do the numbers.
Across the Puget Sound region, traffic congestion is predicted to double, reaching the levels of present day Los Angeles by 2030. Yet, so-called regional transportation solutions will do very little to help and will actually make traffic worse. A more cost-effective solution is staring us right in the face: vanpools.
Vanpools are cheaper, more flexible, and more efficient than any other intercity transit mode. King County's public vanpool program alone carries more riders than Sound Transit's entire Sounder Commuter Rail, and for $1 billion less.
Read the full op-ed on Crosscut >>
Michael Ennis talks with The Conversation host Ross Reynolds about vanpools, March 10, 2010.
How Public Officials Spend Our Transportation Taxes
Have you ever wondered how much of your transportation tax money pays for that Metro bus you always see on the road? Or how much of it funds light rail as opposed to roads and bridges? New research by transportation expert James W. MacIsaac, P.E. shows that if you live in the Puget Sound region, you might be surprised just how officials spend your hard earned money.
As lawmakers prepare to expand tolling and make it easier for transit agencies to raise their own taxes, it is important to understand how current revenues are distributed.
Read the full Legislative Memo here >>
Tolling Interstate 405 Needs a Closer Look
House Bill 2941 was proposed during the current Legislative Session. The bill would authorize the use of express toll lanes on Interstate 405 (I-405).1 The bill is vague and presumably relies on a study that does not adequately compare toll lanes to a no-build option. The legislature should request a full and complete comparison to a no-build option before authorizing the Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) to build express toll lanes on I-405.
Read the full Legislative Memo here >>
Second northbound Amtrak train is a waste of money
The second Amtrak train that connects Seattle and Vancouver, B.C., carries very few people, costs taxpayers millions of dollars and hurts local Washington companies.
Last August, Amtrak began operating a second train between Seattle and Vancouver, B.C. The second train is a pilot project to connect the two largest regional urban areas as the Winter Olympics start in February. Both Washington state and Canadian officials are waiting to assess passenger demand before deciding whether to make the second train permanent.
Read Michael Ennis's full op-ed in The Bellingham Herald here >>
Would high speed rail work in Seattle?
See Michael Ennis, WPC's Center for Transportation Director interviewed by KIRO TV here
Michael Ennis talks with David Boze on KTTH about plans for the I-90 bridge, January 22, 2010.
Vanpools in the Puget Sound Region
The case for expanding vanpool programs to move the most people for the least cost
Part I: The Vanpool Solution, A faster, cheaper and easier way to commute (video)
Part II: Introduction & Background
Part III: Analysis of vanpool performance and market potential
Part IV: Recommendations
Washington Policy Center’s 31 Facts on
Vanpools
2009 Statewide Transportation Poll Results
Traffic relief is still important to two-thirds of voters
Washington Policy Center has released the results of a recent statewide poll that asked voters about the importance of traffic relief across Washington State.
This updated survey builds upon Washington Policy Center’s first poll conducted in December 2007. In both cases, voters continue to show strong support for making traffic relief a high priority. Two-thirds of respondents still feel the state’s role in reliving traffic congestion is important, but also believe the state is performing poorly at actually doing anything about it.
The poll was conducted by Moore Information as a telephone survey to 500 voters across Washington State, on January 14-15, 2009. The sampling error is plus or minus 4% at the 95% confidence level.
To Stimulate the Economy, Stop Trying to Limit Driving and Start Reducing Congestion
I'm often asked how other states compare to Washington on transportation policy. This is a reasonable question, because across our state, traffic congestion is growing worse and is expected to double over the next twenty years. Congestion chokes the economy, robs valuable time from our families and lowers our overall quality of life. But how do we compare to other states?
Read To Stimulate the Economy, Stop Trying to Limit Driving and Start Reducing Congestion
Why the U.S. and Washington Should Not Build High-Speed Rail
Washington should apply for its share of federal high-speed rail stimulus funds for safety improvements such as grade crossings and signaling systems, but not for new trains that will obligate taxpayers to pay millions of dollars in annual subsidies, says a new report from Washington Policy Center (WPC). Authored by WPC adjunct scholar Randal O’Toole, the report makes the following key findings:
• Initial funding commits the nation to a program whose eventual costs could exceed $1 trillion. This doesn’t count overruns, operating subsidies, and rehabilitation costs.
• Outside of the Boston-to-Washington and Philadelphia-to-Harrisburg routes, Amtrak short distance trains lose an average of $37 per passenger and Amtrak expects the states to cover most of these operating losses.
