After several years of increases, ridership fell by 5.15 percent in 2009.
(Two agencies in Washington state had bus ridership increases in 2009. One of the two, Sound Transit, may have gained at the expense of another agency, King County Metro.)
Here, as in most of the United States, bus transit has a small share of passenger trips.
The number of passenger trips taken on buses is extremely low when compared to total passenger trips in the region. On average, there are about 14 million passenger trips per day in the Puget Sound region. According to the APTA, regional buses serve only about 420,000 passenger trips per weekday. This means buses only carry about 3 percent of all daily trips in the Puget Sound region.
Those numbers got me wondering how much we use mass transit now, as compared to the past. Following the links to the American Public Transportation Association, I found this Fact Book. According to Table 1 in the Fact Book, passenger trips by bus, heavy rail, light rail, and trolley-bus peaked in 1944-1946, with about 64 million passenger trips, per day.
At that time, the US population was less than half as large as it is now. (For 2007, the latest year for which the historical table has data, there were about 28 million passenger trips per day by bus, commuter rail, para-transit, heavy rail, light rail, trolley bus, and other (Ferry boat, aerial tramway, automated guideway transit, cable car, inclined plane, monorail, et cetera). Buses were used for more than half of the trips, but less than half of the miles traveled.)
The 2009 decline is mildly surprising, considering all the subsidies for bus travel, and all the public efforts to get more people to ride buses. But it may be less surprising if we remember how far mass transit ridership has fallen since World War II.
Cross posted at Jim Miller on Politics.
Posted by Jim Miller at March 11, 2010 09:29 AM | Email ThisThis should be good.
Posted by: Gary on March 11, 2010 10:04 AMThe automobile, for reference, captures between 84% and 87% of mode share, and 97% of transit share, but receives just 40% of funding. Think about that next time you're stuck in traffic.
Nationalized transit has caused more measurable problems than it has solved, which we would do well to remember the next time we are urged to vote 'yes' on a proposition to add to the problem with more subsidies for transit.
Posted by: gulliver on March 11, 2010 10:08 AMST could attract riders away from Metro, which has already "invested" (...) in the infrastructure and now requires more cuts and/or subsidies.
Of course, because of the differences between ST's and Metro's routes, this could be wrong.
Posted by: gulliver on March 11, 2010 10:12 AMTrains are the fad. It's what makes liberals feel good about themselves. I know several liberals that showed up to ride the Sound Transit Light Rail on the first day, and won't ever ride it again. They feel great, and they needed to connect with their emotional, yet foolish purchase.
But the reality is, that geography, personal safety, convenience, and the massive failure of the rest of their overly progressive, bureaucratic desire to spend their government in to bankruptcy are all conspiring against the success of their train dreams.
What's that they say about people who do the same thing over and over and expect different results ....
Posted by: Jeff B. on March 11, 2010 11:22 AMRail is the highest, with buses being big money losers. And interestingly, vanpools, are often very close to 100% payback...as well as getting multiple cars off the road.
Posted by: Matty on March 11, 2010 12:26 PM2007-2008: Gas prices went through the roof. More people driving solo, which is a good thing.
2009: The entire economy in the wake of epic national mismanagement from 2000-2008 fell apart. Less people working, less bus rides.
Posted by: Joe Szilagyi on March 11, 2010 12:42 PMI don't care if gas is $5 a gallon, I'll never take the bus. My commute is less than 8 miles, and takes me less than 15 minutes and gets me within feet of my destination. The same ride is 45 minutes on a bus, including the wait in an uncovered bus stop and the walk to my destination.
Posted by: Palouse on March 11, 2010 01:08 PMAs a side note: How do people who don't own cars shop? They steal shopping carts and never return them. Our local QFC posted notes on their doors saying they've lost a huge number of carts in the last month.
Posted by: Bill Cruchon on March 11, 2010 01:31 PMAttila, Palouse, Bill, do you three live in the city of Seattle itself? Do you work downtown?
As for shopping without a car, it's actually rather easy. My last physically "large" purchase was a replacement television that I didn't want to carry on the bus. Free delivery. Groceries? Trivial--I have FIVE grocery stores of various sizes between home and work, all within 5 minutes of walking or bus use from my workplace. I live a 5 minute walk from another.
I actually only "need" a car a couple of times per year, and for that I can rent one. There's only one single section of transit that's vaguely annoying for me to take across town, and that's only on Sundays when the buses run less frequently, but that's only even an occasional trip and dependent only on missing a closer connection (rare in and of itself).
As for the whole "reek of urine, b.o., stale cigarettes, wine and have a high ratio of sick, mentally ill, and/ or violent people", sounds like someone is an older person that doesn't actually use metro all that often.
