Ridership declines across all of the MTA’s trains and buses is becoming “more severe” by the day, the agency’s latest statistics revealed, causing $87 million in weekly revenue losses and raising the specter of more debt and drastic cuts to much-needed long-term repairs. — Streetsblog NYC

"I think the public needs to understand that as an agency, we are exploring what [a fareless system] could look like," [TriMet board member Kathy Wai] said. "These conversations are happening at a high level. … I think we are further along in 2019 on the conversation about the funding, what that could look like, and what those mechanisms could be." — Portland Mercury

The cracks discovered beneath the rooftop park were classic brittle fractures. The tapered 4-inch-thick steel beams—2.5 feet wide and 60 feet long, with a horizontal flange on the bottom—undergirded the 5.4-acre park on the building’s fourth level, and buttressed the roof of the bus deck on the second level. By themselves, the cracks formed a point of weakness with potentially hazardous consequences. But they also suggested the possibility of a larger crisis. — Popular Mechanics

Voters in Phoenix have soundly rejected a proposal that would have halted the expansion of the city’s light rail system—a proposition that had the backing of dark money linked to the notorious anti-transit Koch brothers. — Streetsblog

Andres Sevtsuk’s Harvard Graduate School of Design studio—examined how LA might maximize the opportunities at stake. The studio sought strategies to creatively optimize investment in public transit in an increasingly hot market for private-sector services. How can technology complement, rather than compete with, public transit? And, as LA reshapes itself, can it improve equity, sustainability, and quality of life as it aggressively redevelops its transit systems? — Harvard GSD

San Diego approved new growth blueprints Thursday that allow for mid-rise housing and dense urban villages in neighborhoods near new trolley stops in Linda Vista and the northeast corner of Pacific Beach.

City Council members said the new zoning will simultaneously help solve San Diego’s housing crisis, reduce carbon emissions that cause climate change and revamp blighted areas where bicyclists and pedestrians face major challenges. — The San Diego Union-Tribune

Proposition 105, a measure backed by a group called Building a Better Phoenix, would halt all future light rail expansions, directing already-earmarked tax dollars toward “other transportation improvements”—mostly road construction. Like a number of efforts to kill urban-rail plans around the U.S., the initiative to stop Phoenix’s transit development has ties to Americans for Prosperity, the advocacy group funded by David H. Koch and Charles Koch. — CityLab

Montreal Mayor Valérie Plante, right, has struck a deal with Quebec Transport Minister Chantal Rouleau, center, and Treasury Board President Christian Dubé to help fund Quebec City's tramway project in exchange for a commitment from Quebec to support part of Plante's proposed Pink line from downtown Montreal to Lachine. — CBC

Cars and trucks on one of Europe’s most notoriously congested and polluted urban highways would not only be obliged to drive more slowly, they’d have less room to do it: The number of beltway lanes open to all traffic would also be slashed from eight to six. One lane will be reserved for public, emergency, and zero-emissions vehicles. The other one is to be devoted to trees. — CityLab

Some of his benches have become part of the fabric of the city — sat on and rained on, captured on Google Street View and even vandalized. Scrawled in tidy handwriting on one bench was, “i love it, thank you,” punctuated by a small heart.

His greatest frustration is that whoever is removing them is leaving bus riders with no place to sit. The benches and their removal get at one of the more byzantine corners of transit bureaucracy in Los Angeles. — Los Angeles Times

The San Francisco County Transportation Authority voted unanimously Tuesday to freeze $9.7 million in sales tax funding for the next phase of the Transbay Transit Center, as members called for an evaluation of the beleaguered project and the agency that runs it.

The news came as Transbay officials again pushed back the date to complete testing of steel from two cracked beams that led to shutting down the building in September. — San Francisco Chronicle

San Francisco’s new Transbay Transit Center will remain closed at least through the end of next week, officials said Wednesday, after yet another cracked beam was discovered during an overnight safety inspection.

The $2.2 billion hub for buses and eventually trains, which opened just last month as the flashy centerpiece of city infrastructure, was closed abruptly Tuesday afternoon after a fissure was spotted in a beam that helps hold up the sprawling complex. — San Francisco Chronicle

It’s official! The sorriest bus stop in America is in … Canada!

The horrendous bus stop on the Lougheed Highway in Pitt Meadows, just outside of Vancouver, has won our annual contest, trouncing Cincinnati in a 58%-42% landslide. — usa.streetsblog.org