georgia department of revenue

The Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority, (MARTA) is a public rapid-transit system that serves parts of Metropolitan Atlanta, including the city of Atlanta, Fulton County and DeKalb County. MARTA operates a network of bus routes linked to a heavy rail rapid transit system. The MARTA acronym is pronounced as a single word, not as individual letters.

MARTA system

MARTA is comprised of both heavy rail transit and bus transit that operate within the boundaries of Fulton and DeKalb counties. For fiscal year 2005, the average weekday ridership was 461,600. Overall for the year, bus and paratransit ridership was 71,401,846 while rail ridership was 70,984,053.

As of 2005 MARTA had 4,300 employees including 1,085 full time bus drivers and 184 full time rail operators. ^[1] Rail and bus operators, station agents, rail maintenance technicians and many other front line support personnel are represented by Amalgamated Transit Union Local 732.

Heavy rail network

MARTA rail service is comprised of two major service lines, the North-South line and the East-West line. The two lines connect at the Five Points station.

Trains are operated using Automatic Train Control, with one MARTA train operator to make annoucements and operate the doors.

North-South Line (orange)

West-East Line (blue)

^† Stations that offer free Park and ride lots for parking less than 24 hours

^‡ Stations that offer paid Park and ride lots for parking longer than 24 hours

^R Stations which have staffed MARTA Ridestores for the purchase of monthly and weekly passes

Rolling stock

• 101-200: CQ310 class. Built by Franco-Belge, 1979-1981
• 501-520: CQ310 class. Built by Franco-Belge, 1979-1981, originally single unit cars.
• 201-320: CQ311 class. Built by Hitachi, 1984-1987
• 601-700: CQ312 class. Built by Breda, 2001-2003

MARTA has entered a contract with Alstom to rebuild all CQ310 and CQ311 cars. (238 Rail Cars) The rehabilitated cars will feature upgraded passenger amenities and upgraded propulsion and train control hardware. The first rehabilitated cars began service March 12, 2006. The refurbishing program will last until 2008-2009.

Bus

MARTA's bus system serves a wider area than the rail system, serving areas in Fulton and DeKalb counties such as the cities of Roswell and Alpharetta in North Fulton, along with South DeKalb and even portions of Clayton and Gwinnett Counties. Most of the bus lines feed into or intersect rail lines as well. MARTA also runs shuttles for special events, such as the Peachtree Road Race and Atlanta Braves baseball games.

In addition to the free parking adjacent to many rail stations, MARTA also operates Park and ride lots serviced only by bus routes:

• Windward Parkway
• Mansell Road
• Stone Mountain
• Barge Road
• South Fulton

For some time, MARTA had "secret" bus routes in the 700 series. These routes were designed to connect maids, home health care workers, and nannies from MARTA rail stations to their work sites. These routes were not officially noted in any system map except for a small footprint instructing people who needed transit service in that area to contact Customer Information. ^[2] No schedules were publicly distributed, and no information was published on the web site. In 1999, the routes were officially "declassified" and information was published. As part of system-wide service cuts, the 700 series routes were eliminated in 2002. ^[3]

Paratransit service

In compliance with the American Disabilities Act, MARTA provides both curb to curb service for those persons defined as disabled by the ADA. MARTA uses special lift equipped vehicles for this service and can either deliver passengers to their final destination (curb to curb service) or can deliver the passenger to the closest accessible bus stop or rail station (feeder service).

Paratransit is limited to existing rail and bus routes and cannot extend more than a 0.75 mile radius from any existing route. Paratransit service is only provided during the hours of the fixed route servicing the area. An application for acceptance into the paratransit service is required; reservations are required for all users for each trip.

Fare structure and operation

Summary of fares

MARTA offers both single one-way fares (with free bus to rail and rail to bus transfers) and discounted weekly and monthly passes. The fare structure is as follows:

• Single one-way fare: US$1.75
• Single one-way paratransit fare: US$3.50
• Weekly pass (Monday-Sunday): US$13
• Monthly pass (one calendar month): US$52.50
• Weekend pass (Friday-Sunday): US$9

Discounted programs available to select users:

• University montly pass (UPASS) program: US$40 (Students) US$49.50 (Faculty/Staff)
• Student weekly pass program: US$10 (K-12 students in DeKalb and Fulton Counties)
• Half-fare program: US$0.85 one-way (Passengers over 65 and MediCare recipients)

Special routes, such as the Atlanta Braves shuttle and the Hi-Fi Buys Amphitheater have an additional US$1 surcharge for each one-way trip.

