opinion

Here's what's killing Cincinnati streetcar

Longtime streetcar advocate John Schneider is a Downtown resident.

Benign neglect (noun): “A policy or attitude of ignoring a situation instead of assuming responsibility for managing it.” – The American Heritage Dictionary

Since the Cincinnati Bell Connector opened in September, cars and trucks have blocked streetcar tracks 143 times for an average of 6.5 minutes, mostly due to carelessness. These are the blockages serious enough to be formally reported. The actual total is many times more.

Fire truck operators have gone out of their way to park on the tracks. Valet parkers, Uber, Lyft and taxi drivers routinely interfere with streetcar operations.

The fine for blocking the tracks is $50, just $5 more than a common expired-meter violation. Only one car has ever been towed. On the other hand, using the Connector without paying will cost you $100 – and $200 for a second offense. Starting to get a sense of our city’s values here?

Along the 3.6-mile streetcar route, only four signs warn “Do not stop on tracks.” All these signs are around Findlay Market, none in the Central Business District, where the streetcar’s path is often blocked.

Sorry to disappoint, but the long-overdue Downtown traffic study isn’t a magic bullet for improving streetcar service. Cincinnati is ignoring new federal rules that require the counting of people moving through a corridor, not just vehicles. Consequently, the study will under-weight Cincinnatians who travel by bus, streetcar or who walk or bike, thus reinforcing the primacy of auto travel over alternative modes.

Few commuters use our Downtown streets between 9 a.m. and 4 p.m. The city should re-time traffic signals to give the streetcar speedier passage during the middle of the day. Who could honestly object to that?

The Connector can communicate with traffic lights. One of the busiest stops is Fountain Square, where streetcars southbound on Walnut often catch a red light at Fifth Street. When the light turns green, streetcars move about 200 feet across Fifth and stop again to pick up passengers. The city should allow streetcars approaching Fifth to pause the green light for a few seconds so they can clear the intersection, pick up passengers on the south side of Fifth, and rejoin the flow of traffic when the light turns again. Similar opportunities exist on Main and at Race and Liberty. Minutes captured like this really add up. Cincinnati traffic engineers, long accustomed to getting their way, will contend this is like trying to move the Great Pyramids. The truth is, cities all over the United States employ transit signal priority. And importantly, when streetcars get out of the way, the cars behind them move faster, too.

It’s great that weekend ridership is strong, but workdays are different. Downtown workers need fast, reliable travel to destinations spread all over our expanding urban core. But our city is doing nothing to make the streetcar perform better for people on the clock. More than a year ago, the Haile Foundation started to form a citizens’ group to promote the streetcar. That idea vanished in the vapors of the mayor’s office.

Cincinnatians like the Connector, which has seen continuous improvement. Buying a ticket is simple and fast now, and the credit card readers work reliably. SORTA’s vendor has struggled with the real-time arrival notifications, but those problems are nearly solved.

City Hall’s feckless stewardship of this $148 million investment continues with the lax close-out of the vehicle builder’s contract, leaving multiple landmines likely to explode in the form of future equipment failures. But that’s a story for another day.

Benign neglect is an elusive thing. Lurking on the dimly lit backstage of public administration, it is seldom obvious to citizens at large … until suddenly, it is.