Cuts to RTS: What they mean, how we got here, and where this goes
Cuts to RTS has been in the news recently, with the City and UF going back and forth on funding and service. Those cuts are going to mean a lot to everyone, whether you ride the bus or not.
Over the past week the discussions between UF and The City have heated up on RTS. There have been press conferences, letters to the press, and special Commission meetings about the potential of major cuts to RTS, the city’s bus system.
Currently, UF funds 50% of RTS at $12.8 million and utilizes about 70% of the ridership of the system. On July 1st this contract is up for renegotiation, and so for many months the City and UF have been in talks about where this goes.
On March 6th, three months ahead of this new contract, UF sent us this letter stating that they intend to cut RTS funding, and that position has remained firm ever since.
Proposal:
Starting July 1, 2024 – UF proposes a month-to-month agreement with RTS based on average UF community ridership (outlined below) while a technology solution can be implemented to more accurately capture ridership data and/or other travel solutions are implemented
We would propose a month-to-month contract of $570,000/month based on historical average ridership until a long-term solution is reached1
This would be a huge financial hit to the RTS system, a $6.7 million cut resulting in major reductions to service (which I get into more below). Here’s what this means, how this impacts the city, where we are likely to go from here, and why this is such a bad idea for the long-term health of the University.
A Robust Partnership and Transit System
For a city the size of Gainesville we have a pretty amazing transit system, and that’s largely thanks to the partnership the City and the University of Florida have built around RTS.
From the beginning, in 1981, RTS has been partially funded by the University of Florida to help transport students and faculty to and on campus, always with strong student support. This kind of partnership isn’t common among universities and their local bus system, but it isn’t unheard of either.
In the late 1990’s the system expanded to the much more robust system we have today. That was thanks to the students themselves, who in 1997 again voted 58% in a UF special election to include transit fees through RTS as part of their student fees. That has grown over the years to what it is today.
Today RTS is a central part of the student and staff experience of our city and campus life. 45% of students commute to campus on RTS at least twice a week, and it is the only transportation system at the University for people to get around the sprawling 2,000-acre, 900-building campus during the day.
Thanks to economies of scale, by piggybacking on the City’s bus system instead of building their own standalone system, the University has saved a lot of money. According to a Campus Transit Study they did earlier this year:
RTS provides service that is cheaper than the average for its peer systems in terms of cost per service-hour. Cost per service hour is the primary basis for the current contract and an industry standard. To this end, it is unlikely that insourcing the operations or switching to another third-party operator would yield substantial savings for UF.
According to numbers presented by City staff on Thursday, the University is only paying the marginal cost for these additional UF routes catering to University students. They aren’t paying for the administration, buses, buildings, or anything else that keeps RTS sustained. If you add those in UF is only funding 59.5% of the expenses related to running routes catered primarily to UF students.
But it isn’t like the City is getting taken advantage of either. In return, the City has gotten a much more robust transit system than we have any right to for a city our size. Even as the city has grown over the past 20 years the amount of traffic surrounding the University has actually dropped according to FDOT traffic counts. That’s thanks to careful planning of our transit, housing, and walkability near the campus.2
It’s been a great partnership that has allowed a seamless transportation experience for students both on and off campus, saving the City and UF money, and solving a lot of issues for both partners for decades.
The Future of Transportation on Campus
For years the City/UF partnership on RTS was the solution to a few major problems on campus, mainly parking. Anyone who has ever driven to UF campus can tell you that parking is hard to find, especially on the eastern portion where most of the classrooms are.
That’s why, in the University’s 2018 Transportation and Parking Strategic Plan transit and multimodal transportation is one of the main solutions they propose. The University simply cannot afford to build more parking lots, according to the plan, which they costed at $20,000 per parking spot3. The answer has to be getting people to campus through other forms of transportation, it’s the only solution that makes any sense.
And it makes a lot of sense! According to that same study 90% of UF students live within a transit ride of UF campus. There is limited space on UF campus for new buildings, so using that space for classrooms and laboratories instead of parking lots is smart planning. Parking lots take a lot of room, around 320 sq. ft. per space.
But that was a plan of the former administration. We now have a new administration and a new philosophy. A new Campus Transit Study done by the University earlier this year claims that their philosophy has changed and they can’t afford to fund transit any longer. From their study:
Evolving Philosophy on Transportation Spending
Historically, UF has committed to promote and encourage transit ridership as an alternative to driving and parking on campus
Today UF no longer can support less efficient routes with low student ridership
That’s a real shame. There’s no question that transit is expensive, but so is building parking lots, and so is redesigning streets for walkability/bikeability. It’s expensive to run out of room on your main campus, forcing the University to fund massive expansions to Jacksonville.
