Posted on 05/12/2014 1:14:55 PM PDT by MichCapCon
As state lawmakers consider another bailout of Detroit, it is worth suggesting that the city and state might be better off if Detroit bailed itself out.
The current restructuring plan calls for $350 million from the state over 20 years — or $17.5 million per year. With better reforms, Detroit can find additional dollars and many more besides.
A bailout of Detroit by the state is not going to provide the long-term fix desperately needed for Detroit’s problems. Detroit should be turned into a contract city by selling assets and shedding extraneous services, and then competitively contracting for the services it would still provide. This could save far more than the $17.5 million that state lawmakers want to give to the Motor City. That money could be used to fill real potholes statewide instead of fiscal ones in Detroit.
In fact, one bold option the Mackinac Center for Public Policy has recommended in the past could save the city about $78 million every year: privatizing the Detroit Department of Transportation.
DDOT is a model of high costs and bad service. It spends $200 million per year while incurring an average operating loss of more than $175 million annually. Detroit provides DDOT with an average annual subsidy of $78 million, but state and federal funds have to make up the nearly $100 million difference. DDOT should be shut down in favor of private, independent jitney services or operated under some type of franchise agreement or both in concert.
The kindest description for DDOT’s condition is “dysfunctional.” It has suffered through a steady succession of directors and leadership teams, with one director not even staying six months before he was fired. In mid-2013, some 20 percent of buses scheduled to transport passengers weren’t even able to leave the garage. Passengers’ frustration and anger has mounted as they wait at stops for buses that often are extremely late, don’t stop because they are already full, or never show up at all. To add insult to injury, DDOT amassed $1.93 billion in operating losses from 2002 through 2012.
Perhaps the most damning fact is not the extraordinary subsidies enjoyed by DDOT, but rather the extreme costs per rider. The department’s average annual ridership from 2007 through 2012 was about 36.1 million total bus trips. This corresponds to about 12.03 million actual passenger roundtrips, since every rider will have both an outgoing and homecoming trip and some riders may have to transfer between buses.
Since many of the people who ride the bus do so every day, the actual number of specific people using DDOT each year is only around 77,000. This means that the $78 million subsidy from the city alone is worth more than $1,000 per user. Combined with state and federal subsidies, the total adds up to $2,300 per user — enough to buy each of them their own used car — every year.
This problem calls for sweeping reforms. DDOT should be closed or privatized to some degree to end the hemorrhaging of Detroit tax dollars. Additionally, jitneys — small, privately owned cars, or vans driven by entrepreneurs — are popular around the world but are outlawed in Detroit (and throughout Michigan). There has long been an illegal market in Detroit for jitneys to help people with things like grocery store trips, but if the law were repealed it would allow for widespread adoption.
A bailout of Detroit by the state is not going to provide the long-term fix desperately needed for Detroit’s problems.
Detroit’s city leaders should use the opportunity of bankruptcy to chart a new course: Repeal their archaic transit laws, close or privatize DDOT and allow private entrepreneurs to accomplish what DDOT can’t, among other bold changes.
The Detroit bus company is privately owned and growing in Detroit.
I think the author is suggesting that the money is not or won't be swindled. Never ass/u/me...especially in Detroit.
The city of Tallahassee has an insanely comprehensive bus service. It’s normal for buses to have only one or two passengers, yet they run as if the bus was the only way around. Thus, they must be the most expensive mode of transport when viewed in fuel used per passenger mile. Because everybody could see the bus service was so under-used there were numerous complaints and suggestions to curtail or end it. To combat this they bought all new busses that you can’t see inside. (A graphic full of tiny holes covers all windows. You can see out, but not in.) This has worked.
The city bragged that they bought the first two electric buses sold in the country. They were hugely expensive and never seen on the streets. We finally learned that they failed so frequently they had to be taken out of service. Then the city council decided they would force people to use the buses by severely restricting traffic on the two main east/west roads. They claimed they were closing four lanes on the six-lane that runs past the university for “the safety of the children.” (I puke whenever I hear that phrase as that’s NEVER the real reason.) The stated goal of these traffic restrictions was to improve bus ridership and save the environment. The blow-back was so huge that they only restricted the smaller four lane by making it a winding brick and tree covered two-lane. It went from 45mph to 25. If you go 30 you’ll be stopped and ticketed.
I’m guessing for the most part bus service won’t work in small towns. I can see it in New York or Chicago, but not in 90% of the rest of the country.
“The current restructuring plan calls for $350 million from the state”
Detroit has degenerated into a group of violent criminals and parasites who contribute nothing to society but demand handouts from taxpaying, working Americans. The inhabitants of Detroit have already sponged billions from Americans. This so called “restructuring plan” is just another way to give free handouts to these worthless, violent criminals.
But money in private hands isn’t likely to be swindled and is more likely spent making more money by providing effective service.
Let’s turn Detroit into the Venice of Michigan. We’ll take out all the roads, and put in canals! We could put water slides in the tall buildings so that getting off from work could really be fun! Romantic gondola rides! Water ski to work! Cruise ships in Detroit!
this is called ‘traffic calming’.
I think the best option for the City of Detroit is as follows:
1. Move the few remaining residents to Chicago or another similar city.
2. Build a big wall separating the city into 4 quadrants (maybe 8).
3. Sell tickets for the biggest, most badass apocalypse-themed paintball facility ever.
4. Profit.
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