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not sure the grassroots advocacy enthusiasm for transit in the portland region has been this strong in decades. i hope whatever touching-of-the-stove our region experiences from these hideous service cuts is enough to force politicians to respond in kind and restore/expand service in the years ahead

i'm hopeful stars are starting to align that might force regional political powerbrokers to the table to figure out portland's next era of transit investments. crisis breeds opportunity. but these cuts are gonna be deeply inconvenient for many and gruesome and painful to some truly vulnerable people

the 2020 regional transportation measure and its campaign were both imperfect in many regards, and had some rotten luck/timing. it's failure set us back nearly a decade. but if there's a silver lining in these dire service cuts, it's forcing new leadership to fully face and confront the problem

but of course, any regional conversation is premature; all eyes are on salem. the clock's ticking. a year from now, the governor needs to be signing a transportation bill that provides enough funding to restore service for both TriMet and other transit agencies statewide.

due to a combination of republican obstructionism, tax weariness, constitutional limitations on how we can fund transit service, other budget shortfalls, and lukewarm transit enthusiasm from leadership, it'll take a lot of heckling to ensure transit is funded next year. get ready to call your reps

if you think transit service in portland is in rough shape, well, there's dozens of rural transit agencies facing catastrophic, literally existential budget cuts. Without new funding , there's countless rural Oregonians who can't drive who lose their ride to their job, the dialysis clinic, to school

these rural transit agencies are held together by scotch tape and bubble gum; they share anecdotes of weekly standing-room-only bus rides connecting some small town to the VA hospital on the other side of the mountain pass. I can't fathom what happens to people when that bus just doesn't run anymore

there's endless logistical, pragmatic, economic and moral reasons to support provisions of public transit, but at the end of the day, for me, a government that cares about its communities is one that's figured out how to offer you a ride when you need one, on terms that make the offer flattering