So if the plan is to severely reduce bus service to campus, how is the University going to move people to campus? Are they going to have them drive and park? Where are the parking lots going to be located? Where will they budget that expense from? How will they make transportation convenient for people getting around their campus? Are they going to make biking and walking safer so more people do that to campus? How do they intend to lobby the state to make those changes?
The letter to the City doesn’t spell that out, only a bullet point at the end under “Next Steps” that states, “Understand other transit options for UF community and GNV residents (e.g. e-bikes, scooters, etc.)”
The Impacts To The Bus System
The University has said they will only be paying the “pay box” of bus service for UF students and staff, $1.50 per ride. That is a small fraction of the cost to provide bus service, only about 25% of the cost of the UF routes according to their own Transit Study.
In response, our RTS staff has looked at the impact of those cuts and scaled back service focused only on the UF routes. These may or may not be the final routes cut, we will have to work with UF on the final routes if this goes through, but there isn’t a lot of wiggle room:
Elimination of routes
Essentially every on-campus bus route is going to be eliminated. These on-campus routes are the main way students move within the sprawling, 2,000 acre campus of the University. Without it it’s not clear how students will move between the 900 buildings on campus, but it will not be with RTS. These are routes 118, 122,125, 126, 127.
It will also mean the elimination of 6 additional off-campus routes:
17: Rosa Parks Transfer Station-Beaty Towers;
25: Reitz Union-Gainesville Regional Airport;
28: Butler Plaza Transfer Station-The Hub;
34: The Hub-VA Medical Center;
46: Reitz Union-Rosa Parks Transfer Station;
150: Haile Village-Reitz Union
These complete eliminations result in an estimated 4,689 new vehicle trips on the roads. It means direct routes between campus and the airport will be cut, which will impact airport service. It means reductions in connections bwteen UF and Downtown, which will impact downtown business owners.
Reduction in service
It also results in another 11 routes being reduced in service. This isn’t as dramatic of an effect as complete elimination, but it still has a huge impact on the system. A reduction in service means less buses on these routes, which means more time between buses showing up. Here are the routes that will be impacted:
Route 1: Rosa Parks Transfer Station-Butler Plaza Transfer Station;
Route 5: Rosa Parks Transfer Station-Oaks Mall;
Route 8: North Walmart Supercenter-UF Health;
Route 9: The Hub-Lexington Crossing Apartments;
Route 12: Reitz Union-Butler Plaza Transfer Station;
Route 16: Beaty Towers-Rosa Parks Transfer Station;
Route 20: Reitz Union-Oaks Mall;
Route 21: Oaks Mall to Cabana Beach Apartments;
Route 33: Butler Plaza to Midtown;
Route 35: Reitz Union-SW 35th Place;
Route 38: The Hub-Gainesville Place
These include our most used RTS routes: 12, 1, 9, 5, and 8. Those routes are packed with people during the week, and for good reason: they are incredibly convenient. Wait times between buses is in the “sweet spot” of 13-20 minutes, depending on the route. 15-minute intervals is the goal of every bus system, it means that people can simply walk down to the bus stop and grab a bus at a steady clip without planning their day around it.
Layoff of RTS employees
Less routes and service means less bus drivers, and therefore less employees. In total it will mean a reduction of an estimated 52 RTS employees. These are working class, primarily minority drivers, making a starting pay of $16.97 plus benefits.
The Beginning of the Impacts
These are just the direct impacts of these specific cuts, but it’s not going to end there. The city’s partnership with UF bolsters our ridership numbers, which is the basis for federal and state funds. In 2024 Federal and State grants are estimated to be over $8 million in total.
This sudden drop in transit numbers can cause a “death spiral” for a transit system, which is what you’re seeing in cities like San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Philadelphia. During COVID transit ridership fell off a cliff, and remote working slowed commuting down into the city. Less riders for these systems meant less money and less grants, which made them scale back service or increase fees to balance budgets. Charging more or making service less convenient means less people use it, which means further cuts, which means less service, which means . . . you get the idea.
Our RTS system saw some reductions in ridership during the pandemic, but we were lucky. The University still continues in person, students still ride the lines, and while ridership is down from it’s pre-pandemic levels we have recovered far better than other cities have.
But this could be the shock to the transit system that causes that spiral we’re seeing in other areas, which will hurt far more than just UF afilliated routes.
The Community Impacts
I’m a huge fan of buses. They aren’t as sexy a form of public transportation as subways, metros, or high-speed rail lines, but they’re workhorses of public transit. Whether you ride the bus or not, you get an enormous amount of benefits from living in a City that has a heavily used system. Here are some of the impacts we’ll see if we scale that system back:
Increased Traffic
Buses are an extremely efficient form of transportation. One RTS bus can carry roughly 40 people in one lane of traffic. To put those same people into a standard vehicle would take an entire block of cars, as seen from this great image from Cycling Promotion Fund.
City staff did an analysis of how much this would impact traffic on our roads and found that it will put 9,153 trips daily as a result of this reduction. As the graphic below shows, these will be concentrated on Archer Road, W University Ave, and SW 13th St.
