Budget

WMATA Board discussing budget, NextBus, and more today

by David Alpert   •   May 13, 2010 9:41 am

I'll be live-Tweeting today's WMATA Board meeting.

This morning, the Finance and Administration Committee will debate the operating budget and next Metro Matters agreement. There will then be an executive session followed by a special full Board meeting (PDF) to announce an executive search firm for the General Manager search and discuss the recent near-miss on the Red Line.

Finally, this afternoon the Customer Service, Operations and Safety Committee will discuss safety, NextBus performance, the bus and rail fleets, and issues with bus fareboxes.

Below are tweets from the meeting. If you aren't familiar with the individual members, here's a list.

#WMATA now discussing budget

Hudgins recommending finance committee decide on fare hike today, but service levels and rest of budget in June #WMATA

Graham: Board has never voted on fares in a vacuum without knowing about other parts of budget, like service, subsidies #WMATA

Graham asks why 15% increased max fare not on the list because he asked for it last time (and also emailed earlier this week) #WMATA

#WMATA Board now discussing peak of the peak. Balances spreading out load and also revenue gain

#WMATA's Tom Harrington calls peak of the peak "to and through" an "added benefit" to WMATA because it hits more people.

Hitting more people is not the point, though - want to only hit people where trains are most crowded #WMATA

Zimmerman: Should look at narrower peak of the peak time period and higher peak of the peak charge to offset #WMATA

McKay: Service ramifications of peak of the peak? Kubicek: Will probably even out load #WMATA

Sarles: AM peak has enough service to accommodate shift; evening, could shift some people later to when people also going to events, #WMATA

Graham asking "what's the gap" in the budget. But that assumes parking increases taken out. He's rhetorically caving on it. #WMATA

There's no "gap" if you start with the GM's previous budget. That should be the starting point. #WMATA

Zimmerman wants to increase bus SmarTrip-cash difference. Graham says it would hurt the poorest of the poor. #WMATA

Benjamin: But the lower the income, the more careful people seem to be, most likely to get passes, SmarTrip, etc. #WMATA

Staff going to go research requests around max fare, narrower peak of the peak and try to get something by Board meeting later #WMATA

Graham again questions why #WMATA can't implement fare systems, then plug in final fare numbers at last minute.

Kissal says can do that, but increases "risk" of getting it right July 1, which is high ridership weekend #WMATA

RT @wbjsarah: Graham on incr. bus, but not Circulator fares: Going to lose revenue on routes where Circ parallels busy routes #WMATA

Kissal: Part of this is about updating signs, etc. as well - not just about typing fare number into the computer #WMATA

#WMATA board committee leaning toward now picking one of the options from the peak of the peak chart to give guidance to staff

Graham now un-caving on parking? Saying "was willing to see what could be done" to cover removing parking. #WMATA

But instead, we just took it off the table ("between the cup and the lip"). Willing to consider taking pkg off, if revenue from elsewhere

Benjamin: Thinks narrower options are "interesting from a philosophical point of view", but thinks too complex

Albert: DC not ready to increase jurisdictional subsidy beyond $12M increase from last time #WMATA

Benjamin: Maryland WILL cover increase of $16.something million. Great news. #WMATA

Zimmerman: Now parking increase is off the table, but has largest fare increase ever, and still cuts bus and rail service #WMATA

Zimmerman: Would vote against this budget. If parking fee went back, could take away all service cuts, or other options #WMATA

Zimmerman: As soon as anyone on committee started talking about anything, it just got dropped, but those were ad hoc decisions #WMATA

McKay: Anyone who thinks a parking increase is not a fare increase is not paying attention #WMATA

McKay: Parking is a fare increase in people who are most fundamentally impacted by this budget already. #WMATA

Does McKay realize that Fairfax has people who take the bus to the rail? #WMATA

McKay now attacking subsidy for bus ride vs. subsidy for a rail ride. #WMATA

McKay: "I take personal exception to the idea of raising the parking rate"

Graham: How about reducing parking impact by only increasing at lots that fill early #WMATA

Graham: Late night change (DC request) was $3.6M, parking (Ffx request) was $6.5M.

Benjamin saying by including peak of the peak in max fare, it is going up close to 15%. #WMATA

Yeah, but then min rail fare going up MUCH more than 15%. #WMATA

Graham: Committee is going to be giving guidance to staff without full Board approval, and which wouldn't pass full Board bc of veto #WMATA

Graham: Want special meeting of full Board to review & approve guidance #WMATA

Motion clarified to say that this is just committee report, not "guidance". #WMATA

Passes with Graham voting no, all MD & VA members (on the committee) voting yes #WMATA

Now on to capital. Asking Board to distribute draft of new Metro Matters agreement, agree upon framework #WMATA

Downey: New capital agreement should include requirement that governor request funds. #WMATA

Zimmerman: Should separate out federal funds, which are supposed to be "extra", from rest of funds #WMATA

#WMATA going to have hearing on capital budget 1st week of June, same night as RAC meeting

#WMATA says they think NextBus customers are happy because there are few complaints.

However, there's no easy way to make a complaint from NextBus if you aren't happy. #WMATA

If everything working properly, if bus doesn't move for 2 mins, NextBus stops predicting that bus #WMATA

Giancola on behalf of @DDOTDC: Can NextBus tell rider if there's an unpredicted bus not moving? #WMATA: Working on that

Also working on informing rider if bus route not running at this time of day or day of week #WMATA

Giancola: Poor quality of IVR system? #WMATA: Background noise makes that a problem

#WMATA announces that there was no unsafe situation in recent Red Line emergency braking: http://bit.ly/9bkJ3q

RT @wbjsarah: Metro says it uses NextBus to mk sure buses don't bunch, but regular clumps of S2 and S4 buses I see tell a different story

#WMATA says NextBus performance is increasing in all garages

#WMATA: Predictability just means 78% of buses have predictions? Trying to make sure I understand here

Bus is considered on time as long as it's less than 2 mins early and 7 mins late. Zimmerman: That's a lot. #WMATA

David Alpert is the Founder and Editor-in-Chief of Greater Greater Washington. He has had a lifelong interest in great cities and great communities. He worked as a Product Manager for Google for six years and has lived in the Boston, San Francisco, and New York metro areas in addition to Washington, DC. He loves the area which is, in many ways, greater than those others, and wants to see it become even greater.