Ethical Conundrums:Justice and Equity in New York City Transportation

Dr. Cameron GordonJohn J. Marchi Visiting Scholar in Public Policy

City University of New York – College of Staten Island – Philosophy, Economics and Political Science Department

Center for the Study of Staten Island

Senior Lecturer in Banking and FinanceUniversity of Canberra (Australia)

Faculty of Business and Government

A note on data and maps

Data and maps for this presentation (unless otherwise noted) were produced by the High Performance Computing Center (HPC) at the College of Staten Island – City University of New York

Weblink: http://www.csi.cuny.edu/cunyhpc/

Item

6% of toll revenues in the US are collected on the Borough of

Staten Island...

...yet Staten Island consistently has one of

the worst average commute times in the

country.

ItemMore than a million people in the

borough of Queens live more than a half mile beyond a subway stop because of population expansion

beyond where the subway stopped expanding circa 1940....

...yet the MTA is spending over $17 billion to build the Second Avenue subway, the first leg on the Upper East Side of Manhattan paralleling the Lexington Avenue 4,5 and 6

line.

Item Despite the MTA's current budget crisis,

the New York City government says it is

committed to providing perhaps more than

half the funds for the $2.1 billion 7 line

extension to the west side of Manhattan,

(though scaling back that line by eliminating

the 10th Avenue stop)...

.

...yet because of that same budget crisis has proposed cutting service in half on the only subway line that does not go through Manhattan, the G train from Brooklyn to Queens

Speaking of doomsday budgets…• The MTA budget just passed contains the

following:• Starting May 31, subway and bus fares will

be $2.50 and the 30-day cards will be $103, up from $81. Express bus fares will rise from $5 to $6.25

• 35 bus routes will be eliminated and two subway routes, the W and Z. Off-peak and weekend subway, bus and commuter rail service will also be cut. The G train will no longer serve Queens.

• Commuter rail fares will increase on June 1, and bridge and tunnel tolls will increase in mid-July, the maximum Verrazano Bridge fare to $13(!).

Ethical transport conundrums

The items presented above can be said to be ethical transportation conundrums. They represent difficult and intricate problems of seeming unfairness of treatment between different groups.Their starkness – and persistence – suggest that they have long since become rhetorical questions rather than problems to be solved.Their occasional absurdity makes some ask, in classic New York parlance: “What gives?”

Equity in New York City Transportation

In this lecture I will focus on a single question: how equitable is transportation in New York City? I will not give simple answers to this question as there are none but I will identify where some of the answers may be found. Throughout this discussion I will refer to conundrums that point to what we know, what we don't know, and what we need to know to develop a coherent policy that deals with transportation equity, in New York City and beyond.

Keeping it simple The simplest concept of equity is 'horizontal equity' which is how people of similar characteristics are treated with respect to a specific policy; an example would be whether people with similar abilities to pay taxes in fact bear similar levels of taxation. I will thus define transportation equity as the degree to which people throughout the city have similar access to transport services and pay the similar costs per unit of those services. This resonates with notions that individuals are equal under the law and that transportation is a basic right and requirement of citizenship.

A measure of equity: the Lorenz Curve

A technical note: one example of an equity metric is the Lorenz Curve (LC). Here is a typical LC showing how much of total income that a portion of total population has. Perfect equality is a situation where the proportion of total income and proportion of total population is equal at all points.

But is it fair?

Should there be absolute equality between population and income … or transport services … or housing … or anything? This is an important question that I will not be addressing in this lecture. Nonetheless, the starting point is to ask: is there inequality in the transportation system and if so how much and in what areas? Having established the “what is” we can then address the “what should be”.

Measuring transportation equity in New York City

So how would one define 'horizontal equity' in New York City transportation? Keeping it simple I will do the following: (1) Take the total population of New York City (2) See what proportion of that total population lives in each borough (3) See what proportion of total transportation system 'costs' and 'benefits' are borne or enjoyed by the total population in each borough. If (2) and (3) match then we can say there is rough horizontal equity in transportation. This is very crude but I'll go with it for now.

Population and area per borough

•The 2000 US Census shows that the largest borough in terms of population was Brooklyn, accounting for almost one-third of the City's total; Queens was a close second, the two containing 60% of the total.•Queens meanwhile contained more than one-third of the City's total area.

County Population % share Area % share Sq MilesBronx 17% 42 14%Brooklyn 31% 71 23%Manhattan 19% 23 8%Queens 28% 109 36%Staten Island 6% 58 19%

NYC Total 100% 303 100%

  1,354,068 2,488,194 1,546,856 2,237,815 457,383

  8,084,316

A Question…

• So do the boroughs get proportions of the services – buses, trains, and subways – that the transportation system offers that roughly match either their share of total population or total area?