Parking Issues
I already went into parking a bit above, but it’s a serious concern for both the University and the Community.
According to UF’s Campus Master Plan there are 23,643 parking spots on the main UF campus with an on-campus student population of 47,383 and staff of 25,393, totaling 72,776 people. That comes out to a ratio of 1 spot for every 3.333 people.
The campus cannot possibly take an additional 9,153 cars parked in it, and so that parking is going to be distributed across the downtown area. This is what happened in the 1980’s: there were big fights between the University and City about parking, with nearby neighborhoods and businesses upset that students were parking in random spots about town. That was mostly solved by the RTS transit expansion and an increase in parking supply, but this sudden shock of new cars will cause that to increase again.
Economic Development
Good public transit means good cities. Less cars on the roads means less congestion, more room for businesses and less room for parking lots. It saves money for its users, brings people to businesses, and helps direct investment along these routes.
That’s why in 2020 the American Public Transit Association found that for every $1 invested in transit you receive $5 in economic returns.
That’s particularly true in Gainesville. These bus routes run between campus, student apartments on the South-West side, downtown, and Butler Plaza. This enhanced system brings students to the local businesses and shops in town.
Environmental Impact
Putting people into buses, even if the bus isn’t used to full capacity, is significantly better for the environment than having those same people in cars. According to the International Energy Agency a small to medium car produces 2.4 times the CO2 as a bus per Km and a large car produces 3.6 times the Co2.
Where We Go From Here
This issue is going to need to resolve itself quickly. With only 2.5 months we have to know as soon as possible whether to begin winding down this enormous system. So, hopefully sooner rather than later, some kind of compromise will come from the University. As the Mayor stated at the Tuesday press conference:
I’m hopeful this is just the beginning, a late beginning, but a beginning to a negotiation and Im hopeful we will be able to continue what has been an award winning partnership that we should all be very, very proud of
But UF is going to need to have answers quickly as well, I assume. As hard as it is for us to scale down a major transit system in 3 months, it is nearly impossible to scale up a transit system in that same amount of time.
UF, for their part, has downplayed the disagreement in the wake of the City press conference, releasing the following statement:
“There seems to be a major misunderstanding on the city’s part. The University of Florida has made no announcements and believed that our good faith talks were ongoing. We were surprised to learn about this press conference, because we recently asked the city to give us transparent data on their operating costs. We’re still working in good faith. This is unfortunate, but we agree with the mayor that a good outcome is possible, and we hope they share their data and come back to constructive talks as partners. We’re committed to doing what’s right for our students and the community.”
Steve Orlando, University of Florida spokesperson
Yesterday they sent another letter, claiming that the City has left the table of the negotiations and that all they want is “data”. In it they claim the City is charging only $1.50 for non-UF students and $2.86 for UF students.
This is absurd, the services UF gets from RTS isn’t just fares but a massively expanded system for UF students, paid for out of student fees. By the data in their own Campus Transit Study they show that the cost per Boarding for RTS on a UF-funded route is $5.49, meaning even at the cost they are paying they are still underpaying for RTS service.
Regardless, if data is all they want, and assurance that they are getting a good deal from RTS, we have that data in spades. That is all very easy to prove, their own internal studies show that they are getting a good deal, but we can provide them more data and all move on.
The answers seem obvious: continue to provide this great service and look for more efficiencies and perhaps a reassessment of the system.
My optimistic side hopes that both sides come out stronger from this. Our RTS routes and system haven’t had a major revamp in many years. Population has shifted for UF students away from the south-west side and towards the north and east of campus. The RTS routes should reflect these changes, and see where we can reduce duplication of routes.
But that is going to take more of a community conversation with the City, our residents, UF Administration, and the students at UF. Hopefully we’ll get there.
I don’t get into this in the article but this portion is also unreasonable. How are we supposed to plan for a $39 million transit system on a month-to-month contract? This isn’t a way to plan the long-term transportation of a campus like UF or a City like Gainesville.
This is according to UF’s internal Campus Transit Study, which I don’t have a digital copy of, so you’ll just have a take my word for it for now
UF Transportation and Parking Strategic Plan, Page 10: “A poor parking and arrival experience has produced complaints from students, employees, and visitors of the University and UF Health. High demand for parking, combined with many lot choices have contributed to this problem. Considering the high cost of building additional parking facilities, these challenges require more thoughtful solutions than simple increases in supply.”
This is shameful. I rode the bus daily when I was a UF student. Some of the routes I used - the 17 and the 28 - are among those proposed to be completely cut. Without RTS, I would not have been able to attend UF. Not every student can (or wants to!) live within walking or biking distance to campus.
These types of idiotic decisions will end up being a bane for UF. I'll be taking my 98th percentile LSAT score and applying to a different law school next year.