Consumer spending fuels Miami’s free trolleys. What happens in a COVID-19 recession?
Free rides came to Sharon Lightsey-Collie’s neighborhood two years ago during the economic boom times of 2018, when Miami extended its trolley system to a new Little Haiti route. Now she’s using it regularly as an Instacart shopper, delivering groceries for people reluctant to shop for food themselves in a pandemic.
“When they started this, this is like a blessing to a lot of people,” she said, on a recent afternoon commute to her home in Liberty City. “There’s a lot of people that are less than fortunate.”
The coronavirus crisis brought the rockiest times ever for Miami-Dade’s sprawling network of city-run trolley systems, and the future promises tough choices as well.
While the county’s bus and train systems have federal relief dollars to cover expenses in the months ahead, the city-run trolley systems are more vulnerable to the ongoing economic calamity. Cities rely on a countywide sales tax for large chunks of their trolley budgets, a revenue source facing an unprecedented decline with tourism all but suspended, the retail industry hobbled by COVID-19 fears and a significant chunk of Miami-Dade’s population unemployed.
Budget forecasts released Thursday by Miami-Dade predict a 10 percent drop in sales tax through September, though there are no predictions for the transportation tax in 2021. On Friday, the Commerce Department reported retail sales nationwide plunged 16 percent in April.
By law, Miami-Dade must turn over to cities about 20 cents of every dollar from its half-percent transportation sales tax. Cities can use the money for road projects and for transit service. That makes the sales-tax dollars the primary revenue source for trolleys.
Trolleys for groceries, and trolleys to commute
The short, neighborhood routes make trolleys popular with senior citizens running errands and commuters heading to work, sometimes in connection with a longer county bus trip.
A Miami Beach survey from March found nearly a third of its trolley riders were on their way to work, and 17 percent of the passengers were going to the grocery store, shopping or a medical appointment. By far the largest category, 42 percent, were on their way somewhere fun, such as a restaurant or entertainment spot or were sightseeing.
The coronavirus pandemic has already caused the longest cutback in trolley service in Miami-Dade history, thanks to plunging demand from riders and concern about close quarters in the mini buses. A summary released Friday by the Citizens Independent Transportation Trust, the county board that oversees the “half-penny” transportation tax, found 15 of the roughly two dozen cities with reports had cut back service, with eight suspending trolleys or circulators entirely.
Miami Beach shut down its trolley system on March 25, and the vehicles remain off the streets nearly two months later.
Mayor Dan Gelber said the free vehicles’ popularity with seniors made them too high a coronavirus risk, even with stepped-up cleaning. “The easiest thing to do was to stop the trolleys,” he said. Gelber said he doesn’t know when the trolleys will go back on the road, or how many of the prior routes will return.
The trolley system’s $11.8 million budget relies on the countywide sales tax for about 35 percent of its funding, with the rest coming from city dollars that include a tax on hotels and restaurants.
“That will depend on how flush we are,” he said. “The trolleys are important to the city’s economic viability. They move people around, including residents and workers. They unclog our arteries. They do quite a bit.”
In Miami Gardens, the city didn’t cut trolley service and reports the routes “are still getting a good amount of riders,” according to a summary by the Citizens Independent Transportation Trust, which oversees the half-percent sales tax. In a statement, the city said no cutbacks were planned and that long-term demand will be assessed “after we transition through the global pandemic and return to some resemblance of normalcy.”
Coral Gables administrators are projecting a $1.3 million shortfall from the transit sales tax through the summer, a tough prospect for a city that spends its entire share of the tax on trolleys and pays an additional $22,000 from property taxes on top of that.
“We have to subsidize what we get from half-penny to allow the trolley to be free,” said City Councilman Vince Lago, who is running for mayor in 2021.
Washington rescues Miami-Dade transit, but what about trolleys?
The extent of the pandemic’s impact on countywide transit is not yet clear, though the anticipated shock was enough to help the county secure $223 million in federal relief funding under the federal CARES act. The dollars are meant to cover shortfalls for Miami-Dade’s transit system during the coronavirus crisis, and the county estimates the relief package is so large it should be enough to last through the fall of 2021.
None of that money is earmarked for cities, which will likely prompt pressure from local elected officials to use the CARES funding to help pay for city trolleys and circulators by filling gaps left by sales-tax shortfalls.
