Faced with languishing ridership, Metro Transit is cleaning up its trains, adding more police on the light-rail lines and improving its technology to make riding the bus more reliable.
In addition, the transit agency said its new plan to improve service quality includes investing in promising new bus routes and launching an anti-harassment campaign rewarding passengers who exhibit "positive behavior," according to Wes Kooistra, Metro Transit's newly appointed general manager.
"Our customers want to feel safe, they want facilities to be comfortable and clean, and they expect fellow riders to be respectful," Kooistra said Tuesday. "Customers are tired of people smoking pot and cigarettes on the trains, they want trash to be cleaned up and they want the unsanitary conditions to be addressed. And we want that, too."
The improvements, some of which have already been rolled out, will cost about $1.5 million from Metro Transit's $55 million reserve fund.
But Kooistra stressed that fund will be spent on operations by 2023, adding the Legislature must step up with a sustainable funding stream for local transit to maintain the enhancements.
"We've held vacancies, eliminated investments in new routes, held back service improvements, we've really focused on keeping service on the street," Kooistra said. "It was felt that it was the responsible thing to do. But we continue one-time fixes and Band-Aids for a budget that needs sustainable funding."
The Walz administration has proposed a one-eighth-cent sales tax in the seven-county metro area, as well as a 0.375 percent increase in the motor vehicle sales tax to maintain the bus, light rail and commuter rail system — moves expected to raise close to $1 billion over the next decade.
Whether these tax increases will gain traction at the Capitol — particularly among the tax-averse, light-rail leery Republicans who control the Senate — is unclear.
