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TRIMET

People who regularly vote in the Portland metro area use their car to get around much more often than they use public transportation or ride a bike.

This fact will likely have an impact on how Metro, the regional governing body for Multnomah, Clackamas, and Washington counties, shapes a major transportation funding measure headed to the 2020 ballot.

That measure will probably total several billion dollars and span at least 20 years, but it isn’t yet clear whether it would be a bond, a corporate tax, or some other funding mechanism. Metro recently hired political survey company FM3 Research to poll people who are expected to vote in the region, finding that a full two-thirds of those polled do support funding some kind of transportation measure, and a solid majority supports paying up to $200 a year on it.

“Our sense is that people recognize this region is growing fast,” said Andy Shaw, the director of government affairs for Metro, which passed a $652 million housing bond last November. “It’s going to continue to grow, and to get ahead of that growth, we need to invest in roads, in our transit. We need to improve our bridges, to create a system that works for all of our residents.”

However, more nuanced questions within the poll highlight some of the tensions that exist between urban and suburban voters, and drivers and transit-dependent people, in the area.

Eighty-eight percent of poll respondents drive alone at least several times a week, while just 23 percent use the MAX or the streetcar, 22 percent take the bus, and 20 percent go by bike. Given that breakdown, it isn’t surprising that 78 percent of respondents said that improving highways and roads to decrease car traffic was a priority, while just 43 percent said the same about improving public transportation.

The poll also found that voters in the more urban Multnomah County were likely to differ with residents of suburban Clackamas and Washington counties. Multnomah County residents would prefer Metro craft a ballot measure that tackles a wide range of smaller projects, focusing on local streets and roads; Clackamas and Washington residents, meanwhile, favor a measure that prioritizes a few major highway improvement projects.

Support for a transportation funding measure in general is significantly stronger among likely voters who use transit alternatives, especially TriMet. But even among those who say their only mode of transportation is driving, 57 percent say they’d be likely to vote in favor of the measure.

One project that will almost certainly be named in the measure: a planned Southwest Corridor MAX line, which would connect SW Barbur to Tigard. Beyond that, Metro says it is considering a broad range of possible projects across the tri-county area.

When presented with six different project types, most poll respondents said they favored widening freeways and improving major roads over things like upgrading the MAX system, replacing bridges, and making bus routes faster.

Now that it’s clear Metro has general support for a transportation measure, next steps will include conducting focus groups to determine what, exactly, that measure ought to include.