The Atlanta region ranks among the worst major metro areas in the nation for putting transit services within reach of people without cars, the Brookings Institution Metropolitan Policy Program said in a report released Thursday.
Of the nation’s 100 largest metro areas, Atlanta ranks 82nd, providing 68.5 percent of its households without vehicles access to transit services, the report says. That leaves 37,634 such households out of reach, the largest number among the 100 regions studied.
Honolulu ranked the best with 99.3 percent coverage. The Greenville, S.C, area ranked the worst at 45.9 percent. Among the regions, the South ranked the worst at 79.7 percent. The Midwest ranked the best at 96.2 percent.
Nationwide, the institution found, about 700,000 households without vehicles in the largest metro areas lack access to these services.
“These people are terribly constrained in earning a living, getting to the store or taking their kids to daycare,” said Adie Tomer, a senior research analyst at Brookings and the author of the report. “If this many people were facing a public health scare, this country would be in crisis mode. We need to approach this problem with similar urgency.”
The institution -- a nonprofit public policy organization located in Washington -- based its report on U.S. census data and information from 371 transit providers in the nation’s largest metro areas.
MARTA CEO Beverly Scott said the findings from the report are not surprising.
“Unfortunately, on any measure -- transit service coverage, walkability, number of buses, service frequency -- we pale in comparison to the vast majority of other major U.S. metropolitan areas,” she said in an email. “Hopefully, this latest in a series of national reports, helps to serve as a real ‘wake-up’ call for our region.
“It is particularly timely in view of the Transportation Investment Act investment choices facing our region [through next year's referendum]. To me, the key point is that we finally have an opportunity to make a difference.”
A spokesman for the Atlanta Regional Commission said the institution’s findings point to “tremendous challenges” for the area.
“Households without vehicles have dispersed in the region -- in many cases to locations without access to transit services,” ARC spokesman Jim Jaquish said in an email. “Atlanta is a low-density metropolitan area where transit is not cost-effective in all areas. It is a tremendous challenge to meet the needs of zero-car households that are not located in our more dense areas served by existing transit.”
Complicating matters, some of the region’s transit agencies have been forced to cut services and increase fares in recent years because of lean budgets and the troubled economy. But Jaquish pointed to several plans to restore or expand such services, including a regional transportation referendum planned for next year. That referendum would add a 1-cent sales tax to pay for transportation projects.
“Providing access to transit for people in zero-car households,” Jaquish said, “is an area that needs to continue to be addressed.”
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