It’s true.  Transit does mean business, and today you’ll hear from local business leaders about the ample business opportunities that follow transit development.   The American Public Transportation Association underwent an economic impact analysis of public transportation investment in 2009 and found that combined capital investment and transit operational spending supports 36,000 jobs per year per billion dollars of annual investment.  These 36,000 jobs also corresponds to $1.8 B in GDP which is made up of workers income and corporate income.  Right now Congress is still debating the re-authorization of the federal transportation bill in the range of $400-500 Billion for all types of transportation (roads, water, air, rail).  Jobs!  Jobs! Jobs!!!!

However, this is just covering the short-term impacts, but what about the long-term impacts?  The same study by APTA also found that if investment in public transportation was maintained over the long haul, another $1.7B in GDP would come from cost-savings (fuel, time-savings, productivity, congestion reduction, emissions, etc) and thus drive up the overall impact to $3.5B per $1B of annual investment in public transportation.  Based on these numbers, a $140M project could support approximately 5,000 jobs per year of investment which is not a number to downplay, but it’s just a shot in the arm because it’s primarily driven by the capital investment on the front end.  If we continue to focus on public transportation over the long-haul through the Nashville MPO’s Long Range Transportation Plan, we could double this number and maintain it.

So let us know what you think and take our little survey.

If you haven’t registered yet, it’s okay because we moved the event to the AT&T Auditorium (333 Commerce St.) which has more seating capacity.

This is a brown-bag lunch featuring a discussion of the opportunities and benefits transit brings to your business and Nashville’s economic development, including Nashville’s future East-West Connector.

Agenda:

• Opening–Mayor Karl Dean
• Panelists—Paul Ballard, MTA; Terry Clements, Nashville Convention and Visitors Bureau; Bert Matthews, Matthews Company, Colliers International, Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce; and Tom Turner, Nashville Downtown Partnership
• Moderator—Ed Cole, Transit Alliance of Middle Tennessee

This event will be Wednesday, April 18 from 11 a.m. to 12:30 p.m.

AT&T Auditorium, 333 Commerce St., Nashville, TN  37201

Don’t forget… this is a FREE event!  Attendees are encouraged to bring a brown-bag lunch, drinks will be provided.