Study: Maryland public transportation fails to reach jobs

Public transportation in Maryland doesn’t reach the vast majority of jobs, according to a new study by the Central Maryland Transportation Alliance that analyzes census and other public data.

A typical resident of the Baltimore metropolitan area can reach just 8.5% of the region’s jobs in under an hour using public transportation, down from 9% in 2018 according to the study released this month that cites data published by the University of Minnesota in 2020. About a quarter of the region’s workers spend at least 45 minutes commuting to work while the average commute for transit riders is 57 minutes, according to census data.

“What that means is if you are relying on public transportation to get to a job the universe of jobs that you can consider, the number of opportunities for you, has gotten smaller,” said Brian O’Malley, president of the alliance, a nonprofit advocacy organization founded in 2007. “Why is it getting worse? We keep approving budgets that invest in highways over transit.”

O’Malley added that MTA buses on local routes maintained more riders during the coronavirus pandemic and has regained riders at a faster rate compared with commuter trains.

“A significant amount of people still had to go to a job in food distribution or at a hospital, and that’s a significant part of the workforce It helps explain why bus ridership never fell as low,” O’Malley said. “The bus system is recovering faster because people work in jobs that require people to physically show up. The ridership for bus routes that serve [Tradepoint Atlantic in Sparrows Point] is growing faster than recovery overall that.”

In the Baltimore region, including Towson and Columbia, 83% of the jobs are at least 20 minutes away by car, according to the study. The study also found that the Baltimore area ranks in the bottom third of its national peers for transit reliability as only 80% of the bus and train trips printed on Maryland Transit Administration’s schedules matched real-time data.

The study also found that 44% of households spend at least 45% of their income on transportation and housing expenses, according to data from The Center for Neighborhood Technology.

Fifteen percent of the region commutes by walking, biking, riding transit or carpooling.

According to state data, an average of 125 pedestrians were killed each year from 2017 to 2021.