5 ms·

Any reason to not simply make all public transit free. I'd assume once you factor in reduction in traffic, car accidents, etc. It would more than pay for itself

by 41209 5y ago

Any reason to not simply make all public transit free. I'd assume once you factor in reduction in traffic, car accidents, etc. It would more than pay for itself .

JumpCrisscross 5y ago
> not simply make all public transit free Not sure if Barcelona has this problem, but in New York, that would turn the subway system into a moving homeless camp.
- remarkEon 5y ago
  How much of the overall transit demand in NYC is serviced by public transit? Isn’t it already super high? The homelessness issue is one problem, yes, but I also wonder about how much more traffic the subways could actually support.
- 41209 5y ago
  Like homeless people can't jump the turnstiles. In most cities I've lived homeless people don't pay fares regardless. Considering fare enforcement is very expensive, I imagine making it completely free would be be cheaper. The Utopian in me imagines a struggling working class person saving a significant amount of money. To us, 200 or 400$ a month for public transportation isn't a big deal, but if your only making 2k a month that's a ton of money. I already pay sky high taxes, I figure the city can pay for public transportation out of that.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - Larrikin 5y ago
    What cities are you talking about, I'm guessing not in America? Fare enforcement is one of the few pro arguments for the broken window theory. I've never been on any subway system in the US that didn't have attendants near the gates and they have no qualms stopping trains while the transit police come. Homeless people get on the train and ride all day but they put in their couple dollars at the beginning of the trip.
    - 41209 5y ago
      I'm in America. Cops generally don't care if a homeless person jumps a turnstile. In my ideal world of course you'd still have tons of cameras and attendants for security. Expensive public transit is horribly regressive.
      - Larrikin 5y ago
        Which city are you talking about because this just generally isn't true in any of the major city subway lines like NYC and Chicago
        41209 5y ago
        In LA the cops generally don't care. Even if they do, they'll just give the homeless guy a citation which he'll never pay. Don't get me wrong, the cops should definitely still handle crimes on the trains, as well as anyone who's trying to live there.
dublinben 5y ago
The primary argument is that the funds used to make transit free would be better put to use to provide better, more reliable, more frequent service.[0] [0] https://slate.com/business/2021/06/free-transit-is-not-a-great-idea.html https://slate.com/business/2021/06/free-transit-is-not-a-gre...
fragmede 5y ago
Because it's not an unlimited, infinite resource. They are physical systems with unsolvable bottlenecks, and as soon as you release pressure in one place, another crops up. By making it absolutely free, the cost to a rider for an inconsequentially short trip is zero, but the rider using it for that short of a trip makes the system as a whole less usable for other riders because the system is full at a chokepoint. This happened in Boston on the Green line. Riding the T was free for students, but the number of young healthy students using that perk to ride 1 station overwhelmed the system, causing it to be harder for everyone else that had to use the system for commuting. I support better access to public transportation, but free has issues is its own.
- 41209 5y ago
  I can make the same argument about freeways. I can make the same argument about parking. If you have a society where almost everyone has a car you're just pushing that cost somewhere else.
  - diggan 5y ago
    As with the metro in Barcelona, you also pay to use the highway in Spain and most parking is paid inside the cities, most likely because someone have made those very same arguments.
    - GekkePrutser 5y ago
      The highway tolls in Catalonia were just abandoned this month :)
      - diggan 5y ago
        Oh good, I noticed that they were shut down when I went to the beach sometime last month but I didn't realized they had been completed abandoned. Source for others who missed the news: https://english.elpais.com/spain/2021-09-01/tolls-scrapped-on-more-than-550-kilometers-of-spains-freeways.html https://english.elpais.com/spain/2021-09-01/tolls-scrapped-o...

by 41209 5y ago

Any reason to not simply make all public transit free. I'd assume once you factor in reduction in traffic, car accidents, etc. It would more than pay for itself .

JumpCrisscross 5y ago

> not simply make all public transit free Not sure if Barcelona has this problem, but in New York, that would turn the subway system into a moving homeless camp.

remarkEon 5y ago
How much of the overall transit demand in NYC is serviced by public transit? Isn’t it already super high? The homelessness issue is one problem, yes, but I also wonder about how much more traffic the subways could actually support.
41209 5y ago
Like homeless people can't jump the turnstiles. In most cities I've lived homeless people don't pay fares regardless. Considering fare enforcement is very expensive, I imagine making it completely free would be be cheaper. The Utopian in me imagines a struggling working class person saving a significant amount of money. To us, 200 or 400$ a month for public transportation isn't a big deal, but if your only making 2k a month that's a ton of money. I already pay sky high taxes, I figure the city can pay for public transportation out of that.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- Larrikin 5y ago
  What cities are you talking about, I'm guessing not in America? Fare enforcement is one of the few pro arguments for the broken window theory. I've never been on any subway system in the US that didn't have attendants near the gates and they have no qualms stopping trains while the transit police come. Homeless people get on the train and ride all day but they put in their couple dollars at the beginning of the trip.
  - 41209 5y ago
    I'm in America. Cops generally don't care if a homeless person jumps a turnstile. In my ideal world of course you'd still have tons of cameras and attendants for security. Expensive public transit is horribly regressive.
    - Larrikin 5y ago
      Which city are you talking about because this just generally isn't true in any of the major city subway lines like NYC and Chicago
      - 41209 5y ago
        In LA the cops generally don't care. Even if they do, they'll just give the homeless guy a citation which he'll never pay. Don't get me wrong, the cops should definitely still handle crimes on the trains, as well as anyone who's trying to live there.

dublinben 5y ago

The primary argument is that the funds used to make transit free would be better put to use to provide better, more reliable, more frequent service.[0] [0] https://slate.com/business/2021/06/free-transit-is-not-a-great-idea.html https://slate.com/business/2021/06/free-transit-is-not-a-gre...

fragmede 5y ago

Because it's not an unlimited, infinite resource. They are physical systems with unsolvable bottlenecks, and as soon as you release pressure in one place, another crops up. By making it absolutely free, the cost to a rider for an inconsequentially short trip is zero, but the rider using it for that short of a trip makes the system as a whole less usable for other riders because the system is full at a chokepoint. This happened in Boston on the Green line. Riding the T was free for students, but the number of young healthy students using that perk to ride 1 station overwhelmed the system, causing it to be harder for everyone else that had to use the system for commuting. I support better access to public transportation, but free has issues is its own.

41209 5y ago
I can make the same argument about freeways. I can make the same argument about parking. If you have a society where almost everyone has a car you're just pushing that cost somewhere else.
- diggan 5y ago
  As with the metro in Barcelona, you also pay to use the highway in Spain and most parking is paid inside the cities, most likely because someone have made those very same arguments.
  - GekkePrutser 5y ago
    The highway tolls in Catalonia were just abandoned this month :)
    - diggan 5y ago
      Oh good, I noticed that they were shut down when I went to the beach sometime last month but I didn't realized they had been completed abandoned. Source for others who missed the news: https://english.elpais.com/spain/2021-09-01/tolls-scrapped-on-more-than-550-kilometers-of-spains-freeways.html https://english.elpais.com/spain/2021-09-01/tolls-scrapped-o...