This gloomy analysis from Streetsblog describes a state Department of Transportation mired in debt, one that ranks 49th nationally in per capita transportation spending.
The defeat of what was called T-SPLOST (might that name have been a factor in the loss? It sounds like something splatting on a hard floor), also means the ambitious greenway-around-the-city called the Beltline has no major funding source.
My analysis-from-a-distance: The package had too much packed into it, was too large a sum ($7 billion) for these financially hurting times, and by trying to please both city-dwelling transit-lovers and suburban- and exurban-dwelling motorists it was vulnerable to pleasing neither. Note, also, that this vote was not only in Atlanta, but in all the state’s metro regions. Other measures, crafted by elected officials in other regions, passed in three of seven regions: Augusta, Columbus and a central-south Georgia region. Note, also, that voters inside the restrictive-annexation-law-strangled city of Atlanta passed the measure. Was messy politics involved? You betcha.
This idea for regional transportation funding has been in the works for years. Here’s a 2008 Neal Peirce column that describes some of the groups that pushed for it. Note, 2008 was a good two years before the anti-tax, anti-government, anti-transit Tea Party overtook the Republican Party. Add that political influence to the generally bad economic climate in the Atlanta area, and you have a problem. The Sierra Club and NAACP opposition did not help.
What happens next?
My guess is that the region’s civic leaders won’t give up and will, after a long and restful vacation, try to figure out how to pay for important needs. After all, here’s what Sam Williams, president of the Metropolitan Atlanta Chamber of Commerce, said in 2008: “Failure to invest [in transportation] would spell economic disaster for Georgia.”
But for now, it must be terribly disheartening for those people who have tried for so many years to find a solution to the problems Atlanta faces with transportation.