Why isn’t mass transit part of the package?

This week, the city of St. Louis shut down nearly one-third of its bus service. More than a quarter of the city's residents will go without bus access in the largest service cutback the region has ever seen. Sure, Missouri received $546 million in stimulus funds for transit projects, but that's largely headed toward passenger-car projects like roads and bridges.

Why wouldn't Missouri put the money toward saving its fractured mass transit system? Because it's not allowed to.

Despite President Obama's vaunted green initiatives and efforts to provide tax relief to low- and middle-income families, stimulus funding for transit contradicts both these goals. The package provides little to no incentive for mass transit projects that would reduce gas consumption and assist non-auto commuters.

This snubbing of support for mass transit has roots going back 20 years. In 1988, the federal government announced it would no longer fund ongoing transit operations, as part of the broader trend of privatization and transfer of government spending away from Washington. That meant state and local governments would have to supply their own funding for maintenance. And in St. Louis, that meant a $10 million funding cut. New projects could receive federal funding—city and state officials could use federal money to build a bus depot, for example—but when the time came to pay for gas, drivers, and upkeep, they were on their own.

Without federal funding to defray the cost of employee salaries, machinery maintenance, and upkeep, mass transit was suddenly a huge burden to local economies. This made low-maintenance transportation infrastructure, like roads and highways, increasingly attractive propositions, benefitting suburban, car-driving commuters (who also tend to be wealthier; more on this below).

"Local community leaders have grand visions-and the vision is right-to add more [mass] transit infrastructure," said Dianne Williams, a representative with the St. Louis Metro. "But then they have to go to the taxpayer and ask them to pay for it."