For the last 15 years, Modern Transit Partnership could sometimes see a light at the end of the tunnel as it worked to bring a commuter rail line to the Harrisburg region, but lack of funding and political will has kept that project in the dark.
Now, with no signal that such a project is on the agenda of either the governor or the General Assembly, which are wrestling with funding for the state’s existing mass transit systems, Modern Transit has changed its strategy to winning hearts and minds.
In so doing, Brad Jones, the group’s new chairman, said MTP has brought onto its board individuals representing the region’s various modes of mass transit – from commuter services to transit bus lines from neighboring cities.
The group also works to help promote projects Amtrak has undertaken to improve amenities and facilities along the Keystone Corridor such as the rehabilitation and renovation of Amtrak’s Elizabethtown station and its proposed Middletown station.
For MTP, it’s a new era of cooperation with regional transit agencies and state and local governments, part of an effort to expand “the transit mentality,” Jones said.
“We’re not giving up on the mission for rail,” he said. “If anything, we’ve been guilty of being too far ahead of the curve.”
Opponents such as former Cumberland County Commissioner Rick Rovegno have believed the commuter rail project as envisioned by MTP has always been more wishful thinking than concrete planning, and the concept far ahead of need.
As such, Rovegno said, the proposed Lancaster-Harrisburg-Carlisle commuter train line was not going to get the needed federal funding. “The issue always comes down to the level of public benefit for the level of public financing,” he said.
Rovegno, who sits on Capital Area Transit’s board, said he supports passenger rail service. But he believes it may take a generation or more before the region’s population – 656,000, according to 2007 U.S. census figures – is dense enough to make commuter rail viable for the region.
Until then, Rovegno said he supports efforts by the region’s various bus transit agencies of one day creating an integrated bus system. It’s at this junction that MTP, CAT and the region’s other bus and commuter services have met.
MTP, which sees bus and rail as tandem services, is helping to promote CAT bus ridership (up 2.67 percent, from 2.61 million to 2.68 million between 2010 and 2011), and supports a regional transit system study, expected to be completed this spring.
“We’ve got to build the transit brand first,” Jones said. “You build the need, to show the politicians the need for [commuter rail] funding.”
For now, that means MTP’s chief mission waits at the station. “It’s going to be a long, slow road to bring commuter rail to central Pennsylvania,” said Julie Shade, MTP’s executive director.
That disappoints such longtime supporters as the Cumberland County Coalition for a Sustainable Future, but they remain hopeful, nonetheless.
“It’s needed,” said Ron Skubecz, the coalition’s president. “We think it’s the most forward-thinking idea the county has to consider.”
