SEWRPC TRANSIT PLAN FLAWED

Ozaukee Plan Based on Out-of-Date Concept

By Michael Horne

Port Washington Road in Mequon is almost six miles of uninterrupted commercial activity, complete with hotels, multi-family residential facilities, offices, businesses, fast-food restaurants, and Ozaukee County’s only hospital.

You’d think the Mequon-Thiensville Chamber of Commerce would keep records of the number of employees on that corridor, but the organization does not, according to Linda Oakes, its executive director. You’d think the city of Mequon might have an idea of how many employees work in that corridor, but, according to City Administrator Lee Szymborski, “because the city does not issue business licenses it does not have a method for calculating or tracking the number of employees in any of the businesses within the city.”

Let’s just say there are thousands of jobs – there are at this time between 500 and 999 at the hospital alone, with many, many more on the busy street, with a lot of them (including the hospital) paying single-digit per-hour wages.

We do know that about 6,000 workers commute from Milwaukee County into Ozaukee County each workday. Since Mequon is both the largest city in area and population in Ozaukee County, as well as the closest to Milwaukee County, it is likely that many of these workers from Milwaukee County work in Mequon. Also, a number of Ozaukee County residents work in Mequon.

The question is, “how do they get there?”

According to census reports, of the 10,595 workers aged 16 or over who live in Mequon, 86.7 per cent drive to work alone in a car, truck or van. Fifty-seven took public transportation (including taxicab) and 149 walked. (The walkers were most likely the farmers in northwestern Mequon who trekked from farmhouse to barn.)

Recent gasoline prices have increased the number of those who took public transportation 8 per cent, according to a news article this week.

That number could be far higher, I feel, if the City of Mequon, the Southeastern Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission, the County of Ozaukee, and the Milwaukee County Transit System were to take a fresh look at the highly-developed Port Washington Road corridor as an “urban” street, suitable for conventional bus traffic.

For whatever reason –- and I suspect the worst – this is not the case. As a result, far too many automobiles drive in Mequon daily and hundreds of jobs go begging because the governmental entities have failed to develop a plan that would put Port Washington Road on the transit map. When I inquired, in 1998, why there were no busses on Port Washington Road in Mequon, the Milwaukee County Transit System informed me that it was the organization’s policy to run bus routes only on streets that have sidewalks. At that time, Port Washington Road did not have sidewalks. It does now – beginning two blocks into the city north of County Line Road (Zedler Lane, to be exact) all the way to Mequon Road. Mequon Road, itself has sidewalks for several miles, nearly to the heart of Thiensville, in the center of Mequon. Thiensville station at one time provided 33 commuter train trips daily to Milwaukee.

Every retail business owner I have spoken to in the area has complained about their difficulties hiring service personnel. These difficulties would be eliminated if the Milwaukee County Transit System would extend its bus routes across the County Line and into the burgeoning Port Washington Road commercial zone.

This matter will become of even greater urgency when Columbia St. Mary’s Hospital completes its expansion.

A Transit System Development Plan for the Ozaukee County Transit System was formally approved by the Ozaukee County Public Transit Planning Advisory Committee on October 31, 2002 – over three years ago. It stinks. It called for reducing the number of trips taken by route 143, construction of a park-and-ride lot at Mequon Road and Port Washington Road, and would offer Mequon service only “as a demand-responsive service instead of fixed-route service due to low and inconsistent ridership.”
It conceives of the system merely as a convenience for factory operators, and does not envision that the professional or mercantile class might use it for transit to work, or that residents within walking distance of Port Washington Road (there are thousands) might use it to get to work in Milwaukee -- or in Mequon.