• A hidden cost of rail is that it must be rebuilt about every 30 years. This means construction could leave states obligated to fund billions of dollars in rehabilitation costs.
• The fact that American freight railroads are profitable while European passenger lines are not suggests that freight, not passenger, is the highest and best use of a modern railroad in most places.
• It is far more cost-effective to save energy by encouraging people to drive more fuel-efficient cars than to build and operate high-speed rail.
• Considering the energy required for rail construction, improvements in auto and airline energy efficiencies, and the high energy cost required to move trains at higher speeds, high speed rail will have little to no environmental benefit.
• Upgrading the 280 rail miles in Washington to 110-mph standards would cost nearly $1 billion.
• The average Washingtonian will take a round trip on high-speed rail once every 8.5 years.
• For every Washingtonian who rides high-speed rail once a month, more than 100 Washington residents will never ride it.
WPC Op Ed in the PSBJ: High-Speed Rail is Wasteful
The complete report can be viewed online here
A Policy Note summarizing the full study is available here
Emphasize mobility on Sound Transit's Eastside approach
The Seattle Times published this WPC op-ed on May 5
When voters approved extending Sound Transit’s system last November, most people probably thought the controversial battle over light rail on the Eastside was over. But the agency did not release its Draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS) on the possible alignment options until after the November election, so everyone was left to imagine for themselves the details on where exactly the tracks would lie.
Now, as Sound Transit has released the information in its DEIS showing a dozen and a half possible alignment scenarios, businesses, policymakers, and neighborhood groups are lining up with different and competing views on where light rail should come through Bellevue.
Avoiding Seattle’s Congested Future:
Region Faces Competitiveness Crisis without Transportation Investments
Residents of the Puget Sound region hate traffic congestion. The Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue urbanized area ranks among the nation’s most congested places, a result of strong growth, geography and a failure to keep its transportation network on par with the needs of the region’s rising wealth.
The Seattle area is on track to match current-day Los Angeles levels of congestion if major upgrades to the road network aren’t implemented now, even with the fall in demand triggered by last summer’s gas prices and the current global recession. The national economy is expected to start turning by the end of the year, and with it will come higher travel demand and congested roads.
This op ed appeared in the Puget Sound Business Journal on April 24
It also appears on the Washington Policy Center website
State’s Mandate to Reduce Driver Mobility Threatens Revenue for Transportation Projects
by Michael Ennis, Director, Center for Transportation, January 2009
Key Findings
• The state estimates that on average each Washington motorist now drives about 31 miles per day. The state’s new policy is to reduce how much people drive to 22 miles per day by 2035.
• Missing from the debate on reducing Vehicle Miles Traveled (VMT) is a quantitative analysis of its financial costs.
• If the state is able to achieve the first phase of the VMT reduction targets it will reduce the state’s fuel tax revenue stream by about 10.2 percent by 2020.
• Not only does the state’s mandate to reduce drivers’ VMT cause fuel tax revenues to fall, revenues actually peak in 2014 and based on the state’s long term reduction targets, never recover.
• Washington relies heavily on fuel tax revenue to pay for the transportation budget, which means a 10.2 percent reduction in fuel tax revenue could jeopardize funding for the Nickel and Transportation Partnership Account (TPA) projects and the $2.4 billion in state fuel tax collections set aside for the Seattle Viaduct.
• A policy of reducing VMT for drivers, while simultaneously adopting widespread tolling as a primary revenue stream that relies on driving, guarantees the state will fail at one or the other.
Read or download the full study here (pdf)
Reforming State Transportation Policy:
Washington State’s Efforts to Implement Performance-Based Policies
by Michael Ennis, Director, Center for Transportation
September 2008
The Heritage Foundation recently published a study by Michael Ennis, director of WPC's Center for Transportation.
Key Findings:
• Across the country, transportation spending decisions are too often tied to political agendas and the wishes of influential constituencies, not objective measures of public need, such as safety and congestion relief.
• In 2005, voters in Washington State passed an initiative authorizing the State Auditor’s Office to conduct independent performance audits on several major aspects of the state’s transportation system. The findings of these audits could potentially trigger a seismic shift in how state and local governments do business.
• In 2007 and 2008, the Washington State Auditor’s Office independently audited four facets of state transportation operations, uncovering $110 million in potential cost savings. The congestion audit estimated that
implementing the recommendations on reducing traffic congestion would produce $3 billion in economic benefits.
• Since the Washington audits, officials in Virginia, Idaho, and Hawaii have considered or adopted similar assessments.
Read or download the study here (pdf)