Effective January 2006, disabled riders who are paratransit eligible can ride fixed bus and rail routes for free.

Additional discounts are available to corporate partners who sell monthly MARTA passes to employees and also to groups and conventions visiting Atlanta. Some employers also provide reduced cost or free MARTA passes to employees to encourage the use of public transportation.

Breeze Card

Main article: Breeze Card

MARTA is currently implementing the "Breeze" fare collection system, allowing riders to load money on the card for use over time, and to add weekly/monthly passes that are not fixed to a calendar period. The system will use a two card scheme: the Limited-Use Ticket will be used by people that are visiting, and other light users, and is composed of coated paper around the RFID antenna. The Extended-Use Card is meant for those that use MARTA frequently and need to load time-based passes. Breeze will also prevent fare evasion which costs MARTA an estimated US$10 million per year ^[4]. Other connecting transit systems such as GRTA Xpress, CCT and the Belt Line could adopt the infrastructure easing inter-system transfers.

As of mid September 2006, the Breeze gates have been installed in every MARTA station and buses were converted over the Labor Day holiday. The system will stop sellling tokens in the late fall, but magnetic weekly and monthly MARTA cards will be sold until spring 2007. As the system reaches its final phase, MARTA will host "token exchanges" from October to December, allowing people with rolls of tokens to have the number of tokens encoded on an extended-use card. Extended-Use cards will become available for pre-registered users by late September. This is in line with MARTA's implementation plan.

Hours of operation

Rail service is provided from approximately 5 a.m. to 1 a.m. Monday through Friday and 5 a.m. to 12:30 a.m. on weekends and holidays. Weekday train frequency is 10 minutes on branch lines and 5 minute frequencies on trunk lines. Late night (after 7:00 pm) and weekend frequency is reduced, with train frequencies of 15-20 minutes on all lines. Bus routes have varying frequencies depending on passenger demand.

MARTA Police

MARTA maintains its own police force, which is currently headed by Chief Wanda Dunham. MARTA has been named the safest transit system in the US seventeen times^[5].

Fare reciprocity

MARTA riders are able to transfer for free to other metro area transit systems, including Gwinnett County Transit, Cobb Community Transit, Clayton County C-TRAN, and GRTA Xpress. These fare reciprocity agreements also allow for riders of the other four systems to transfer for free to MARTA. Some of these agreements require that neither system have significantly more transfers than the other. MARTA has stated that this is the case, that inbound (to MARTA from another system) and outbound (from MARTA to another system) transfers are approximately equal (for second quarter 2006 8,888 daily passengers transferred inbound and 8,843 transferred outbound).^[6] However, it has been noted that workers traveling in the morning to Atlanta from another system will more than likely make the return trip home, resulting in the apperance of an equal number of transfers. Analysis of morning transfers (5 to 9 am) to MARTA shows that Cobb County had 718 inbound transfers but only 528 outbound, Clayton county had 928 inbound but only 424 outbound, Gwinnett County had 239 inbound and 269 outbound, and GRTA Xpress had 1,175 inbound but 615 outbound.).^[7] These data suggest that more people from the other systems benefit from free transfers than those living in the MARTA service area.

History

The agency was formed by an act of the Georgia General Assembly in 1965. In the same year, four metropolitan area counties (Clayton, DeKalb, Fulton, and Gwinnett) and the city of Atlanta passed a referendum authorizing participation in the system, but the referendum failed in Cobb County. In 1972, Fulton and DeKalb Counties successfully passed a 1% sales tax increase to pay for operations, while Clayton and Gwinnett counties overwhelmingly rejected the tax in referendum, fearing the introduction of crime and "undesirable elements".

In 1971, the agency agreed to purchase the existing, bus-only Atlanta Transit Company and on February 17, 1972 the sale was completed for US$ 12.9 million giving the agency control over all public transit.

East Line construction

Construction on the East Line began in 1975 and the first rail service began on June 30, 1979 between the Georgia State and Avondale stations. In June of 1993, the Kensington and Indian Creek stations opened, which also marked the first time MARTA rail service went outside I-285.