The study proceeds from entirely faulty assumptions. The 143 route runs only a half-dozen or so trips daily, with a bewildering array of stops designed mostly to bring factory workers to plants in the outlying areas of the county. The bus begins at 6^th and Mitchell and runs along residential streets near the freeway, before leaping onto I-43 at Teutonia. It speeds along I-43 and bypasses the Port Washington Road exit, where it should exit, and thereby pass thousands of jobs. Instead the bus exits at Mequon Road, heads north to Columbia St. Mary’s hospital and thence to Ozaukee’s scattered factory zone. Furthermore, there are many acres at the freeway, County Line Road and Port Washington Road that would be eminently suited for a park-and-ride lot. These acres were not even considered, likely due to possible neighborhood objections from residents of that area, Mequon's wealthiest.

A far more sensible plan than the semi-freeway flyer service would be to continue the 15 bus route, Milwaukee’s longest, beyond Bayshore, where it now terminates. Any passengers at this time who would like to travel further north in Milwaukee County must transfer to the #68 bus which begins at the unlikely intersection of Atkinson and Keefe and ends at Port Washington Road and Brown Deer Road. Even if that bus would have the gumption to travel a few more miles to the north, it would serve the thousands of jobs on Port Washington Road in Mequon that have no bus service.

This option was not even considered by the transit planners, nor does there appear to be any effort by the Milwaukee County Transit System to consider expanding its service.

As Mequon City Administrator Symborski wrote, “to my knowledge there has been no correspondence between the City of Mequon and the Milwaukee County Transit System.” Well, let's institute some.

Regarding the hospital, Symborski says, “The primary discussion, at this time, between the city and the hospital concerning an increase in traffic has focused on improvements to the intersection of Port Washington and Highland Roads. Discussion about the hospital’s public transportation needs would take place between the hospital and the county. When that occurs I would expect the city to participate as well.”

Another weakness, system-wide, of the MCTS is its express route service, known as the “Freeway Flyer” system. The flyer uses a methodology that is nearly a half-century old, and one that predates the existence of such things as commercial streets with sidewalks in suburbs like Mequon. In most cities, express route stops do two things.

1.) They provide parking for automobiles, the passengers of which then take express busses to their destinations.

2.) The express bus routes connect with local bus routes.

In Milwaukee, the Freeway Flyers, for the most part, only provide the first service. A truly effective transit system in Milwaukee and adjoining heavily-populated communities would use local routes to feed the express routes. Here, they do not even connect.

Gasoline prices will continue to increase over time, and the demand will always be strong for a workforce in the Port Washington corridor in Mequon, with its abundance of low-paying, service industry jobs.

It is time for a true study of the transit needs of this community so that the poor who desire to work can find access to jobs in the wonderland that is Mequon without the expense of purchasing an automobile, and the likelihood that that automobile, owned by a worker making $7 per hour might not be up to the standards of the Mequon Police Department. This is a variant of the “Driving while Black” syndrome.

We must demand accountability from a transit system that continues to cut back service and increase fares during a time when fewer and fewer people will be able to afford to drive privately-owned vehicles to jobs in densely-settled areas.

Mequon, in particular, must overcome its parochialism. It is a big, grown-up city with a dense commercial district, its widely-spaced residences notwithstanding. A common-sense bus transportation system to Mequon's commercial artery is necessary. It is time the politicians address this crisis, and allow low-income Milwaukeeans an opportunity to earn money in that paradise.
(Joe Caruso, the ordinarily voluble spokesperson for the Milwaukee County Transit System, did not respond to a detailed message asking for comment for this story.) [Editor's note: Thursday, December 1, 2005 -- Joe Caruso left a message. I will speak to him Friday and update this piece with his information. --Horne.]

TIRIMBINA RAINFOREST PLANS TO BE ANNOUNCED
But, apparently not here.

