Alex W

Deficits arise because expenses are growing faster than tax subsidies and fare revenues.

That's why it's crucial that new tax revenues--be it from the state or from a local half cent sales tax--be raised to fund MTS

"Profitable" means farebox recovery >= 100%.
Farebox recovery = fare revenues/operating expenses
MTS fare revenues cover only 20% of operating expenses.
That's completely fine. As long as tax subsidies cover the remaining 80%, revenues and expenses are balanced. No deficit.

First, I agree, it's OK for transit to not be profitable.

Secondly, MTS' looming annual $100M deficit is not about whether MTS is profitable or not.

MTS board delays decision on budget strategy as 'fiscal cliff' nears A majority of board members balked at the suggestion of an increase to fares, which have been mostly the same since 2009.

MTS is broke. Before you say, "who cares? Transit shouldn't be profitable anyways", let me explain why this is a serious problem.
www.kpbs.org/news/local/2...

Vancouver Skytrain is also a people mover! It uses the same vehicles as JFK Airport's AirTrain (below):

Vancouver's Skytrain comes every 2-6 minutes all-day, vs. every 7.5-15 min on SD Trolley.

The result? Skytrain gets 4x the Trolley's ridership, despite Greater Vancouver having less people than SD County.

Here's Tokyo's 9.1-mile metro rail line--once again using Mitsubishi people movers to serve a dense, urban area. These trains can carry 600 passengers each!

But People Movers aren't just for airports! Here's the same people mover vehicles seen at Dulles Airport--except here they're serving a dense, urban area in Singapore:

People Movers are driverless trains. They often shuttle airport passengers between terminals, as shown below in DC Dulles:

This Friday SANDAG's Transportation Committee will discuss Airport Transit Connection Concepts, including an Automated People Mover (APM). The APM is the best concept. But what is an APM? pub-sandag.escribemeetings.com/Meeting.aspx...

Imagine that instead of the Airport Trolley, the people mover is built instead. Then the Blue and Green Line would have those 24 trains per hour all to themselves. Each could run 12 trains per hour, or trains every 5 minutes, per direction!

SANDAG says the Blue, Green, and Airport Trolleys could each have a train every 7.5 min, or 8 trains per hour per line, or 24 trains per hour in total.

Fortunately, none of the Automated People Mover (APM) options being considered merge onto existing Trolley tracks. So the APM will not further limit Blue/Green Line frequency.

Why will the Airport Trolley limit frequency? Because it'll merge onto existing Blue/Green Line tracks, creating a bottleneck:

7.5 Blue Line frequencies will be inadequate! MTS would have doubled Mid-Coast frequencies to 7.5 minutes this past June. The Blue Line is exceeding all-time highs for a second year in a row. That’s before University City’s plan update adds 72K new jobs and 50K new residents.

Problem with Airport Trolley: It'll limit Blue, Green Line frequencies to 7.5 min each, according to pub-sandag.escribemeetings.com/filestream.a...

SANDAG to present Airport Transit Connection (ATC) at this Friday's Transportation Committee!

There's two major airport rail concepts: the Trolley and the people mover. The people mover is better!
pub-sandag.escribemeetings.com/Meeting.aspx...

Unfortunately, MTS is a special district, and under the CA constitution any tax for a special district is a special tax, which requires 2/3, even if there isn't a specific use of the funds required. Thanks to @colinparent.bsky.social for the info!

Mission Valley on a Mission: From TOD Zero to Hero - Streetsblog California However, SDSU Mission Valley is not a run-of-the-mill TOD; it is North America’s first university campus purpose-built as TOD.

Morena Blvd is undoubtedly a laggard. Encouragingly, Mission Valley is a rising TOD superstar:

cal.streetsblog.org/2025/07/08/m...

Will the proposed plan update raise height limits above 30 ft around Clairemont Drive Station?

I agree that MTS should never be expected to make a profit. Taxpayer subsidies pay for the vast majority of MTS, and rightly so.

Even so, MTS is tragically broke, because unfortunately there are not enough tax dollars subsidizing MTS.

OpEd: San Diego Should Put Transit Funding Measure Back on 2026 Ballot - Streetsblog California Bad timing and a conservative electorate sunk Measure G in 2024, but there's many reasons to believe a sales tax measure for transit would pass in 2026 in San Diego County.

That's really interesting. However, I've asked MTS and they seemed sure it'd require a 2/3rds threshold.

Safest bet would still be Measure G 2.0. Here's suggestions for revising it: cal.streetsblog.org/2025/05/06/o...

San Diego MTS is at >93% ridership recovery and has a $30-$40 million projected annual deficit. Half of that deficit could be erased by setting the price of just one major operational expense, the electricity powering our light rail ("The Trolley"), back to 2019 levels. bsky.app/profile/alex...

MTS is mulling putting its own initiative on the 2026 ballot but it will require 2/3rds supermajority, which will never pass.

We need a 2026 transit citizen's intiative. Take the 12% Measure G allocated towards transit operations and increase it to 40%.

SDSU Mission Valley breaks ground on project with 621 apartments, grocery store Avalon Mission Valley will be built in a portion of the existing Orange Parking Lot right next to the stadium.

SDSU Mission Valley's 1st residential project broke ground 2 weeks ago! 621 units in seven stories of apartments on top of ground-level retail.

www.nbcsandiego.com/news/local/s...

2024's Measure G allocated 62% transit, 34% towards roads, and 4% towards admin.

But out of that 62% towards transit, 50% went towards transit capital projects and only 12% towards transit operations.

Let's change this to 40% towards transit operations, 22% towards transit capital projects.

OpEd: San Diego Should Put Transit Funding Measure Back on 2026 Ballot - Streetsblog California Bad timing and a conservative electorate sunk Measure G in 2024, but there's many reasons to believe a sales tax measure for transit would pass in 2026 in San Diego County.

I wrote this in May, but still relevant. If we improve Measure G it would easily win in 2026!
cal.streetsblog.org/2025/05/06/o...

And with the University City Community Plan allowing for 72K new jobs and 50K new residents, the Mid-Coast will need 5 min.

Rerouting the Blue Line onto Bayside is worth studying. However, the Blue and Green Lines will each need 5 min frequencies. Mid-Coast ridership was growing so fast that MTS planned to increase Mid Coast frequencies to 7.5 min in June 2025.

San Diego Needs Higher Train Frequencies, Not Another Express Light Rail or Bus Alex Wong is Data Researcher for RideSD, a nonprofit organization working to improve public transportation in San Diego.  The San Diego Association of Governments is studying concepts to speed up […]

Let there be Trolleys every 5 minutes on the Blue Line!

San Diego Needs Higher Train Frequencies, Not Another Express Light Rail or Bus voiceofsandiego.org/2025/08/19/s...