The Utah Transit Authority needs to prioritize on-time service and better coordinate with local governments as it plans projects, a newly released audit from the Utah Legislature recommends.
The review aimed to evaluate UTA’s efficiency after changes prompted by its last audit in 2014, which found the agency gave away millions in sweetheart deals and dramatically increased salaries for top executives, among a slew of other problems.
The agency has seemed to improve since the state replaced its part-time, 16-member board with a full-time, three-member board in 2018, the audit states. But things are still in flux because of repeated turnover in key leadership positions over the years, so auditors were unable to “fully evaluate the effectiveness” of the new governance model.
“The audit validates a lot of effort over these last few years to remedy some kind of long-standing issues at UTA, and certainly issues that were identified from 10 years ago,” UTA board chair Carlton Christensen said. “I don’t think any of us were shocked about those recommendations; we know they are areas we needed to work on and, it’s always healthy to have an outside perspective.”
What UTA needs to change
To become a transit leader, UTA needs to increase the speed, performance and frequency of its service, the audit recommended. Utah’s population is growing, and increasing ridership will be critical to mitigate congestion in years to come, it states.
UTA’s ridership has yet to bounce back to pre-pandemic levels, the audit noted, but its post-pandemic ridership is improving at a faster rate than that of two-thirds of transit agencies nationwide.
The agency also needs to cut down on routine delays to keep public transit an effective option, according to the audit. Between 2021 and 2023, such delays have more than doubled on FrontRunner, the audit reported.
UTA has only recently worked on plans to reduce these types of delays, the audit states, but it is making progress with the Utah Department of Transportation to reduce delays through traffic signal priority on critical routes like Redwood Road.
“Being able to know that transit services will consistently be on time and available is a primary factor in determining whether public transit services are a viable option for those in a transit agency’s service area,” the report states. “In fact, some studies have found that reliability is more important than total travel time in determining the success of a transit agency.”
How UTA could better plan
Auditors also want to see better data practices and formalized benchmarking from the agency so UTA can better review its own performance.
And the audit urged that UTA improve its coordination with local planning organizations so the agency can better align its long-range planning efforts with that of growing local municipalities.
UTA’s wide service area — which includes around seven counties and 80 municipalities — covers about 80% of the state, so integrating UTA service plans with local development plans can be a challenge. That’s why the audit also recommended that UTA improve guidelines for municipalities on how to create transit-supportive development.
“Legislative leadership who made up the audit management committee were quick to point out that there’s almost no way for us to continue to grow without a strong transit backbone in our our corridors,” Christensen said.
