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>> It is crowded, unclean, slow, and noisy. in North America it's also expensive and heavily subsidized by those who don't use it. With no judgement, both of

>> It is crowded, unclean, slow, and noisy. in North America it's also expensive and heavily subsidized by those who don't use it. With no judgement, both of these aspects go directly against the capatalist American zeitgeist

vonmoltke 7y ago
Expensive to run. A big reason North American systems are so heavily subsidized is that they are really cheap to ride. Very few flat-rate systems have good (>=60%) farebox recovery, yet the majority of NA systems are flat-rate. It's something of chicken-and-egg thing, though. It's hard to charge reasonable prices when a system is inconvenient, but it's hard to build a convenient system without demonstrable demand.
- treis 7y ago
  >It's something of chicken-and-egg thing, though. It's hard to charge reasonable prices when a system is inconvenient, but it's hard to build a convenient system without demonstrable demand. Uber/Lyft have done it with their pool/line service. IMHO, the problem is the focus on major infrastructure over less grand services that people actually will use. My city is talking about spending billions to extend commuter rail. Yet when I looked at going to a place in the city center 5 miles away it was 23 minutes by car and an hour and 20 minutes by public transport. I literally could have run there faster than taking the bus. I did the math and for the system as a whole it comes out to be about ten bucks a ride. It would be cheaper and better for everyone if they just subsidized line/pool.
- magduf 7y ago
  >Expensive to run. A big reason North American systems are so heavily subsidized is that they are really cheap to ride. Huh? Here in DC, the subway fares are rather high compared to the fares I payed in Germany and Japan. Germany was downright cheap, with multi-day all-you-can-ride passes available for what it costs me to take 3 rides on the DC Metro. The NYC MTA isn't very inexpensive either, though I think it's still cheaper than DC's. But for the money, it's a far, far worse user experience than the systems in Germany and Japan.
bontaq 7y ago
>> in North America it's also expensive and heavily subsidized by those who don't use it. That's exactly how I feel about cars https://usa.streetsblog.org/2013/01/23/drivers-cover-just-51-percent-of-u-s-road-spending/ https://usa.streetsblog.org/2013/01/23/drivers-cover-just-51...
- briandear 7y ago
  Except you benefit from roads even if you don’t use them: stuff delivered to you or via stores always comes via road. Even if it is transported by train, it still has to get to the shop. Mail service uses the roads, police, fire, ambulance also uses the roads. Firemen and Fedex aren’t doing their jobs taking the train. The refrigerator in your house didn’t arrive on the light rail. So even if you think you don’t use roads — you definitely benefit from them. However, I fail to see how I benefit from light rail I never ride. My electrician never showed up to my house on the light rail. Amazon isn’t shipping packages on BART. Public transit is a luxury, while roads are a necessity for the simple reason that ambulances, fire, police — they all need roads. Deliveries need roads, but they don’t need public transit.
  - bluGill 7y ago
    If the only use for roads was the things you mention most roads would be dirt tracts (fedx would either have to invest in 4 wheel drive or not deliver when it rains), with only the busiest upgraded to gravel. The vast majority of traffic is cars not shipping - even in dense cities in Europe or Japan this is the case

vonmoltke 7y ago

Expensive to run. A big reason North American systems are so heavily subsidized is that they are really cheap to ride. Very few flat-rate systems have good (>=60%) farebox recovery, yet the majority of NA systems are flat-rate. It's something of chicken-and-egg thing, though. It's hard to charge reasonable prices when a system is inconvenient, but it's hard to build a convenient system without demonstrable demand.

treis 7y ago
>It's something of chicken-and-egg thing, though. It's hard to charge reasonable prices when a system is inconvenient, but it's hard to build a convenient system without demonstrable demand. Uber/Lyft have done it with their pool/line service. IMHO, the problem is the focus on major infrastructure over less grand services that people actually will use. My city is talking about spending billions to extend commuter rail. Yet when I looked at going to a place in the city center 5 miles away it was 23 minutes by car and an hour and 20 minutes by public transport. I literally could have run there faster than taking the bus. I did the math and for the system as a whole it comes out to be about ten bucks a ride. It would be cheaper and better for everyone if they just subsidized line/pool.
magduf 7y ago
>Expensive to run. A big reason North American systems are so heavily subsidized is that they are really cheap to ride. Huh? Here in DC, the subway fares are rather high compared to the fares I payed in Germany and Japan. Germany was downright cheap, with multi-day all-you-can-ride passes available for what it costs me to take 3 rides on the DC Metro. The NYC MTA isn't very inexpensive either, though I think it's still cheaper than DC's. But for the money, it's a far, far worse user experience than the systems in Germany and Japan.

bontaq 7y ago

>> in North America it's also expensive and heavily subsidized by those who don't use it. That's exactly how I feel about cars https://usa.streetsblog.org/2013/01/23/drivers-cover-just-51-percent-of-u-s-road-spending/ https://usa.streetsblog.org/2013/01/23/drivers-cover-just-51...

briandear 7y ago
Except you benefit from roads even if you don’t use them: stuff delivered to you or via stores always comes via road. Even if it is transported by train, it still has to get to the shop. Mail service uses the roads, police, fire, ambulance also uses the roads. Firemen and Fedex aren’t doing their jobs taking the train. The refrigerator in your house didn’t arrive on the light rail. So even if you think you don’t use roads — you definitely benefit from them. However, I fail to see how I benefit from light rail I never ride. My electrician never showed up to my house on the light rail. Amazon isn’t shipping packages on BART. Public transit is a luxury, while roads are a necessity for the simple reason that ambulances, fire, police — they all need roads. Deliveries need roads, but they don’t need public transit.
- bluGill 7y ago
  If the only use for roads was the things you mention most roads would be dirt tracts (fedx would either have to invest in 4 wheel drive or not deliver when it rains), with only the busiest upgraded to gravel. The vast majority of traffic is cars not shipping - even in dense cities in Europe or Japan this is the case