• Here is a summary look at the transit rail network in New York City.• The network was mostly built before 1940 so Manhattan is obviously very well served, much of Brooklyn, parts of the Bronx and some of Queens is reasonably well served.• But Staten Island does not have a subway and the rail it does have misses much of the Island’s population.• Eastern Queens is also poorly served.Source: NYMTC

• Here’s a particularly interesting set of maps from New York City DOT.

• Here the gaps in the city subway are especially clear, and the gap in the regional commuter rail network is even more stark.

• Buses look better but Manhattan definitely has much denser bus network than the rest of the City.

* Here’s an analysis of the borough-by-borough spread of bus routes and bus route miles.* This measure shows that in terms of numbers of buses and routes there is rough proportionality between share of population and share of bus service in the Bronx and Manhattan. * Brooklyn seems relatively under-served and Queens is especially short-changed.* Staten Island, on the other hand, seems to be making out very well.

ANALYSIS     BUS ROUTES 2002            County Population % total Local % total Express % total Buses % total Route % total     Routes   Routes       Miles  Bronx 1,354,068 17% 40 19% 0 0% 877 19% 255 12%Brooklyn 2,488,194 31% 54 26% 5 13% 1393 31% 520 25%Manhattan 1,546,856 19% 42 20% 4 11% 883 19% 203 10%Queens 2,237,815 28% 40 19% 5 13% 704 15% 309 15%Staten Island 457,383 6% 31 15% 24 63% 709 16% 822 39%     

NYC Total 8,084,316 100% 207 100% 38 100% 4566 100% 2109 100%

* Here are the subway stops and route-miles by borough.* Here the proportions look a bit different from buses.* Staten Island appears more proportionate in terms of route miles, less in terms of stops. Brooklyn appears to be well ’subwayed’, the Bronx less so, and Queens really comes out as a loser on this metric.* Manhattan really does well relative to its population.

MTA Subway Routes and StopsBorough by Borough

December 30th, 2008

Subway Route Miles

% total Subway Stops

% total

Staten Island 0.260765 6% 19 4%

Brooklyn 1.210744 29% 185 34%

Manhattan 0.907594 22% 164 30%

Queens 0.658569 16% 94 17%

Bronx 0.517803 13% 74 14%

Total 4.129092 100% 539 100%

What’s the benefit?

• These are very crude measures but revealing in the sense that the nature of transportation alternatives varies rather widely across the boroughs and does not match where the population is located.

• But how much does this matter? If everyone can get to where they are going at roughly equal speeds and levels of convenience then differences in distribution of number of trains/buses etc. may not matter too much.

• How do the boroughs stack up here?

* US Census figures show that the relative availability of transit options does radically affect how people get to work.* New York City uses transit much more than the rest of the US but Manhattanites and Brooklynites use it more than people in other boroughs.* And here is a big kicker – commute times in the outer boroughs is much worse than Manhattan – and worse than the rest of the US.

PERCENTAGE MODAL SHARE – TRIPS TO WORKUSA Bronx Brooklyn Manhattan Queens Staten Island

Drove Alone 73.2% 27.0% 22.5% 7.6% 34.3% 54.3%Carpool 13.4% 9.3% 8.8% 3.4% 10.2% 12.1%Public Transit 5.3% 53.7% 58.0% 59.6% 47.4% 28.4%Bike or Walk 4.3% 7.5% 8.6% 22.8% 5.9% 3.1%Motorcycle or other 0.9% 0.6% 0.5% 0.8% 0.4% 0.5%Work at home 3.0% 1.9% 1.6% 5.8% 1.8% 1.7%

COMMUTE TIME (MINUTESAverage Commute 25.5 43 43.2 30.5 42.2 43.9Mass Transit Commute

47.7 54.2 51.8 34.4 54.3 68.6

Comparison of Trip Times Jonathan Peters Based on Scheduled Trip Time and Road Milage NYC Transit - Outer Boroughs The College of Staten Island Versus Other Systems 30-Mar-05 Origin Destination Mode Road Travel Time Mode MPH Mileage Minutes Shifts

Tottenville, SI, NY 42nd Street & 5th Avenue

SIRT - SI Ferry - 1&9 Subway 33.2 83 3 24.00

St George, SI, NY 42nd Street & 5th Avenue SI Ferry and 1&9 Subway 17.6 41 2 25.76

Tottenville, SI, NY 42nd Street & 5th Avenue Express Bus - X-22 33.2 97 1 20.54 * 8:05 AM Bus

Tottenville, SI, NY 42nd Street & 5th Avenue Express Bus - X-22 33.2 72 1 27.67 * 5:00 AM Bus

