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Poughkeepsie, NY – A new national report takes a look at the links between employment and transportation needs in the most populated areas of the US. As WAMC's Hudson Valley Bureau Chief Greg Fry reports, the region receives a poor ranking when it comes to the needs of residents who want to find another way to get to work...
The report is from the Washington D.C. based Brookings Institute. It examines the 100 largest metropolitan areas in the U.S., the transit systems within those areas, and how well those transit systems serve residents, and provide opportunities for them to get to work. Researchers also studied a metropolitan area in the Hudson Valley including Poughkeepsie, Newburgh, and Middletown. And, according to the Brookings Institute, the area ranks at the very bottom, when it comes to transit access and job coverage.
It's no surprise to Nancy Proyect, the President of the Orange County Citizens Foundation. She points to the lack of transportation infrastructure. She says there is a good bus system in Orange County, but says there is not enough room for park and rides, and says there's the ongoing struggle to have both inbound and outbound tracks on the MTA's Port Jervis line.
According to the report, 46 percent of working-age residents in the defined metropolitan area reside near a transit stop, compared with a national average of 69 percent. The study puts the median wait for transit service during rush hour at 51 minutes in the area - much higher than the just over 10 minute average wait in the country's 100 largest metropolitan areas.
Jonathan Drapkin heads the non-profit public policy research organization, Pattern for Progress. He expressed hesitation about the study, because of the comparisons between the largest US cities, and the smaller cities in the Hudson Valley. Drapkin says for the cities being studied, there are people who are not accessing New York City. Therefore, he says, their ability to find jobs, and use mass transit to get there is difficult. He says it's well worth the study, but says the connectivity of the Hudson Valley cities studied is probably very limited.
The topic of getting to work came up last week during a meeting in Washington between county officials from around the country, and officials in the Obama administration. Speaking with WAMC News following that meeting, Westchester County Legislature Chairman Ken Jenkins talked about the need to link services, and referenced links between housing and transportation. Jenkins says there must be live-work environments, which help families that are struggling right now.
The study finds that about one-third of residents in the largest metropolitan areas in the country can get to a job in their metropolitan area via transit within 90 minutes. Proyect says there are more commuter options needed, and not just into New York City. She says help is needed to get residents to areas of Westchester County and northern New Jersey. She says the Access to the Region's Core project would have helped, as would the construction of a new transit-friendly Tappan Zee Bridge.
New York City is ranked 13th when examining transit coverage and job access, the Albany-Schenectady-Troy metropolitan area ranks 29th, and the Springfield, Massachusetts area ranks 44th.