Encouraging people to embrace alternatives to the car – still the dominant mode of travel in Switzerland – means factoring human decision-making into the equation.
I would say free for everyone, but short of that I’m a fan of free for residents of the greater metro region via card/app. Then your tourists can be charged to subsidize the residents assuming local politics aren’t completely corrupt.
Check out the municipal finances of lots of US cities. Auto infrastructure costs more than the taxes it generates from economic activity. The federal government fills a lot of funding gaps through grants with its deficit spending. Yes, free public transport would cost more than it brings in through direct revenues; it would still cost less than private car subsidies, and could be a net positive in economic activity stimulated, unlike the cars.
If it’s free for everyone you’ve gotta step up enforcement of civility rules. Otherwise it just turns into a crackhead dacha. If people don’t feel safe riding it’s defeated it’s purpose. Needs to be clean and safe.
Whether it’s free or not doesn’t impact that issue.
People have to travel, and if you’re referring to poor and/or unhoused folk. They can’t walk across city any easier than you can. When you’re in that situation you have to travel a lot to maintain access to government services. They’re going to use the cheapest transit either way.
Except they’re not using it for transportation. It’s just a place to be and do drugs. When I was living in a city a bit further south, the trains were out of control. People smoking and selling their drugs right at the station, sometimes on the train. Every woman I knew was scared to ride. The stations and trains were just filthy.
Once they started enforcing fares again it got so much better.
I would say free for everyone, but short of that I’m a fan of free for residents of the greater metro region via card/app. Then your tourists can be charged to subsidize the residents assuming local politics aren’t completely corrupt.
this relies on having enough tourists that it’s worth the infrastructure for having fares, otherwise it’ll just cost more than it brings in.
Check out the municipal finances of lots of US cities. Auto infrastructure costs more than the taxes it generates from economic activity. The federal government fills a lot of funding gaps through grants with its deficit spending. Yes, free public transport would cost more than it brings in through direct revenues; it would still cost less than private car subsidies, and could be a net positive in economic activity stimulated, unlike the cars.
Like i said, i prefer free for everyone which would make more sense in low-tourism locals.
If it’s free for everyone you’ve gotta step up enforcement of civility rules. Otherwise it just turns into a crackhead dacha. If people don’t feel safe riding it’s defeated it’s purpose. Needs to be clean and safe.
Whether it’s free or not doesn’t impact that issue.
People have to travel, and if you’re referring to poor and/or unhoused folk. They can’t walk across city any easier than you can. When you’re in that situation you have to travel a lot to maintain access to government services. They’re going to use the cheapest transit either way.
Except they’re not using it for transportation. It’s just a place to be and do drugs. When I was living in a city a bit further south, the trains were out of control. People smoking and selling their drugs right at the station, sometimes on the train. Every woman I knew was scared to ride. The stations and trains were just filthy.
Once they started enforcing fares again it got so much better.
I’ve lived in cities with free transit without those problems. They just also had strong social welfare systems.
It’s not a problem inherent to free transit, it’s a result of failures in governance.
Right. And what I’m saying is the public transportation departments can’t carry that burden.
Neither am I 😊