Study Finds Public Would Support Transit Tax

San Diego County residents strongly support a tax initiative to expand public transit in the county, a federally funded study for the San Diego Assn. of Governments (Sandag) has found.

According to the study by CIC Research Inc. of San Diego, a majority of county residents--including a majority of non-riders of public transit--endorse increasing taxes to expand the public transportation system.

Those questioned were about equally split over whether the transit funds should be raised through sales taxes or gasoline taxes.

“There appears to be a tremendous degree of support for a tax initiative that would expand the present public transportation system in San Diego,” according to the 161-page “San Diego Region Transit Marketing Segmentation Study” released this week. “The majority of both current riders (67%) and non-riders (56%) were in favor of such a measure.”

The survey showed that 86% of non-riders are willing under some circumstance to consider using public transit, a figure that has “thrilled” officials of San Diego Transit, said Deborah Wetter, the agency’s marketing manager, Tuesday. “For that big a percentage of the people to consider using transit is a victory for us.”

Still, when the non-riders were questioned further, 46% said that even if desirable changes were made, they still would not use public transit.

The study, which was funded by the U.S. Department of Transportation, Urban Mass Transportation Administration, California Department of Transportation and Sandag members, will be used to develop future recommendations for public transit in the county.

CIC pollsters conducted more than 1,000 in-person interviews with bus riders and more than 3,000 telephone interviews to determine who uses public transit and who doesn’t--and in both cases, why.

More frequent service and consistent advertising is needed to boost public acceptance of mass transit, the study says.

Extending evening and weekend hours would “definitely increase” ridership by more than half those who use public transit now, the study found.

Still, “nearly half (46%) of the non-riders stated that there was ‘nothing,’ short of taking their cars away, that the transit companies could do to gain their patronage.”

One deterrent to transit use is the requirement that customers pay the exact fare, the study says.

Wetter responded that exact fares are required so that drivers won’t have to provide change, and therefore won’t be targets for robbers.

Also, public transit commuters take “nearly three times as long to get to work as it does non-riders driving their own cars or car/van pooling--45 minutes compared to 17 minutes respectively,” the study found.

Wetter said she doesn’t know if the latter figures are correct, but acknowledged that “in some cases I’m sure that’s true . . . I think it was truer in the past (but) I think we’re getting better because traffic is getting worse,” hence public transit is more appealing. “And we are working very hard to pick the best routes.”

Public transit marketing has been weakened by too many different types of ads, the study says.

One solution is to promote a simpler, area-wide transit campaign that emphasizes the hassles of cars such as “a person by the side of the road with a steamy radiator; 18 kids trying to get into a six-person mini-van; (and) a man with a broken front bicycle wheel,” the study advises.

Ads should emphasize “happy bus drivers, fleets of buses zipping in and out of San Diego Stadium, the buses being cleaned, kids with surfboards getting out the back door while ladies loaded with packages go in the front,” the study continues.

Wetter agreed “there is a need for more generic advertising.” More frequent trips are definitely needed as well, she said. “There’s evidence that use increases dramatically when the frequency (of trips offered) increases.”

Young adults from 20 to 39 years old constitute 53% of the public transit users, the study reports. The largest single proportion of them, 23%, are students.

The study advises: “Over the long run we must do what we can about changing minds about the system and the ‘sanctity’ of automobile use.”