Sarles proposes budget with far fewer service cuts

WMATA interim GM Richard Sarles has revised the proposed FY11 operating budget to substantially pare back proposed service reductions. He will present his proposal to the Board of Directors today.

Sarles manages to reduce the need for service reductions by cutting departmental costs and increasing some revenue, but the biggest change is restoring the tactic of using capital money to pay for preventive maintenance.

Sarles also adds money to the budget for safety improvements and reduces Catoe’s proposed jurisdiction subsidy requirement from $40 million to $26 million. He restores some MetroAccess service for people beyond the ¾-mile limits and raises fares less than initially proposed. In addition, Sarles proposes restructuring some bus lines to pay for bus service improvements elsewhere in the system.

Here’s a comparison between Sarles’ new budget and Catoe’s previous General Manager’s budget:

Sarles proposes rail and bus service reductions including holiday & holiday related reductions, mezzanine closings, wider bus stop spacing and targeted bus trip cuts, largely in line with the ones I found reasonable for rail and bus. The one cut in his budget I didn’t recommend is closing the rail and bus system at 2 am instead of 3 on Friday and Saturday nights.

Rail cuts total $3.7 million versus $1.93 million that I recommended; the 2 am closing largely accounts for the difference. His budget contains $4.3 million in proposed bus service changes vs. $4.2 million that I recommended.

Sarles’ budget includes the fare increases that Catoe recommended and does not address any of the equity issues over fares between bus and rail. He adds a 50¢ across-the-board increase in parking fees, increases in reserved parking fees, and increases in the boarding charge for express buses and special events.

He also proposes a 5¢ (one document says 10¢) charge at certain stations to fund specific capital improvements, a 25¢ surcharge for rail non-SmarTrip transactions, and a $4.00 flat fee after midnight Friday and Saturday night. These additional projected revenues come to about $13.5 million.

Many fare proposals advocates recommended to minimize ridership loss, including peak-of-the-peak fares larger than 10¢ minimizing off-peak reductions, increasing the rail-to-bus transfer discount along with bus fare increases, increasing the cash/SmarTrip differential on bus, or tailoring parking charges by lot instead of across-the-board didn’t get into Sarles’ proposal.

To help close the gap, he proposes to “internally borrow” $30 million in capital money to pay for preventive maintenance now paid for out of the operating budget. Instead of taking from the capital budget permanently, Sarles proposed “paying it back” over time by restoring some money to the capital budget on a quarterly basis anytime ridership growth exceeds projections and WMATA ends up with a surplus.

Previously, the Virginia and Maryland Board members strongly opposed using capital to close the operating budget gap. We’ll find out today if that resolve still holds, especially given Maryland’s recent decisions to defer some of its capital contributions.

Additional jurisdictional subsidies would total about $26 million. DC would have to pay $11.9 million, Maryland $13.9, Alexandria $200,000, Fairfax County $300,000, Falls Church $100,000, Fairfax City nothing, and Arlington would actually see its subsidy reduced by $500,000.

Sarles also proposes to utilize bus line restructuring proposals that include the E6/M4, N2/4/6/8, H2/3/6, Hyattsville area, Greenbelt area and the 7A/B/C/F/X/W and 16F/H/W & 13A/B restructuring to pay improved running times on various lines, additional bus priority corridor measures and other bus transit enhancements. He pays for safety improvements through some across-the-board departmental reductions.

Sarles modifies Catoe’s MetroAccess proposals by grandfathering in current participants who live beyond the ¾-mile service area and charging them a higher fare. The base MetroAccess fare would remain at twice the bus fare rather than twice the rail or rail and bus fare for longer trips that include rail for fixed-route riders.

In total, the proposal looks much better than the original budget gap closing measures proposed by former General Manager John Catoe. However, there are still some items that shouldn’t be included and perhaps a few that should but aren’t. Today, Board members will likely discuss the equity issues between modes and the way the fares and cuts fall unevenly on various jurisdictions.