West Line construction

The West Line opened between Hightower (now Hamilton E. Holmes) and Five Points stations, on December 22, 1979. On December 12, 1992 the Proctor Creek Branch and Bankhead Station opened. The 1979 plan for the West Line also included an additional station at Fairburn Road (Brownlee-Boulder Park) and another station was planned at the then-existing Perry Homes housing project.

North Line construction

On December 4, 1981, the North-South Line opened from Garnett to North Avenue, including Civic Center and the lower level of Five Points. On September 11, 1982, the line was expanded to Arts Center, and the Peachtree Center (whose opening was delayed from 1981) also opened. The section between Lindbergh Center and Brookhaven opened on December 15, 1984. The line reached Chamblee in 1987, and the Doraville terminus was finished in 1992. The section between Lenox and Doraville was redesignated the Northeast Line on June 8, 1996 when the North Line opened between Buckhead and Dunwoody stations, including a stretch in the Georgia 400 median. The last two North Line stations to open were Sandy Springs and North Springs, on December 16, 2000.

South Line construction

The Garnett station opened on December 4, 1981 and was the first South Line station to open. The section between the West End and Lakewood-Fort McPherson opened on December 15, 1984. The East Point Station opened on August 16, 1986. and the College Park and Airport Stations opened on June 18, 1988. The Airport Station however, was built in 1980 as part of the construction of Hartsfield International Airport and was unused until the line was connected.

MARTA funding

In addition to fare collections, MARTA is funded by a 1% sales tax in Fulton and DeKalb counties. MARTA does not receive any opertational funding from the State of Georgia.^[8]

Some of Metro Atlanta's inner suburban counties, Gwinnett, and Clayton initially agreed to join MARTA but refused membership when voters in their respective counties voted against paying to help fund the system. The inner suburban counties have instead created their own independent bus systems; Cobb Community Transit on July 10, 1989, Gwinnett County Transit on November 5, 2001 , and C-TRAN on October 1, 2001, respectively. Since the original MARTA plan consisted of a much wider service area, some counties have representatives on the board of directors (e.g., Gwinnett and Clayton). However, only Fulton and DeKalb counties give financial support to MARTA. Eleven counties, including Fulton and DeKalb, and the Georgia Regional Transportation Authority also are working together to provide a regional commuter coach service, Xpress, which began service on June 6, 2004. The system receives limited financial support for capital projects from the state of Georgia, and U.S. federal transit subsidies and grants for capital development and maintenance.

Operations vs. capital expenditures

By law, half of all MARTA revenues (sales tax plus fare box) must be spent on operations, half on capital expenditures like expanding the system. The idea behind the split is that at the time of MARTA's formation it should continue expanding and investing in the system. However, MARTA currently has no future plans to expand rail service. As a result the capital funds enjoy a large surplus whereas the operations funds limit the amount of service MARTA provides. This law was amended by the state legislature in 2002 to allow a temporary three year 45% capital/55% operations split ^[9]. This additional 5% for operations expired in 2005. A bill to renew the split was tabled by the legislature's MARTA Oversight Committee, forcing MARTA to pass a new budget with cuts in service. In addition a fare increase was considered; however, MARTA board members voted down a fare increase and instead used cash reserves to make up for the operations shortfall. The temporary 45/55 capital/operations split was renewed again in the 2006 state legislative session. The capital funds surplus has resulted in projects, such as a new $100+ million Breeze Card fare collection system and $1.1 million automatic toilets in the MARTA Five Points station, occuring at the same time that MARTA is struggling to pay for bus and rail operations. ^[10]

MARTA Governance

General Manager/Chief Executive Officer

The highest employee at MARTA is the General Manager/CEO. In September 2006, Richard McCrillis was named the new General Manager after having served since January 2006 as Interim General Manager. McCrillis was chosen after the other finalist for the job withdrew his application. McCrillis has worked at MARTA since 1985. The first day in his new position he unveiled plans to improve MARTA service by restoring bus route cuts, increase paratransit drivers, increase East-West rail line frequency, and to reopen the South Yard rail maintenance facility. ^[11]

Prior to McCrillis, MARTA's General Manager was Nathaniel Ford from 2000 to 2006. In January 2006 Ford offered his resignation to take a position as the Executive Director of the San Francisco Municipal Railway. After Ford left MARTA, audits discovered he had his own corporate credit card which was not subject to review by the MARTA Board of Directors (see criticism and concern).