Milwaukee Public Museum Executive Director Dan Finley told milwaukeeworld Wednesday that there will be an announcement soon regarding the museum's Tirimbina Rainforest. "There are some plans in the works, and it will stay in the family. We have a good plan to deal with it." He refused to comment further on the plan, except to say that we will be able to read about it in the newspaper. -- Michael Horne

STARBUCKS IN, ALTERRA OUT

Add Milwaukee to the list of cities where Starbucks Coffee shops can be found within a block of each other. As we reported here first, a Starbucks has opened in the lobby of the Milwaukee Hilton Hotel, adding life to the Wisconsin Avenue frontage of that landmark hostelry. Walk north a block to the Milwaukee Public Museum and you will find another Starbucks in the lobby of that financially-troubled institution. The Starbucks replaced a locally-owned Alterra coffee kiosk that had operated there for years. Museum Executive Director Dan Finley says the coffee concession is operated by Sodexho, a large firm that features Starbucks products. He said the plan for a new vendor had "been in the works for awhile," and that coffee kiosks at the museum "generate a substantial amount of money," although he did not have the figures at hand immediately. -- Michael Horne

DONOVAN'S DISMISSAL

Ald. Bob Donovan held a hastily-called news conference Monday to announce the "non-criminal resolution of the pending charge" against him by U. S. Attorney Steven M. Biskupic. Donovan had denied since being charged in July that he had done anything improper in his relationship with the Milwaukee Alliance and his campaign committee, particularly that Donovan "knowingly and with intent to defraud caused a false material statement to be made to the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development."

But getting a criminal charge dismissed by the U. S. Attorney does have a couple of stipulations, as can be seen from the attached document.

The dismissal of the criminal charges included a recounting of "the following facts that would have been presented by one or both of the parties" if the case had gone to trial.

Among the facts: Donovan transferred $2,400 from his campaign fund to the Milwaukee Alliance to cure an overdraft of $2,356 on or about August 9, 2001. On August 23, 2001, $2,400 was transferred back to the campaign fund.

In January, 2002, Donovan wrote a $5,000 check from the campaign fund again to the alliance, listing it as a "loan" on the check's memo line, and in March 2002, an aide transferred an additional $5,000 to the alliance.

The $2,400 transfer was never mentioned on campaign finance disclosure documents, and the loans were disclosed as office expense payments by the campaign for the creation of an adlermanic office space within the Alliance's headquarters.

Biskupic was also prepared to allege that the records of the Milwaukee Alliance regarding payments to Donovan's wife Kathy were changed from "payroll expense" to Kathy Donovan to "general services" payment to an unknown payee.

Donovan, for his part, said "City officials, as well as HUD were aware that Donovan rented office space from the Milwaukee Alliance, using campaign funds to pay the rent."

Donovan also asked for, and received a City Ethics Board opinion on payments to his wife. This opinion apparently escaped the attention of Biskupic.

As a "resolution of the charge" Donovan agreed to pay the City of Milwaukee Treasurer $2,500 as "a penalty for failure to provide appropriate oversight for the activities of Milwaukee Alliance."
He also agrees to disband the institution, to provide no funds to the Alliance, to take no steps to advocate the Alliance to receive funds from any source and, for a period of two years, to "take no direct or indirect role in the operatin of any non-profit agency receiving federal funds."

Thus ends what had been a high profile case for the U.S. Attorney, and a matter of great intrigue at City Hall. It is a far different resolution from what Biskupic originally planned -- he repeatedly tried to get Donovan to resign his seat, for example, according to City Hall sources.
And, certainly, a great deal more than $2,500 was expended on the investigation by the Federal Government.
Donovan would not comment Tuesday on the U.S. Attorney or if he feels that Biskupic is continuing to investigate other Milwaukee aldermen. Some aldermen in Milwaukee continue to privately express the opinion that Biskupic is continuing to investigate Milwaukee aldermen.
Donovan did say that he "thanks Willie Hines and the members of the Common Council" for their support throughout his ordeal. Hines, the council president, had removed Donovan from his committee assignments and chairmanship when the indictment was announced, and restored him to his positions immediately Monday. -- Michael Horne

WINDY CITY PEN FOR KAROS

Marilyn Karos, the felon you've read about here for her attempts to subvert justice has been placed in the Federal Community Corrections Facility in Chicago, Illinois, according to the Bureau of Prisons website. She was sentenced this month to 20 months in prison by Judge Charles Clevert.