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SMART Slammed for Withholding Ridership
Author: Ken
Date: 12-19-2019 - 08:30
Today's IJ editorial
Are they trying to lose their tax extension measure?
Editorial: SMART needs to release ridership numbers
By MARIN IJ EDITORIAL BOARD
PUBLISHED: December 18, 2019 at 10:34 am | UPDATED: December 18, 2019 at 10:35 am
When talking about ridership, the Sonoma-Marin Area Rail Transit District focuses on impressive aggregate numbers: Its trains have carried more than 1.6 million passengers since the service started a little more than a year ago.
Getting details about that number has been more challenging, as SMART, a public agency supported by tax dollars, has refused repeated requests for more precise ridership numbers.
News outlets, the Marin IJ and the Santa Rosa Press-Democrat among them, have repeatedly asked for daily and weekly ridership counts only to be denied those numbers.
Other local transit agencies, such as the Golden Gate Transit District and the Marin Transit District, are more forthcoming with numbers that detail how many people are taking their buses.
There’s no debate that SMART’s numbers will reflect that it is a new service that is still a work in progress. For instance, this month, the train started service to Larkspur Landing and now links with the ferries.
In addition, for most of its young life, the weekday train had a nearly 90-minute gap in evening commute service. That gap likely cost SMART ridership in both the morning and evening commutes.
Anybody looking at SMART’s detailed numbers would have to take its fledgling status into account. That’s only fair.
SMART’s leadership, however, has guarded that data, declining to provide specifics that would give the public a clearer picture of how many people are taking the trains, when they are taking them and where they are getting onboard and where they debark.
Critics may seize on lower numbers to build their case to persuade voters in Marin and Sonoma counties to vote against Measure I, the extension of the SMART sales tax on March’s ballot.
But stonewalling legitimate public requests for detailed ridership numbers is a posture that could prove more politically damaging than numbers that the public has every right to see. It undermines SMART’s public image.
It’s up to SMART officials to help decipher those numbers. It’s not their job to hide them.
Both Caltrain and BART are more forthcoming, providing daily and weekly ridership data.
Likely, SMART’s detailed numbers will generate more questions.
It was launched by taxpayers across both counties as a more convenient form of public transportation, one that would provide an alternative to sitting in traffic.
Nearly 50 years ago, Golden Gate started its ferry service with the same goal in mind, providing commuters and transbay visitors a more pleasant way to get back and forth between San Francisco and Marin.
A driving concern, at the time, was the growing traffic jam on the Golden Gate Bridge.
Today, the ferries are such a popular means of making that commute that Golden Gate is in the process of adding more boats and more trips.
Traffic congestion on Highway 101 was the impetus for SMART. It may not resolve the traffic jam, but it provides the public with a reliable alternative to sitting in a car stuck in gridlock.
The bi-county train is off to a promising start and likely, detailed numbers will show room for increasing ridership. Every train is not going to be packed across the timetable. Every ferry isn’t packed with riders. That’s the nature of public transit.
We hope that SMART, perhaps at the insistence of its board members, rethinks its steadfast refusal and releases detailed numbers instead of glossing over specifics by focusing instead on loftier aggregate totals.
Are they trying to lose their tax extension measure?
Editorial: SMART needs to release ridership numbers
By MARIN IJ EDITORIAL BOARD
PUBLISHED: December 18, 2019 at 10:34 am | UPDATED: December 18, 2019 at 10:35 am
When talking about ridership, the Sonoma-Marin Area Rail Transit District focuses on impressive aggregate numbers: Its trains have carried more than 1.6 million passengers since the service started a little more than a year ago.
Getting details about that number has been more challenging, as SMART, a public agency supported by tax dollars, has refused repeated requests for more precise ridership numbers.
News outlets, the Marin IJ and the Santa Rosa Press-Democrat among them, have repeatedly asked for daily and weekly ridership counts only to be denied those numbers.
Other local transit agencies, such as the Golden Gate Transit District and the Marin Transit District, are more forthcoming with numbers that detail how many people are taking their buses.
There’s no debate that SMART’s numbers will reflect that it is a new service that is still a work in progress. For instance, this month, the train started service to Larkspur Landing and now links with the ferries.
In addition, for most of its young life, the weekday train had a nearly 90-minute gap in evening commute service. That gap likely cost SMART ridership in both the morning and evening commutes.
Anybody looking at SMART’s detailed numbers would have to take its fledgling status into account. That’s only fair.
SMART’s leadership, however, has guarded that data, declining to provide specifics that would give the public a clearer picture of how many people are taking the trains, when they are taking them and where they are getting onboard and where they debark.
Critics may seize on lower numbers to build their case to persuade voters in Marin and Sonoma counties to vote against Measure I, the extension of the SMART sales tax on March’s ballot.
But stonewalling legitimate public requests for detailed ridership numbers is a posture that could prove more politically damaging than numbers that the public has every right to see. It undermines SMART’s public image.
It’s up to SMART officials to help decipher those numbers. It’s not their job to hide them.
Both Caltrain and BART are more forthcoming, providing daily and weekly ridership data.
Likely, SMART’s detailed numbers will generate more questions.
It was launched by taxpayers across both counties as a more convenient form of public transportation, one that would provide an alternative to sitting in traffic.
Nearly 50 years ago, Golden Gate started its ferry service with the same goal in mind, providing commuters and transbay visitors a more pleasant way to get back and forth between San Francisco and Marin.
A driving concern, at the time, was the growing traffic jam on the Golden Gate Bridge.
Today, the ferries are such a popular means of making that commute that Golden Gate is in the process of adding more boats and more trips.
Traffic congestion on Highway 101 was the impetus for SMART. It may not resolve the traffic jam, but it provides the public with a reliable alternative to sitting in a car stuck in gridlock.
The bi-county train is off to a promising start and likely, detailed numbers will show room for increasing ridership. Every train is not going to be packed across the timetable. Every ferry isn’t packed with riders. That’s the nature of public transit.
We hope that SMART, perhaps at the insistence of its board members, rethinks its steadfast refusal and releases detailed numbers instead of glossing over specifics by focusing instead on loftier aggregate totals.
SMART Slammed for Withholding Ridership