A friend asked why I was critical of Mayor Satya Rhodes-Conway’s plan for bus rapid transit when I was such a proponent of it during my years as mayor.
Short answer: This is not the BRT I envisioned. Madison is financially devastated because Rhodes-Conway is mismanaging the bus system.
By 2015, I was aware BRT was the future for Madison. But we were not prepared to implement it. In addition, Donald Trump was president and Scott Walker was still governor in 2017. We were not going to get assistance from either the federal or state governments.
Because of this, I had staff conceptualize routes, prepare applications for federal funding and draw up informational material for Madisonians so we would be prepared to go when both administrations changed.
My vision of BRT meant we would keep any existing routes except those the new BRT would replace. Under this mayor, the city has eliminated significant services to many southwest and east side neighborhoods.
My vision of BRT meant we needed a new funding source: a regional transit authority with a modest sales tax to fund the system. In the last legislative session, however, the current administration made no effort to get a regional transit authority with a sales tax. The city and the bus system are now in dire financial straits.
Meanwhile, the city has a new garbage tax (so-called recycling fee) and a regressive wheel tax (almost $7 million collected.) At the same time, the city has cut services, including snow plowing and the hours for yard waste and brush collection/drop off.
My vision of BRT meant a stable city budget. Under this mayor, the city is now facing an unprecedented $22 million deficit and is asking for a referendum to exceed the property tax levy.
My vision of BRT also meant increasing ridership. The capital investment for BRT is close to $250 million. Under this mayor, even though COVID is over, ridership levels are below 2017 levels. In fact, Rhodes-Conway has dumbed down ridership levels. When she draws comparisons, she uses 2023 — not pre-COVID — levels ($17 million annually.)
My vision of BRT was to improve access to all communities. Under this mayor, the racial and poverty data is distorted. When I worked with that kind of data, we utilized the city’s Neighborhood Indicator Project to discover disparities and then target solutions. This tool is important because it identifies the “voluntarily poor,” namely university students.
The current mayor instead used an outside consultant when designing Madison’s new bus routes, counting college students in service access. That means when you read that the new system is improving service to job centers, they are counting students around campus and the large Asian graduate and retiree population on Sheboygan Avenue. This masks the real reduction to neighborhoods with residents of color.
I also wanted citizens to actively participate in critical policy questions. Rhodes-Conway, on the other hand, has sought no public input on the important matters such as eliminating green terraces, placing bus stations in the middle of the roadway and denying access to traffic lanes for vehicles. And she has ignored existing neighborhood land use plans altogether.
I additionally wanted to increase zoning density along major commercial corridors based on community input to the 2013 Zoning Code Rewrite and the neighborhood plans. Under this mayor, her staff has instead designed major rezoning. It added high rises while disrupting neighborhood uses for churches, recreation (swimming pools) and medium density housing.
High rises everywhere are not necessary. We should build where greater density is already approved and there will be housing for another million Madisonians!
To make BRT work, we needed a regional transit authority with independent additional funding. We needed to be honest in serving communities of color and low income neighborhoods. We needed to make sure the city was financially stable. We needed to involve the public in critical design decisions. Rhodes-Conway has done none of that.
Sorry, this is not my BRT vision. I doubt it is yours either.
Paul Soglin served as mayor of Madison from 2011–2019, 1989–1997, and 1973–1979.
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