Why does metro KC have so many transit entities?
Posted: Tue Jul 15, 2014 8:41 am
Why does metropolitan Kansas City have so many transit entities that are independent of each other?
While looking at the KCATA Downtown Service Improvement Concept: http://www.kcata.org/maps_schedules/downtown_transit
(Which actually seems to be well thought out and has some really nice proposed improvements for transit in downtown)
I was quickly reminded of how fragmented the organization of the metropolitan transit entities are which leads to fragmented service.
You have the ATA (Area transportation Authority), which is actually a bistate entity. For those that don’t know, Johnson County is actually part of the ATA and has as much representation on the board as Jackson County even though there is almost no ATA service in Johnson County and very little cooperation between JoCo and those outside the county overall. Makes total sense right?
So anyway, Kansas City has:
ATA (aka Metro) Primary transit for central city of KCMO and most MO side suburbs includes Metro and MAX.
IndeBus (fixed routes serving suburban Independence, MO)
The JO (fixed route serving suburban Johnson County, KS)
Unified Government Transit (fixed routes serving KCK)
Kansas City Streetcar Authority (entity running the KCMO streetcars, not part of the ATA)
If the Jackson County commuter rail ever gets off the ground, I’m sure that will yet another agency separate from the ATA.
And what little commuter bus service the MO suburbs (liberty, blue springs etc) have to be funded annually by those cities. They don't have any dedicated funding.
Kansas City is not Chicago or DC. For a metro the size of KC, all of these transit agencies should be under the same umbrella, preferably the Kansas City “AREA” Transpiration Authority which was one of the rare occasions when the states of MO and KS worked together to create a bi-state organization so there would be no need to for legislators of the states of KS and MO (as well as Congress) to attempt to create such an agency, which would probably be impossible today.
Metro buses, streetcars, commuter express buses and future commuter rail as well as local suburban service should all be under one system like you see in places like Denver, Seattle, and Minneapolis.
KCMO can try to improve urban core transit and has made great strides in doing that over the past decade. But till the entire region has a single transit system that is property funded (both locally and by both states), I just don’t see Kansas City ever really closing the gap much making the metro more transit friendly.
I have always thought that this should be step one with regards to regional cooperation for metropolitan KC. If KC can’t even work together on transit, everything else is a lost cause and that has been pretty much proven over the past few decades.
I wonder what it would take and if it would even be possible for the metropolitan area to merge all these separate agencies back into the ATA and then properly fund it with a regional sales tax that would cancel out any existing transit sales taxes.
You could have streetcars in KCMO and KCK and take a streetcar from Union Station to a redeveloped Downtown KCK via the Lewis and Clark transitway/greenway (that shouldn't even be a highway, but that's another topic). You could take a Metro Bus from Cerner’s Bannister complex to Lenexa or from Lee’s Summit to Overland Park. Light rail could be funded and run from Olathe to Blue Springs via Union Station on one seamless line which would allow people in JoCo to take a train to Royals and Chiefs games or a person in Independence to get to a job in Merriam.
Commuter rail could serve areas not served by light rail in lower density longer haul corridors such as KCI, Western WyCo, Lee’s Summit and Cass County.
Commuter buses and BRT lines could crisscross the area and cross the state line.
And you would go to ONE website and have ONE transit pass for the entire system.
Is this even possible. Can this be done today when metro KC is one of the most split up metropolitan areas with some of the fiercest competition within its own metro in the country? Could a grassroots effort to make such a thing happen be possible?
It sure would go a long way in helping the KC metropolitan area realize they have a vested interest in working together if the metro had ONE comprehensive transit system that the entire metro could use and be proud of.
While looking at the KCATA Downtown Service Improvement Concept: http://www.kcata.org/maps_schedules/downtown_transit
(Which actually seems to be well thought out and has some really nice proposed improvements for transit in downtown)
I was quickly reminded of how fragmented the organization of the metropolitan transit entities are which leads to fragmented service.
You have the ATA (Area transportation Authority), which is actually a bistate entity. For those that don’t know, Johnson County is actually part of the ATA and has as much representation on the board as Jackson County even though there is almost no ATA service in Johnson County and very little cooperation between JoCo and those outside the county overall. Makes total sense right?
So anyway, Kansas City has:
ATA (aka Metro) Primary transit for central city of KCMO and most MO side suburbs includes Metro and MAX.
IndeBus (fixed routes serving suburban Independence, MO)
The JO (fixed route serving suburban Johnson County, KS)
Unified Government Transit (fixed routes serving KCK)
Kansas City Streetcar Authority (entity running the KCMO streetcars, not part of the ATA)
If the Jackson County commuter rail ever gets off the ground, I’m sure that will yet another agency separate from the ATA.
And what little commuter bus service the MO suburbs (liberty, blue springs etc) have to be funded annually by those cities. They don't have any dedicated funding.
Kansas City is not Chicago or DC. For a metro the size of KC, all of these transit agencies should be under the same umbrella, preferably the Kansas City “AREA” Transpiration Authority which was one of the rare occasions when the states of MO and KS worked together to create a bi-state organization so there would be no need to for legislators of the states of KS and MO (as well as Congress) to attempt to create such an agency, which would probably be impossible today.
Metro buses, streetcars, commuter express buses and future commuter rail as well as local suburban service should all be under one system like you see in places like Denver, Seattle, and Minneapolis.
KCMO can try to improve urban core transit and has made great strides in doing that over the past decade. But till the entire region has a single transit system that is property funded (both locally and by both states), I just don’t see Kansas City ever really closing the gap much making the metro more transit friendly.
I have always thought that this should be step one with regards to regional cooperation for metropolitan KC. If KC can’t even work together on transit, everything else is a lost cause and that has been pretty much proven over the past few decades.
I wonder what it would take and if it would even be possible for the metropolitan area to merge all these separate agencies back into the ATA and then properly fund it with a regional sales tax that would cancel out any existing transit sales taxes.
You could have streetcars in KCMO and KCK and take a streetcar from Union Station to a redeveloped Downtown KCK via the Lewis and Clark transitway/greenway (that shouldn't even be a highway, but that's another topic). You could take a Metro Bus from Cerner’s Bannister complex to Lenexa or from Lee’s Summit to Overland Park. Light rail could be funded and run from Olathe to Blue Springs via Union Station on one seamless line which would allow people in JoCo to take a train to Royals and Chiefs games or a person in Independence to get to a job in Merriam.
Commuter rail could serve areas not served by light rail in lower density longer haul corridors such as KCI, Western WyCo, Lee’s Summit and Cass County.
Commuter buses and BRT lines could crisscross the area and cross the state line.
And you would go to ONE website and have ONE transit pass for the entire system.
Is this even possible. Can this be done today when metro KC is one of the most split up metropolitan areas with some of the fiercest competition within its own metro in the country? Could a grassroots effort to make such a thing happen be possible?
It sure would go a long way in helping the KC metropolitan area realize they have a vested interest in working together if the metro had ONE comprehensive transit system that the entire metro could use and be proud of.