Board of Directors

MARTA is governed by a Board of Directors consisting of the following members:

• Four members representing the City of Atlanta
  • Juanita Jones Abernathy
  • Clara H. Axam
  • Gloria Leonard
  • Michael Walls
• Five members representing DeKalb County
  • Harold Buckley, Sr.
  • J. Thomas Kilpatrick
  • Mukesh "Mike" Patel
  • Pat Upshaw-Monteith
  • Edmund J. Wall
• Three members representing Fulton County
  • Barbara Babbit Kaufman
  • Walter L. Kimbrough, L.H.D.
  • Marie R. Metze, Ph.D.
• One member representing Clayton County
  • George E. Glaze
• One member representing Gwinnett County
  • Bruce E. Le'Vell
• Four ex officio members from different State of Georgia committees:
  • State Properties Commission & Georgia Building Authority - Gena Abraham
  • Georgia Department of Revenue - Bart L. Graham
  • Georgia Department of Transportation - Harold E. Linnenkohl
  • Georgia Regional Transportation Authority - Steve Stancil

Positions on the MARTA Board of Directors are not elected; rather they are appointed by the organizations they represent. Although the state does not contribute to MARTA's operational fuding (see Criticism and Concern), it still has voting members on the MARTA board. A similar situation exists for both Clayton and Gwinnett counties; as a consequence of passing the authorization referendum but not the funding referendum, Clayton and Gwinnett Counties have representation on the MARTA Board of Directors without paying into the system. This situation became controversial in 2004 when Gwinnett's representative Mychal Walker was found to have accepted US$20,000 from a lobbyist trying to secure a US$100,000,000 contract with MARTA. Despite the controversy, the Gwinnett County Commission failed to remove Mr. Walker from his position on the MARTA Board.^[12] Eventually the state legislature was called upon to change the law governing MARTA's Board to allow for the removal of a member whose appointing county did not act on a request for removal. Before the new law could be used, Mr. Walker was arrested on an unrelated child support violation, which resulted in his firing by the Gwinnett County Commission.^[13]

MARTA Oversight Committee

The Georgia General Assembly has a standing MARTA Oversight Committee, which is frequenly abbreviated MARTOC. This committe is charged with financial oversight of the MARTA organization. State legislation concerning MARTA mus pass through this committee. The current chairperson of the committee is Representative Jill Chambers.

Performance

All performance data comes from the MARTA Annual Report.^[14]

System Wide

Customer Satisfaction

• FY2005 79%
• FY2004 77%
• FY2003 80%
• FY2002 78%
• FY2001 77%

Rail

Mean Distance Between Service Interruptions

• FY2005 9,493 mi (15,274 km)
• FY2004 7,480 mi (12,035 km)
• FY2003 7,479 mi (12,034 km)
• FY2002 6,604 mi (10,626 km)
• FY2001 8,356 mi (13,445 km)

On Time Performance

• FY2005 91.64%
• FY2004 91.74%
• FY2003 90.46%
• FY2002 89.18%
• FY2001 89.80%

Bus

Mean Distance Between Failures

• FY2005 3,301 mi (5,311 km)
• FY2004 6,063 mi (9,755 km)
• FY2003 6,642 mi (10,687 km)
• FY2002 6,297 mi (10,132 km)
• FY2001 4,372 mi (7,035 km)

Future expansion plans

Although MARTA has no active expansion projects, several projects are currently being studied by MARTA:

• North Line Expansion: Potential construction of additional heavy rail from North Springs station to Windward Parkway)^[15]
• West Line Expansion: Expansion of MARTA service to Fulton Industrial Boulevard through the use of both heavy rail extension and Bus rapid transit.^[16]
• I-20 East Corridor: Bus rapid transit from downtown Atlanta to the Mall at Stonecrest ^[17]
• Inner Core (Belt Line and C-Loop): The use of light rail and possibly bus or trolley service on existing railroad right of ways inside the perimeter ^[18]
• Memorial Bus Rapid Transit: Implementation of bus rapid transit from the former Avondale Mall to the Marta Park and Ride Lot in Stone Mountain. This project has moved to the environmental study stage, with an implementation timeline of 2008^[19]

Additional expansion plans for MARTA and other metro Atlanta transportation agencies are detailed in Mobility 2030 a timeline by the Atlanta Regional Commission for improving transit through the year 2030.