Eltingville Transit Center, SI, NY

42nd Street & 5th Avenue Express Bus - X -1 20.8 100 1 12.48 * 8:05 AM Bus

Eltingville Transit Center, SI, NY

42nd Street & 5th Avenue Express Bus - X -1 20.8 70 1 17.83 * 5:00 AM Bus

Castleton Ave & Jewett, SI, NY

42nd Street & 5th Avenue Express Bus - X-10 17.3 109 1 9.52 * 8:06 AM Bus

Castleton Ave & Jewett, SI, NY

42nd Street & 5th Avenue Express Bus - X-10 17.3 78 1 13.31 * 5:35 AM Bus

Victory Blvd, Travis, SI, NY 42nd Street & 5th Avenue

S-62 - SI Ferry - 1&9 Subway 19.3 82 3 14.12

* 8:35 AM Bus - Misses Boat

Victory Blvd, Travis, SI, NY 42nd Street & 5th Avenue

S-62 - SI Ferry - 1&9 Subway 19.3 96 3 12.06 * 8:35 AM Bus - Actual Travel Time - 9:30 Boat

16th Street, San Francisco Freemont, CA BART 38.8 52 1 44.77 16th Street, San Francisco, CA Bay Point, CA BART 39.1 59 1 39.76

Flatbush Ave, Brooklyn 42nd Street & 5th Avenue #2 Subway 9.5 44 1 12.95

242nd Street, Bronx 42nd Street & 5th Avenue # 2 Subway 13.2 50 1 15.84

Where the growth is•There is another element here – where has the growth in population and transport needs been and where is it heading? As these figures show, population growth has been mostly in the boroughs.Manhattan has lost population from 1950-2000.Yet system investment has not been going to those outer boroughs.1950 to 2000 Population GrowthUnited States: +86.0%New York State: +28.1%Manhattan: -21.5%The Bronx: -8.1%Brooklyn: -9.9%Queens: +43.9%Staten Island: +132.6%

• Here’s another way of showing this: the ‘center or population’ or ‘geocenter’ per borough.• If you could somehow place all the population on a flat plane with each person possessing an equal weight and space but distributed in different areas, the ‘geocenter’ shows where that plane would balance.•As population spreads out so does the geocenter.•Look at where these centers are – very far out – often far from transit.

* Here is a very recent study of growth in traffic at subway stops (by the Center for Urban Futures).* Note the lines that have the stations with the fastest growth.* Most of these have heavy service to Queens and Brooklyn.* The ill-fated G has 4 fast growing stops.* But again investment is mostly not going where needed.

At what cost?

• We’ve been focusing on system benefits.• There is also the issue of cost. Who pays how

much?• So Staten Island, as an example, has a very

large share of express bus service overall – 63% of total bus routes in 2002.

• But these buses costs $5, with a proposed increase to $6.25.

• And Staten Islanders drive across the bridges more and are much more subject to tolls.

• Here is a map of the amount of toll revenues collected from people in different zip codes.

• Darker colors indicate greater burdens.

• Staten Island and Brooklyn are especially hard hit.

A bottom-line? What these metrics indicate is that there is a raw mismatch, overall, between the share of total population per borough and the share of facilities, service and costs per borough. The level and quality of transportation service varies widely across the boroughs as well. This is a very rough and patchy picture. There are a lot more data to look at and a lot more interpretation to be made. But overall there does seem to be an issue to examine further and change policy over.

More to know: data•Number of subway stops per borough•Subway-miles per borough•Number of subway cars per borough•MTA expenditures per borough: total•MTA expenditures per borough: bus•MTA expenditures per borough: rail•MTA expenditures per borough: commuter rail•MTA revenues per borough: transit fares•MTA revenues per borough: commuter rail•MTA revenues per borough: tolls•Road expenditures per borough (excluding city streets): NYSDOT•Road revenues per borough: Port Authority tolls•Number of people living more than a half-mile from a subway stop, by borough• Jobs/resident ratio per borough•Travel times, average commute, per borough•“Extreme commutes” per borough• Frequency of bus service (scheduled) per borough• Frequency of subway/commuter tail service per borough (scheduled) per borough• Level of road service (LOS) per borough• Road and street physical condition per borough (state of good repair)• Etc...

More to know: concepts For this particular lecture I have focused only on simple and broad measures of horizontal equity: population by borough matched against borough shares of various transportation costs and benefits. We need more sophisticated measures of horizontal equity that go down to lower levels of geographic equity. And completely undiscussed has been vertical equity: how different groups of people – different races, income classes, genders, ages – are impacted by the transportation system.That is the subject for the next Marchi lecture.