These NW Philly neighbors are fighting to protect their Regional Rail line as SEPTA’s budget crisis looms

Neighborhood groups in Northwest Philadelphia are mobilizing to save the Chestnut Hill West Regional Rail line, saying they fear it will be one of the first things axed as SEPTA prepares drastic service cuts to deal with a $240 million annual deficit.

The activists are demanding that Gov. Josh Shapiro save the train — and the regional transit system — after a $295 million boost in state aid for public transportation was left out of the December budget deal.

“Gov. Shapiro is not making it a priority,” said Anne Dicker, an organizer of the effort called Save the Train and president of West Mount Airy Neighbors. “There’s money. He can move a mountain to get I-95 fixed, but not to fund transit?”

Instead, officials are preparing cuts of up to 20% in bus, subway, trolley and Regional Rail service, in case Harrisburg can’t enact a stable funding source in time.

“There haven’t been any decisions around specific routes or lines,” SEPTA spokesperson Andrew Busch said. “We’re evaluating all modes.” He said the agency doesn’t want the burden of cuts to fall disproportionately on any one area served by the system.

Leslie S. Richards, the agency’s chief executive, has said the focus would be on cuts in frequency or hours of service, with no layoffs planned. Officials expect to slow hiring and rely on attrition.

But people in the Northwest neighborhoods may have a reason to be worried. Ridership is always a key factor in deciding transit service levels, and the two Regional Rail lines that link Chestnut Hill, Mount Airy and Germantown to Center City are lightly used compared with others.

The Chestnut Hill West line was shut down for a year during the pandemic when SEPTA scaled back operations to essential “lifeline” service. The line reopened in the spring of 2021 with fewer trains.

“It doesn’t take a genius to see the writing on the wall,” Dicker said. Only “a huge effort by activists” and federal pandemic operating subsidies for transit systems brought it back, she said.

During 2022, Chestnut Hill West trains carried an average of 1,752 passengers per weekday, SEPTA says — placing it 11th among 13 Regional Rail Lines. By contrast, Chestnut Hill East trains had a weekday average of 1,573 riders in 2022, ranking 12th in ridership.

The governor’s office and party leaders in the Senate and House negotiated the budget package together in a furious end-of-session give and take, but Save the Train is directing its appeal to Shapiro.

It’s circulating an online petition asking him to use his “bully pulpit” to lead on a solution, and members of the coalition said on a Zoom call Tuesday night that they also plan to bombard the governor’s office with phone calls, emails and text messages. They also will alert Regional Rail riders in the area.

”Governor Shapiro has been working with SEPTA, the General Assembly, local leadership, and mass transit partners for months to assess their needs and prepare a serious proposal to address them,” said Shapiro spokesperson Manuel Bonder. “In his upcoming budget address, you can expect the governor to present a plan that provides additional support for mass transit for the first time in over a decade.”

The group is composed of about a dozen neighborhood associations, community development corporations and business improvement districts, joined by the Transit Forward Philly advocacy organization, the urbanist political action committee 5th Square and the statewide Transit for All PA.

“We have to make sure we do our advocacy urging the governor put this line item in his budget,” State Rep. Darisha K. Parker (D., Phila.) urged on the activists’ zoom call. “Email his office, call, do social media.” She suggested phone and email banks as in a campaign. “It has to be an ongoing effort and not [just] individuals. … You have to broaden it and get as many coalitions as possible.”

Shapiro last summer gained national praise after he led a blitz to reopen I-95 just 12 days after a tanker truck crash collapsed a Northeast Philadelphia bridge.

SEPTA and other U.S. transit systems are facing big operating deficits this year because reserves of federal pandemic cash are running out and fare revenue has lagged as ridership has been slow to recover. Through last November, Regional Rail carried 58% of the passengers it did in 2019, for example.

In the mix as unfinished parts of the state budget were negotiated last month was a bill to increase the percentage of state sales tax revenue set aside for public transit to 6.4%, up from 4.4%. That would have raised an additional $295 million a year, without increasing the sales tax. And SEPTA was to get close to two-thirds of that amount.

But when the deal-making was done, that proposal was not in the legislation that Shapiro eventually signed.