There is a large segment of the progressive population that believes in free transit. It's easy to see why this idea is so popular – transit is used by poor people, needs more funding, and we should encourage more people to take it.
So why are our cities forking over hundreds of millions to install barriers to block fare dodgers? Why not use the money to allow more people to ride for free?
The answer is our transit systems SHOULD be adding barriers to people getting on transit. NYC's MTA and SFBART won't say it, but the purpose of cracking down on fare evasion is that it blocks the unhoused, people with mental difficulties, and people who don't have a card to tap with from entering. These expensive gates don't pay for themselves because of an increase in usage. It's because the risk of vandalism and crime drops significantly. Vandalism in SFBART is near 0 now – this helps a lot with spending, aesthetics, and provide a safe environment to encourage middle-upper class professionals, and women, to take transit. And the more women and wealthy people take transit, the more reliable and safer the system becomes.
The fare doesn't matter – make it 0.5$. However, the person SHOULD be in a capacity to have the financial means to pay this and have the mental capacity to avoid fare dodging.
As for those who are now shut out of transit – if you are unable to pay the fare or don't have morality to avoid fare dodging, it should be treated as emergency social services/healthcare can deal with. Not public transit.
We could even make the fare 0.01. The person just has to be able to safeguard a card and pay with it.
Posted by Used-Earth8767
6 Comments
I’m more curious why it costs hundreds of millions to install effective barriers.
Mass Transit is an affordable way to commute. It also has to be funded to be efficient and be clean and welcoming. To be used by everyone makes it even more efficient
Whats affordable. Set rates at affordable
Lets say a baseline for affordable transit is the cost of driving 15,000 miles a year a 2010 Honda Civic including the annual car payment if bought today on a 3 year loan, plus fuel, maintenance, insurance, and parking in the city
$1,000 a month, So if you want to be under that per day at $10 day passes and $200 month passes means one fifth the costs of owning the most affordable car
All those $200 monthly payments mean that the system is kept up to date and working correctly
Or, see NYCHA
Do 961 hours of maintenance cost hundreds of millions of dollars?
Because if not they haven’t, in fact, paid for themselves lol
Do we happen to know if the old turnstiles themselves counted as “within the paid area of stations” re: CM? BART isn’t in my neck of the woods, but I’ve seen a lot of busted up/vandalized turnstiles over the years so I’m curious.
I could get behind something like a 5¢ fare or something as you mention, but I would still consider that a necessary evil
I’m not blind to the fact that people can cause problems on public transit, but we still have to make public transit as available to the public as possible. Too many opponents of free/affordable tolls really just want unhoused folks out of their line of sight, and I think they really derail the conversation about public transit expansion
Doing anything about rampant, growing antisocial behavior will determine the next era of humanity, especially in the US. If governments, especially local, throw up the white flag (which they’ve been doing for the better part of the last decade), we’re in for a decade+ of living in Trump’s reality instead of fixing it.