Progress Illinois

Eighty percent of Chicagoans likely to vote in next month's election but who haven't decided upon a mayoral candidate yet believe good public transit is an "important immediate concern" for the next mayoral administration. That intriguing finding comes courtesy of a recent survey of 500 likely Chicago voters conducted for the Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU) in Washington, whose Local 308 affiliate represents frontline CTA employees.

In other words, the candidate who offers solutions the doomsday-riddled CTA may be able to garner significant votes for herself or himself. To date, the six remaining mayoral candidates have not even tried to do this. The Tribune's John Hilkevich points out none have released recommendations discussing how they view transportation issues. It is a pretty remarkable point, given that last year the region's primary public transit agency cut 9 percent of its train service and a whopping 18 percent of its bus service, slowing down the system and resulting in the layoffs of more than 1,000 layoffs CTA personnel.

ATU wants the city's next mayor to be actively engaged in public transit issues. In a white paper (which can be downloaded from ATU's website), the union calls on Chicago's next chief executive to push the region's congressional delegation to support HR 2746 in Congress. The legislation would give big city transit agencies more options in how they could spend federal transit dollars, allowing urban areas with populations of more than 200,000 to use federal transit dollars on system operations. Currently, most of those dollars in big cities may only be spent on capital projects. The rule means, as the white paper states, federal dollars can be used for "design engineering for the North Park Bus Plug-Ins, technology implementation services to provide hi-definition and thermal cameras" but not for wages, jobs, and rides for transit-using Chicagoans. (The city's "recovery ratio," mandated by the state, is particularly rigid and limits the agency's operational fleixibility, too.)

At least the transit issue is getting some attention in the press and from advocacy groups. Don't forget that a coalition of eight organizations have called on the mayoral contenders to sign on to the Sustainable Transportation Platform, an ambitious document (PDF) that touches on everything from bike access to high-speed rail to raising the state's gasoline tax.

Straphangers, bus riders, and transit workers across Chicagoland can breath a short sigh of relief this afternoon -- there won't be any service cuts to the already depleted Chicago Transit Authority system in 2011 (9 percent of rail and 18 percent of bus service was lopped off last year; more than 1,000 CTA employees lost their jobs), and rate hikes are also off the table for 2011. That's according to the more than $1.3 billion CTA budget (PDF) proposed for the agency's operations for next year.

Still, the Chicago region's main mass transit agency is facing a broad set of fiscal challenges. It will borrow $113 million in capital improvement dollars to keep service and rates the same come January 1. The City of Chicago's 2008 real estate transfer tax increase, meant to help CTA pay its pension obligations, hasn't produced sufficient revenues. For this year, the transfer fee is expected to come in at more than $100 million less than what the agency projected at the time Chicago's City Council passed the transfer tax hike (read more about that tax here). Even as it borrows from its capital dollar pool, the agency calculates it has $6.8 billion in unfunded capital needs. 

Like so many other issues, the CTA's woes probably can't be solved without progressive leadership in Springfield. Recall some of the recommendations in Metropolis 2020's recent report on transportation and transit in Illinois: a governor needs to create a Transportation Advisory Commission to clearly articulate policy; the rigid funding formulas that pay for CTA need reform; and the General Assembly should consider doubling the state's gasoline tax.