Daugherty Repeats the Empty Bus Myth

An example of inner-city people "not riding" mass transit (photo by John Anderson)

As I’ve noted before, one of my biggest pet peeves is the erroneous claim that we should de-fund or reduce funding for Capital Metro because “no one rides the bus in this city” – or as I call it, the Empty Bus Myth. It’s disheartening enough to hear this foolishness coming from regular citizens who likely haven’t actually researched the issue or base it on incorrect assumptions, but it’s particularly galling to hear it coming from public officials who ought to know better.

Today at a lunchtime candidate forum held by the South Austin Civic Club at Green Pastures Restaurant, no less than Republican Travis County Pct. 3 Commissioner Gerald Daugherty – who sits on the Capital Area Metropolitan Planning Organization board, responsible for the region's mobility planning – repeated a version of this fiction. After his Democratic challenger for the office, Karen Huber, said that Precinct 3 could use a light rail line, Daugherty replied, “Getting mass transit to western Travis County is a pipe dream, because we can’t get people to ride mass transit in the inner city.”

Really, Commissioner? Because I’m a regular inner-city bus rider, and I see full or near-full buses all the time. Even on off-peak hours, it’s pretty common to see the buses that are at least half full – and during rush hour, good luck getting a seat. (And I made these observations before the gas price crisis made buses even more appealing.)

Daugherty also bashed on Cap Metro by asking a loaded question: “Did anybody come to this meeting today via public transit?” When no one raised a hand, he enjoyed a smug “told you so” smile.

Problem is, it was a question with a predictable answer: An in-and-out lunchtime event is not the type of situation for which cities build mass transit. The major concern of transportation planners is getting huge quantities of people to and from their 8-hour jobs or classes, not trying to match the convenience of cars for 1-hour events. (But you know what? I damn near did take the bus from my north Austin office to the luncheon anyway. Only a last-minute errand derailed me from doing so; four out of five times, I would have been on that bus.)

I decided to check out the “inner city” on my way home instead of taking MoPac. I saw 102 people boarding, waiting for, or getting off of buses – at the very off-peak hour of 1pm, and with a light rain falling. I wonder how many more I could have counted if I could have seen inside the tinted bus windows.

Daugherty’s stump line this election is, “Years of ‘don't build it and they won't come’ have left us with an inadequate road system while the county population continues to grow.” Yeah, well, you could say something similar about mass transit: Don’t build it, and sure enough, people won’t ride.

The Travis County Precinct 3 Commissioner office is on the Nov. 4 ballot. Early voting begins Monday, Oct. 20 and runs through Friday, Oct. 31. Go to www.traviscountyelections.org for more info.