Valley Transit Zone Would Work, Study Says

A plan to split up the Metropolitan Transportation Authority and form a separate transit zone in the San Fernando Valley would not only be feasible, it would do better financially than the existing superagency, according to a report released Monday.

The thick single-volume document, prepared by a group of independent consultants, examined operations, bus service development and staffing of a Valley system, as well as similar breakaway bus agencies. The report could play a significant role should the plan be put to a vote before the MTA board, which ultimately has the power to approve new transportation zones in Los Angeles County.

“The numbers are promising,” said county Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky, after a two-hour meeting at the Glendale Municipal Services Building. He is a member of the Board of Directors of the Interim Joint Powers Agency, a coalition of city, county and transit representatives gathered to hear the report.

Yaroslavsky said he is cautiously optimistic, even though the projections need to be fine-tuned.

“If the Valley is left to its own devices, we could run a better and more efficient transit system than a superagency,” he said. “We didn’t start down this path thinking that we couldn’t create savings.”

Los Angeles City Councilman Alex Padilla agreed, saying the report’s conclusions bode well for an autonomous Valley transit zone.

“There are outstanding questions,” Padilla said, “but the numbers look promising, and that gives us hope.”

Even so, this particular form of Valley secession--to go along with political and school district breakup efforts--would be made more difficult by pending legislation in Sacramento.

Senate Bill 1101, sponsored by state Sen. Kevin Murray (D-Culver City), requires a new operator of a bus service to pay wages and benefits consistent with those now received by MTA workers.

In October, Gov. Gray Davis vetoed an earlier version of Murray’s bill that was backed by the unions representing MTA drivers and mechanics. That legislation would have made it difficult for other transit operators to take over MTA bus routes in the Valley.

“[The bill] is intended to be a dagger in the heart of the transit zone,” Yaroslavsky said. “I hope that local discretion is not taken away, so that we can negotiate with labor and the MTA and not be at a disadvantage.”

To show their support for local control, transit zone proponents on the coalition voted Monday not to support Murray’s bill. The action was merely a symbolic gesture, because the coalition does not have voting power in Senate deliberations.

Goldy Norton, a spokesman for the United Transportation Union, which represents MTA bus drivers, could not be reached for comment Monday.

The proposed Valley transportation zone would be a coalition of Valley area cities--plus portions of Los Angeles city and county--that would run the new bus system. Included are Glendale, Burbank, San Fernando, La Canada Flintridge, Calabasas, Agoura Hills, Westlake Village and Hidden Hills.

To win the required MTA approval, the zone must show that it could provide cheaper and more efficient service.

Privatizing bus service has boosted quality and cut costs on 26 lines in the San Gabriel Valley, run by the Foothill Transit Zone, a breakaway system established in 1987. But critics argued that Foothill’s bus drivers and other workers, who are paid far less than the MTA’s, bore the brunt of reduced costs.

By MTA estimates, the Valley zone would be the second largest in the county after its own agency, operating 420 buses on 26 routes and carrying 52 million riders a year.

Two groups of city, county and transit representatives have been meeting for months on the proposal. One is a policy committee made up of leaders from the affected cities, and the other a technical advisory group of city staffers and representatives from the county.

The transit zone feasibility study was presented by Russell E. Chisholm, president of Transportation Management & Design, Inc. of Solana Beach, Calif.