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I feel like this is almost an apples-to-oranges comparison. Yes, public transit "competes" with cars, but... Is the government subsidizing something run by the

• AnthonyMouse 9y ago
  > Is the government subsidizing something run by the government really "subsidization?" Yes. Having the government do anything with public money is subsidization. But it often makes sense to do things like that, especially in areas where there is a large up front cost to build something and thereafter the cost per use is negligible. It makes sense for the government to build subways in cities and then charge zero dollars to riders, because everyone benefits from their existence (even non-riders, like stores whose customers arrive on the subway) and once the construction cost is paid it makes no sense to discourage use of the sunk-cost infrastructure by charging fares. And fare collection is inefficient because a nontrivial proportion of the fares are spent collecting them. But it also makes sense to do the same thing for roads for the same reasons. The real question is where and when to subsidize each. It makes no sense to build subways in rural Kansas that no one would ride, or new roads in Manhattan. When you see traffic congestion, the question is how to most effectively eliminate it. Sometimes that means improving mass transit so less people have to drive. Sometimes it's more cost effective to just add a lane to the road. Sometimes the underlying problem is that real estate prices are too high causing people to have to commute too far and the only real answer is to build new housing.
  • grardb 9y ago
    >The real question where and when to subsidize each. It makes no sense to build subways in rural Kansas that no one would ride, or new roads in Manhattan. I can agree with this to some extent, but the question is, "how can we do this without encouraging unnecessary sprawl?" I can understand the want for space, seclusion, etc., but at what cost? How do we build roads in rural areas that don't kill the environment while also not creating a ginormous network of roads throughout our entire country which allow tons of people to own cars and rely solely on them for all travel? I am not necessarily opposed to people living in rural areas, particularly because some of it is necessary (e.g. for farming), but for the most part, I think we'd be better off if most people lived in higher density areas. Not Manhattan-dense, but would it kill people to live somewhere with a population density of 10k/sqmi? I grew up in a town with 15k/sqmi and lived in a big house with a big backyard (and even a driveway!). We had good public transit. > Sometimes it's more cost effective to just add a lane to the road. I replied to this in another comment of yours, but this actually doesn't work. >Sometimes the underlying problem is that real estate prices are too high causing people to have to commute too far and the only real answer is to build new housing. A large part of the reason that real estate prices are high is because of cars. I live in Downtown LA, and within a 2-block radius of me, there are probably at least ten parking lots that could easily fit large apartment buildings with ground retail. To add insult to injury, they're all single-level lots, rather than multi-level structures. When you take into account the minimum parking requirements that are imposed on developers, the amount of space that freeways take up, how wide the roads are, and all the free parking on the streets, it's no wonder that housing costs a lot! In essence, the same thing that allows people to commute long distances in cars is what makes it necessary to do so.
    • AnthonyMouse 9y ago
      > How do we build roads in rural areas that don't kill the environment while also not creating a ginormous network of roads throughout our entire country which allow tons of people to own cars and rely solely on them for all travel? Nobody is actually proposing to build a bunch of new highways in rural areas. The real problem is congestion in cities. > I replied to this in another comment of yours, but this actually doesn't work. It does work, it just doesn't work linearly. You can add a lane and discover that there was already a lane's worth of unsatisfied demand. And maybe there were even two. But there most certainly were not 1,000,000 lanes worth of unsatisfied demand, and in most places there probably weren't even two. > A large part of the reason that real estate prices are high is because of cars. A two bedroom apartment is at least five times the size of a parking space, so the area allocated to parking is less than 20%. That is not the main source of the cost. Of course, minimum parking requirements are still ridiculous, because if landlords can attract tenants to a less expensive building without parking, why stop them? And is is requirements like that which combine with each other to cause high housing costs.
• emodendroket 9y ago
  I have to think some significant portion of parking benefits paid to suburbanites are getting used on park-and-ride, and so are in a sense subsidizing public transport. Certainly that's where mine go.