[sustran] Reinventing Transport in Cities: Pillar 1- Public transport should be free

[eric.britton at free.fr]

With all due respect Brendan, and I do very much appreciate those three
important points you bring up (see below), I really do believe that the time
has come in which we have to set aside just about all of our traditional
thinking and practices about how we finance and deliver transport in cities
and in the process come up with a whole new game plan.  The Chicago
experience, so very typical in many respects, makes it clear above all to me
that  we simply cannot afford to tinker any longer with the old models,
which clearly are not working by any of a thousand balanced criteria.   

 

The emerging new model, which many of  us here are trying very hard to help
bring out from the woodwork, the so-called New Mobility Agenda, is
predicated on an entirely different set of assumptions, one of them being
that a whole dynamic range of seamless "non-own-car" services are needed,
that these can and will be provided by a much broader spectrum of players
than in the old binary mobility model, and that one of these has to be a
basic underpinning of available-to-all public services which are in effect a
"free" or at the very least a fully seamless public utility.  

 

And yes of course I am well aware of the abuses that such free services can
lead to, and this note will not be the place to elaborate or to defend the
basic concept. I might add however that in my view at least the services
should not be altogether free, since it is important for many reasons to
have full feedback about system use and patronage trends, etc., which means
some kind of smart card, and this it seems to me to be fair and good to ask
people to pay for.  

 

The end goal has to be to get the very great majority of private cars out of
the city, and in order to achieve that we are going to have to provide
"better than car" mobility systems. Hop-on, hop-off  transit is part of this
necessary package, an essential  foundation stone for the rest. 

 

How to pay for it?  How to deliver it? And how do you, how do we assure the
necessary rigors of good management?  What other kinds of services are
needed to fill out the mobility spectrum, and what do we need to do to  we
get them on board? 

 

These are the kinds of question that we should be asking ourselves. And
finding cities and city leaders who want to get involved in making this new
model of transport and society.  This has to be a teamwork undertaking

Eric Britton

 

PS. Some of you may wish to check out our in-process Reinventing Transport
in Cities site at www.climate.newmobility.org
<http://www.climate.newmobility.org/> . In addition to the Workpad examples,
more will appear there shortly on the on-going Chicago rethink.

 

 

-----Original Message-----
 On Behalf Of Brendan Finn
Sent: Saturday, September 01, 2007 2:42 PM
 

 

Dear Eric, Sujit, 

 

I have argued many times against cheap fare policies (i.e. deliberate
under-pricing) and that transit should be as close to self-financing as it
can achieve. I have argued three main points: 

 

1) All choice users and many non-choice users have the affordability to pay
more than "cheap", and most would be willing to do so for better quality.
Under-priced transit uses up the available funds for wealth-transfer,
leaving little for quality improvements or reinvestment. Public funds should
be spent on service, quality and infrastructure, not on low fares.

 

2) The vulnerable within society can be supported by subsidising transit
passes for them (rather than for all users) and this should be done through
welfare funding channels rather than transit funding channels. This better
protects the funding source since politicians and administrators would have
to overtly remove welfare from those who need it, at risk of heavy political
backlash.

 

3) Cheap fares require heavy subsidies, and these inevitably tend to keep
growing. The transit is then totally at the mercy of the funder. Sooner or
later, an administration will come in who decides to cut the subsidy
program. They can dress it up in many ways - national austerity measures,
correct 'inefficiency and profligacy' (as Eric quotes), moving to a
user-pays principle, etc., etc. - we are all familiar with these dreaded
sea-changes. Tariffs increase dramatically, services are thinned out and
quieter routes closed, customer support programs are slashed, investment is
put on hold, quality programs are shelved, important management functions
are shut down, and confrontation arises with labour as hard measures are
forced through. Patronage is lost, good working relationships are lost, the
development effort of a few decades goes down the drain, and the innovators
and developers in the management team are pushed aside for the
bean-counters. Instability and down-sizing kill user confidence in a way
that takes decades to recover.

 

Chicago seems to be yet another example of the vulnerability of transit once
subsidy becomes a significant part of its income stream. I have no moral or
economic argument against subsidy for transit - the more public funds the
better, if used wisely. However, it is a Faustian Pact, and a day of
reckoning eventually comes. Transit planners and managers should think long
and hard about the bargains they enter - they owe it to their customers,
their city and their workers.

 

With best wishes, 

 

Brendan.

_________________________________________________________________________

  ----- Original Message ----- 

  From: eric.britton at free.fr 

  Sent: Saturday, September 01, 2007 10:10 AM

 

 Dear Sujit and Sustran friends,

 

Don't think that our Chicago CTA friends have made these moves with joy in
their hearts.  The fact is that they have been trapped by state legislators
(many of whom have their power base in rural and small town areas) who have
decided to, in a phrase, "punish the CTA for their inefficiency and
profligacy". Typically "old mobility" and terribly wrong headed, but if this
were only the only city and agency that this kind of thing were to take
place this would be a happier planet.

 

  In point of fact I have just come back from a lively week on brainstorming
session with a group of more than forty experts and agencies around the
table, where we gave our full attention to the possibility of "Reinventing
Transport in Chicago".  You can see more of that if interested in our New
Mobility/Climate Emergency Project at www.climate.newmobility.org
<http://www.climate.newmobility.org/> , where I hope shortly to post some
useful information on these sessions. 

 

In the meantime, you may fond some us in the "Workpad" that you will find on
the bottom left menu of this site in process.

 

  Eric Britton

 

  ----- Original Message ----- 

  From: Sujit Patwardhan

  Sent: Saturday, September 01, 2007 10:10 AM

 

  While we feel encouraged by the excellent proposals initiated by the Mayor
of New York, here is what I got from a friend about Chicago. I was under the
impression that Chicago was one of the better cities in the US in providing
transit facilities.

  --

 

  Sujit

 

  Here is the news:-

 

  To make up for poor revenues in recent years, the Chicago Transit
Authority's board has approved *fare hikes *and changes to services-to
include the shutting down of 39 bus routes. Bus and off-peak train fares
paid in cash will rise from $2 to $2.50. During peak hours, train fares will
become $3. The price of the one-day travel pass will increase from $5 to $6;
the seven-day pass from $20 to $23; and the 30-day pass from $75 to $84. The
changes go into effect on September 16th.