ST. LOUIS – Bi-State Development Agency’s board didn’t agree to buy the Delmar Loop Trolley but only asked for more information, commissioner Herb Simmons said on Dec. 16.
At a Bi-State board meeting on Dec. 10, Simmons – who also runs St. Clair County’s emergency management department – said he “voted for them to investigate.”
The Loop Trolley, linking the western end of the Delmar Loop commercial area in University City and the Missouri History Museum in Forest Park, opened in November 2018 at a cost of $51 million. But it has been troubled from the start, first with construction delays and now deficits in a $1.3 million budget and lagging ridership.
In 2017, officials projected that trolley fares would reach nearly $400,000 in the first year of operations. Records, however, show Loop Trolley has averaged less than $3,000 per month in ticket revenue since it opened last year.
Simmons said that he told others at the Dec. 10 meeting that if he had to vote right then on whether Bi-State should acquire Loop Trolley, “I couldn’t.”
“There were a lot of good questions asked by the public, and it doesn’t make sense not to get answers,” he said. “I’ve had people call me who were for it and I’ve had people call me who were against it.”
He said president and CEO for Bi-State Development Taulby Roach, former St. Clair County transit director, would present a report to the board in late January or February.
The trolley’s distance doesn’t rule it out as a proper investment for St. Clair County taxpayers who support Bi-State with sales taxes, according to Simmons.
“I look at it regionally,” he said.
He said he has visited the Loop since the trolley started running.
“I’ve seen it and I took pictures,” he said.
Bi-State conducted the first feasibility study in 2000.
Citizens formed a Loop Trolley Company, not for profit, in 2001.
It solicited private donations that eventually grew to $8 million.
In 2005, St. Louis city created a tax increment financing district along its portion of the Delmar Avenue corridor, to raise $3.5 million.
In 2008, Missouri legislators created a transportation development district and authorized it to collect a penny on every dollar of sales in the Loop.
The tax would support operations but couldn’t cover the cost of the project.
Voters in the district elected a board of district residents.
In 2009, Loop Trolley Company and East-West Gateway Council for Governments conducted a planning study.
Late that year, the U.S. Department of Transportation announced that it would award “urban circulator” grants up to $25 million.
The rules required applicants to include plans for operation and maintenance, “to demonstrate their ability to carry out the proposed project successfully.”
They also required applicants to have basic technical, legal and financial capacity including evidence of stable and reliable financial commitments and reserves and evidence of a recipient’s ability to manage grants.
The development district won a maximum grant, covering almost half the cost.
The district also secured an $11 million surface transportation grant from the Federal Highway Administration.
It also obtained $3.5 million through federal income tax credits for investors.
As it turns out, the government misjudged the district’s capacities.
Bi-State began an unofficial rescue mission at some point, according to a national study of streetcars that consulting firm WSP published in 2017.
It stated, “Although not actively involved in planning the system, Metro Transit has more recently worked closely with the Loop Trolley Transportation Development District, offering guidance and support on construction and Federal Transportation Administration grant administration.”
Support didn’t spell success, and the government’s determination that the district board could handle the project looks as fanciful as the ridership projections.
Another $25 million grant winner, Cincinnati, faces similar disappointment.
It chose the 21st Century over the 19th, by deploying streetcars weighing 40 tons.
Ridership started strong in 2016, but fell by half in 2017.
Cincinnati Bell Telephone brought some relief by paying $3.4 million to name the system Cincinnati Bell Connector.
City leaders have moved a rescue plan to the top of their agenda.