It is time to investigate SEPTA
By JIM FOSTER
With increasing frequency, we read and hear of the federal
investigations into city government and it seems that malfeasance and
manipulation by authority figures, along with misuse of public funds are
not far under the surface. But until very recently no one, even those
delegated with the responsibility, choose to look. However, the second-largest
taxpayer funded bureaucracy in the Delaware Valley continually operates
with virtual blank-check autonomy, and seems answerable to no one for
its day-to-day operations and management practices.
The Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority (SEPTA) does have
a board of directors, but the political makeup of that entity provides
little expertise in the fine details and nuances of a transportation network,
and the management of SEPTA itself seems more concerned with covering
its tracks (pun intended) than building a viable efficient network that
will serve the public and the city with the best possible foresight and
planning.
Legal monopolies without professional oversight are dangerous entities,
and SEPTA is just such an organization. Created from multiple independent
systems with good intentions nearly 50 years ago, it has assumed a bureaucratic
life of its own, answerable to almost no one, and repeatedly causing heated
debate with the state political system as demands for subsidies from the
taxpayers statewide are rarely met with enthusiasm.
Now it is a well-known fact that no intercity transportation network
covers all its expenses from the farebox, and probably none ever did even
in the pre-automobile eras, as the transit companies often owned the developments
along the routes they built. But at least those private companies were
answerable to stockholders and informed management. I contend SEPTA gets
a pass on both. It is time those who pay the bill have the most to say
about how things are run and the money spent.
Shortsighted decisions from often irresponsible management is the operative
phrase when it comes to many operations and costly practices, and the
recent ones regarding surface rail transportation are no exception. Cities
all across this country are building or rebuilding abandoned streetcar
networks to serve the public transportation needs in what has long been
known to be the most efficient in cost and environmental considerations
when moving large numbers of commuters over regularly established routes.
The flexibility of buses cannot be denied where certain needs to vary
routes are concerned, but electric rail systems are far cheaper in the
long run and much less damaging to the infrastructure and environment
when the population density and clearly established heavily traveled routes
are required. Most of Philadelphia’s street transit fits that category.
We were one of the last major cities to abandon much of our extensive
trolley system, beginning with the takeover of the PTC in 1954 by National
City Lines, a straw company owned by General Motors, Firestone Tire and
Rubber, and Standard Oil of California. This corporation was formed in
the 1940s with the expressed purpose of buying and then abandoning rail
systems throughout the country and replacing them with buses from the
parent company, fueled and serviced by the products of the other two parent
companies.
Philadelphia’s transit system was the last one they purchased before
the federal investigations into those practices began. (The complete destruction
of the quite modern Los Angeles rail system was their major coup.) Rapid
replacement rather than careful modernization was their practice and our
network of 48 surface routes was pared down to 13 in five years. Despite
public outcry that number was further reduced to eight, with five of them
being subway-surface lines in West Philadelphia. The future of the other
three were also in jeopardy, but were part of a City-SEPTA formalized
agreement in 1992 that “insured” their future with upgrades.
The machinations that have accompanied the fulfillment of that agreement
are typical of some of the practices that SEPTA foists upon this city
and its ridership, and ones that mimic the tactics of National City Lines,
which followed a repeated formula of degrading service and conditions
intentionally and then claiming that costs were too high to repair or
restore. The short-run solution (bus replacement) was always touted as
“cost-effective,” when in fact it was the most expensive when
one looked beyond the initial investment.
Of course the purpose of NCL was to eventually bankrupt the lines and
sell them to the taxpayers anyway, so it did not matter.
Essentially SEPTA operates on that same premise: that the taxpayers will
continue to pay regardless of how much money is wasted or how recklessly
they dispose of assets. Inventive approaches to new service or coordinating
existing ones when it comes to surface routes are few and far between.
Of course, a lackluster political culture has allowed much of this to
happen and there are definitely ways SEPTA could have their feet held
to the fire, as much of the infrastructure SEPTA inherited was city-owned
under arrangements with its predecessor PTC, or part of a lease-leaseback
arrangement crafted to help SEPTA get its financial footings years ago.
Few have had the political moxie to put SEPTA’s management under
the microscope and hold them accountable, but maybe the time has come.
Our recently elected state senator, LeAnna Washington, took just such
a position last week in a letter to the SEPTA management, copied to our
governor, criticizing the manner in which a portion of Germantown Avenue
was repaired.
The recent arrogance of paving over the tracks SEPTA intentionally neglected
on Germantown Avenue — with no notice — is a typical first
step used in rendering the Route 23 line useless, despite the fact that
it was one of the three (15 Girard and 56 Erie-Torresdale the other two)
that were guaranteed to be reequipped with new cars and upgraded under
the 1992 agreement. This partial paving over has already been done to
segments of the 23 in North Philadelphia.
A large portion of the 56 has met the same fate, with reported political
assistance from Councilwoman Joan Krajewski and Sen. Mike Stack in side-stepping
the Streets Department. The paving of the 56 was accomplished with full
removal of poles and wires, in that case, to insure increased difficulty
and expense in restoring service. Little of this was ever reported in
the press, despite the fact that much of it was done surreptitiously.
Only the Route 15 on Girard Avenue has been restored to service, and
that has taken 14 years to accomplish what was to have happened in five.
Even the $85 million spent on that route with major track and street rebuilding
would still be sitting unused were it not for an article I wrote on the
political chicanery in West Philadelphia that stalled service from starting
for a full year as a favor to Carol Campbell, Secretary to the Democratic
City Committee, who wanted to send a message to SEPTA. Of course, SEPTA
did nothing to alleviate the situation on its own, as wasting $85 million
to them is inconsequential and they had no interest in living up to their
obligation in any event.
I contend they will do anything they can to sabotage the renewal of surface
rail, as the current management mindset has an anti-rail perspective.
The Route 15 is now running, but would not have been in operation were
it not for the huge public outcry when the mainstream press picked up
the story and the politicians right up to the governor were called to
task.
There is much more to learn about how SEPTA wastes dollars, sidesteps
obligations and lacks basic foresight on the direction of modern urban
transit. In another installment I will bring more to the surface.
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