Hop On Board

SEPTA should make friends, not foes, of its riders.

by Steve Conn

Another strike postponed. Another bullet dodged, at least for the moment. And I think I've finally figured out what's wrong with SEPTA.

Several months ago, I was riding the "L" in Chicago. Apparently, the Chicago Transit Authority (CTA) is faced with a budget crisis, largely because of inadequate funding from the state of Illinois. I found this out because the car I was in had several ad placards detailing this crisis.

This ought to sound familiar. SEPTA too has been lurching from one financial or labor crisis to the next because the commonwealth doesn't have a reliable, dedicated funding source for mass transit. This too has been the subject of reading material, at least on the Green Line trolleys I ride. With one interesting difference: The placards in Chicago ended with a call to arms for passengers. They told riders to call or write their state representatives, and helpfully provided addresses and phone numbers to do so. The SEPTA posters simply predicted doom if more state money was not forthcoming. And at that moment, squealing around the Loop, I realized the problem.

SEPTA was created at the end of the region's industrial era, cobbled together out of the collapsing wreckage of several rail and transit lines. It retains from that era its culture of management and labor relations. That older model of the workplace pitted workers against management in a struggle to balance working conditions against profits. Corporations had a variety of ways to squeeze more out of their employees — seasonal layoffs, work speedups, and so on. Workers responded in turn with slowdowns, strikes and union contracts.

Regardless of what you think about the efficacy of this model, it is one that left customers out of the equation. No surprise given that, when this model evolved, consumers were not a particularly potent force in the economy. That has changed. For better or worse, the U.S. is no longer a producer economy but a consumer one. SEPTA, however, doesn't seem to have figured that out.

The implication of the CTA's appeal to its riders is not only that the riders would pick up the phone to lobby state politicians, but that CTA recognizes just how important lobbying is. SEPTA, on the other hand, has not done much to turn its riders into political allies. Indeed, anyone who has ridden SEPTA can attest that what we might call "customer service" isn't high on the priority list. Management has pursued policies that make it often downright difficult to ride the system. I defy anyone to defend the way SEPTA makes tokens available. Most SEPTA employees I have encountered are perfectly friendly and professional, but there are certainly enough who are surly or indifferent. I tried to buy some tokens from the guy in the booth at 13th Street a few weeks ago, but I couldn't get his attention. His was practicing his electric guitar.

In an earlier era, a railroad management could balance its books by raising fares, and its workers could address their grievances by going on strike. Either way, customers would come back because they had no other choice. Now, of course, they do, and every time fares go up or workers go on strike SEPTA loses riders, which only exacerbates its financial problems further.

SEPTA could solve many of its problems by increasing ridership. But that would mean doing things to attract new riders. Like lowering fares rather than increasing them. Like offering family deals on the weekends (like Boston's MTA often does). Even little things like making sure that buses and other vehicles are clean would help. SEPTA's workers and its managers must make SEPTA a first choice for customers rather than a last resort. In turn, riders who feel good about using SEPTA are more likely to yell at politicians until they fund the system properly. And ultimately SEPTA's long-term problems require political solutions.

Let's be clear: The era of cheap gas and big road-building projects is over. The SEPTA network could be among the very finest transit systems in the country. But turning "could be" into "is" means treating riders as an asset, not an afterthought.

Steve Conn is an associate professor of history at Ohio State University. If you would like to respond to this Slant or submit one of your own (750 words), contact Duane Swierczynski, editor in chief, City Paper, 123 Chestnut St., third floor, Phila., PA 19106 or e-mail Duane Swierczynski.