How about 40 per day? Our region’s MPOs found a way to make that happen.
Raleigh’s MPO is finalizing its long-term project management plan, and it wants to adopt the most transit investment-heavy option out of 3 possible funding scenarios. That scenario includes running 40 commuter rail trains per day (the 12-8-12-8 plan) as soon as it has the means to do so. Durham’s MPO landed at the same conclusion regarding commuter rail, too, and found a way to possibly make that and the Hillsborough extension happen five years sooner.
Here’s the catch, though, as mentioned in a CAMPO meeting from last week: Wake County need to raise its transit sales tax from 0.5 cents to 1 cent to pull that off and make our ends meet. Can we really win at the ballot box when people who don’t follow transit issues haven’t seen benefits from our last tax referendum, yet?
Fun fact: if we do end up getting such a tax increase, CAMPO’s 2020-2050 local transit spending will finally be on par with road- and pedestrian/bike-related uses!
By the way, CAMPO’s still taking your comments about this draft plan, and could modify it further depending on your input. They’ll listen to your thoughts if you write to them by this Wednesday. Same deal for DCHC (Durham etc.'s MPO), though that request for emails ends tomorrow.