Criticism and concern

Financial Support

Due to limited financial contributions from the local and state government, MARTA has been plagued by limited serivice throughout the greater metropolitan Atlanta area and financial difficulties. It is the largest mass transportation system (ninth largest in North America) not to receive state funding, ^[20] and many suburban counties, such as Gwinnett County and Cobb County, have refused to join or fund MARTA (see history, above). Under these funding constraints MARTA has struggled to provide adequate service to the metropolitan area, and as a result, MARTA has gained a reputation for being ineffective and inconvenient. Many people who own cars avoid using the system, and residents in suburban areas usually must still drive to a MARTA station to ride a train.

MARTA's financial structure has led the agency to cut services, resulting in complaints about the inconvenience of MARTA services.

Racial Concern

Racial politics also play a role. The acronym is sometimes referred to as "Moving Africans Rapidly Through Atlanta". ^[21] Some suburban communities have opposed MARTA expansions believing it will be a pipeline to bring minorities and/or crime to their communities.

Reliability of Service

As is typical of rail transit in the United States, MARTA's rail lines have two parallel tracks. Any train failure or track work results in shared use of the other track by trains going opposite direction, a situation known as single-tracking. There are no plans at this time to expand the number of tracks. MARTA is currently nearing the end of a complete replacement of tracks on all rail lines. Over the past few years, this replacement work has caused the agency to implement single tracking on the weekends, which in turn has caused weekend patrons to experience less frequent service.

In the Summer of 2006, as a result of high summertime temperatures, many MARTA rail cars became overheated, damaging onboard propulsion equipment. As a result many trains brokedown and had to be taken out of service for repair. This was further compounded by the fact that at any given time up to 50 older rail cars are out of service as part of MARTAs rail car rehabilitation project. To compensate for fewer cars MARTA shortened trains from 6 cars to 4 cars in length. Sometimes this resulted in almost half of the trains being shortened, resulting in crowded conditions for passengers.^[22] The breakdowns and overcrowded conditions may have contributed to a drop in customer satisfaction in the most recent customer survey (72% were very satisfied or satisfied with MARTA, a 7% decline from the prior survey).^[23]

MARTA Governance

The composition of the MARTA Board of Directors is also criticized. The State of Georgia, Gwinnett and Clayton Counties do not support MARTA financially, but still have positions on the MARTA Board of Directors. Additional criticisms of the MARTA Board is that they are not elected, and thus not accountable to the citizen's whom they represent. Furthermore the Board members are also criticized for not being regular users of MARTA and thus are not actually aware of the concerns of MARTA commuters.

As the metropolitan area grows the Georgia Department of Transportation has looked to greater road infrastructure to manage traffic problems. Most notably, a proposal for the widening of I-75 will put up to 23 lanes of traffic into the city. The city of Atlanta, however, has started a push for new mass transportation systems, such as a proposed Belt Line and a streetcar line up Peachtree Street. The Georgia Department of Transportation even plans to build a commuter rail line from Lovejoy, Georgia to Atlanta, and there is considerable support for an Athens-Atlanta line dubbed the Brain Train because it will connect the University of Georgia, Emory University, Georgia State University and the Georgia Institute of Technology. Several people have called for a new metropolitan planning committee to manage transportation, but for the time being transportation planning is split among different county and state agencies.

MARTA finances

Recent audits (Summer 2006) discovered a corporate credit card was improperly used by MARTAs previous GM/CEO Nathaniel Ford. As a result of the audits, Ford repayed approximately $1000 in questionable expenses, including gasoline, restaurant, and hotel charges.^[24] Additional charges included clothing and golf purchases, and also a dentist charge. ^[25] Ford's administrative assistant, Stephanie Smart, also had questionable charges totalling $6000, which included purchases made to GEICO and Comcast Cable. MARTA has revised its credit card policy and no longer issues corporate cards to the General Manager.

See also

• List of rapid transit systems
• The Rail Network

References

External links

• MARTA website
• MARTA Breeze website
• New Georgia Encyclopedia article
• Georgia Regional Transportation Authority website
• Clayton County C-TRAN website
• Cobb Community Transit website
• Gwinnett County Transit website
• nycsubway.org Atlanta page
• The Clueless Commuter's Guide to MARTA
• Citizens for Progressive Transportation - Atlanta Chapter
• Moving Beyond Sprawl: The Challenge for Metropolitan Atlanta
• Railfanning.org: MARTA Profile
• MARTA Pub Crawl (social event)
• The Rail Network