Before the threat of COVID-19, top administrators in the city of Miami warned that the day is coming where funding the trolley system will require support from the property-tax-fueled general fund — which will take a hit. City budget analysts are projecting a $19.7 million budget shortfall.
Alan Dodd, Miami’s director of resilience and public works, said it’s not clear how the sales tax slump might impact trolleys, but a budget crunch could lead to changes in service.
“We do not know the impact of reduced sales tax revenue, but we will make the appropriate adjustments to stay within our budgeted amount,” he said. “If needed, we will consider reduced hours during periods of low ridership to make up any shortfall.”
Miami budgets 70% of its share of the countywide half-cent tax on the trolley system, about $13.4 million. The tax dollars cover operation of 13 routes, fuel costs and the purchase of new vehicles when needed. The Florida Department of Transportation also subsidizes certain routes through grants.
The city cut back trolley hours during the coronavirus crisis, and eliminated Sunday service for all but one route. That’s the Little Haiti line that Lightsey-Collie uses for her Instacart runs.
Lightsey-Collie, 53, remains a loyal transit rider after growing up using public transportation. She stitches commutes together using Miami-Dade County buses and the city of Miami’s free trolleys, a routine that got upgraded in 2018 when the city debuted a route in Little Haiti. It made travel to work, errands and family outings easier for her and the community.
As an Instacart shopper, she rounds up items and hands them to a driver who delivers them to customers’ front doors — a service seeing more use during the coronavirus pandemic. She begins her six-hour shifts at 8 a.m., timed so that she can make sure she can catch the free trolleys on her way back home.
With trolley service at risk during a prolonged economic downturn, some transit advocates see the coronavirus crisis as a way to take a hard look at how transit dollars are spent subsidizing the free routes.
The Better Bus Project, a county-funded effort by Transit Alliance Miami, wants to double access to high-frequency bus routes, where the average wait is about seven minutes. The plan released in February touts the potential of reworking “highly duplicative” trolley routes that serve the same Miami and Miami Beach streets where county buses already run. It consolidates some county routes and redirects trolleys to create fewer options on some streets but more frequent service where demand is highest.
What will the coronavirus crisis mean for Miami-Dade transit?
Eileen Higgins, a Miami-Dade commissioner representing Miami and Miami Beach, said the need to rework transit budgets during a fiscal squeeze could be an opportunity for the Better Bus plan’s focus on eliminating overlap.
“Maybe we don’t get the frequency we wanted, but we get better coverage,” she said. “We end up using our buses more efficiently, and we use those city trolleys more efficiently. And it addresses the decline in the city’s share of the revenue.”
Transit Alliance director Azhar Chougle said the pandemic has highlighted why Miami-Dade needs to rethink how transportation dollars are spent at the city and county level.
“I think it’s a great time to reevaluate the role that trolleys play in transit,” he said. “City budgets are going to be strained, and sales-tax revenue is going to decline. Transit is not going to be the same for a while.”
The desire to shelter city-level transit from cuts could be driven by rider habits. If demand remains low after the economy begins to reopen, leaders’ attitudes might shift. Doral’s ridership dropped enough to allow the city to temporarily shut down the service, which has since reopened on a limited schedule. Hialeah slashed the number of buses running by half and eliminated fares, mirroring Miami-Dade’s policy with county buses.
In Miami, days and operating hours have already been reduced due to decreased demand during the pandemic. Since March 24, Miami trolleys have run during limited hours, from 8 a.m. to 7 p.m.
On March 27, the city took 11 of its trolleys off the street after ridership dropped. Overall, the number of passengers fell by about 81% across 13 trolley routes, according to the average number of riders during a week in late April, compared to the passenger total for March 12.
“Normal trolley services on a Sunday cost approximately $18,500 per day,” Dodd said. “By reducing Sunday services to only the Little Haiti route, we are saving approximately $17,000 each Sunday.”
If trolleys face cutbacks, the city will have to decide where to trim. Sam Lattimore, president of the Hadley Park Neighborhood Association and an advocate for the Liberty City trolley route that launched last year, said he hopes if service is reduced, it is done fairly and rooted in ridership data.
“We understand that this is going to have a wide-ranging impact on all services,” he said. “But we would ask that changes be equitable and fair.”
This story was originally published May 16, 2020 at 6:30 AM.