Posted by: Joe on March 11, 2010 01:48 PMCan you imagine only needing a car "a couple of times a year"?
Personally, I like the ability to get in my vehicle and turn on the key any time I want to. Oh, but how selfish am I? When I want to go to the meat market I should shiver at a bus stop and then transfer busses twice in order to get there. And then repeat the misery getting home. Liberals think I should turn a 20-minute drive into a 3-hour expedition.
And just today I'm hearing leftists want to ban salt from cooking in New York restaurants.
These people don't want to control how we live our lives. How did I possibly get that idea?
Posted by: Bill Cruchon on March 11, 2010 04:51 PMPlease do your part in getting us to #1 by ignoring the chart in the link that Jim posted showing the increases in ridership from 2007 to 2009 and focusing your attention on the anomaly in the trend.
Remember, if we try we can make Seattle more like LA by ignoring investments in mass transit, building infinitely more roads with public dollars all the while fighting against taxes on motor vehicles to pay for them. Only then will we be able to surpass LA and do our part in keeping the undesirable minorities out of our suburbs and employed as soldiers fighting never ending wars for the oil our cars need to glide down the highways in to the next traffic jam.
I'll be happy to pay a higher gas tax for more highways so that I can drive my car. It's more convenient, faster and safer. Kemper Freeman has the right idea; build more highways. Forget about trains, buses and other mass transit. It's a colossal waste of money and will never come near to paying for the operational cost, not to mention the capital costs to build it.
The liberals who vote for more buses, light rail, and other forms of mass transit as throwing good money after bad and refuse to face reality. It's too late to convince people to give up their cars. Might as well live with it and cope.
Posted by: Clean House on March 11, 2010 09:14 PMBelieve me. Young parents with a couple of kids cannot possibly deal with their active lives utilizing public transit.
What young mother is going to wait in the dark with her little children for a bus in a city filled with young thugs? Not to mention that it takes at least twice as long to get home as it would driving. Our snooty leftist politicians could care less. Do you think they ever take the bus downtown at night with their wives or husbands for a night out at a restaurant? I'll guarantee you not one of them would. When these creeps who want to tell the rest of us how to live go out, they drive.
Posted by: Bill Cruchon on March 11, 2010 09:44 PMIn fact, with 420,000 daily passengers, and knowing that the fare box covers only 10% of the actual cost (yes, we're subsidizing - on average - $12 per rider), well, covering the costs of mass transit at the same rate as gas and other taxes cover roads would raise close to $800 million a year, and that would go a LONG way towards ending the State's deficit.
Hey, I think this is a great two-fer! It's fair in that each mode of transit is equally subsidized, and it makes sure the transit riders pay their fair share and solve our budget deficit!
Posted by: Shanghai Dan on March 12, 2010 07:49 AMa. My favorite driver retired, saying he'd had enough of the loonies, drunks, thugs, etc.
b. Police, with guns drawn, stopped and boarded my late-night bus to arrest a pair of armed robbers.
c. A man was murdered a block away from my stop while I was waiting for the bus.
It's not worth the aggro.
Posted by: Max Dad on March 13, 2010 11:35 AMHighways are funded about 70% by gas and use taxes meaning a 30% "subsidy". In Washington, it's about $0.55 per gallon of gas. And there are tolls, and licensing fees, and commercial trucking fees, and more and more.
What's the subsidy of mass transit - do user fees (tickets) cover 70% of the costs? Do user fees even cover 30% of the costs?
Posted by: Shanghai Dan on March 13, 2010 01:37 PMOnce he's done defending his claim (bwahahahaha...), he can tell us why having a former bus rider take the train is a bad thing, especially when the Downtown Seattle bus tunnel was always designed to carry trains as well.
Posted by: tensor on March 14, 2010 03:30 PMYou liberals and conservatives make me laugh with your cart-leading-the-horse logic. This country is screwed up with no chance of recovery no matter who gets elected it is the fault of ALL of you for clinging so tenaciously to your ideologies and "systems".
Posted by: Everett Veteran on March 14, 2010 03:33 PMYou liberals and conservatives make me laugh with your cart-leading-the-horse logic. This country is screwed up with no chance of recovery no matter who gets elected it is the fault of ALL of you for clinging so tenaciously to your ideologies and "systems".
Posted by: Everett Veteran on March 14, 2010 03:34 PMAs Wendell Cox points out:
"From 1956 to 1982, Congress dedicated 100 percent of gas taxes and other federal road user fees to highways. The 1982 reauthorization began diverting some of these funds to mass transit."
Once 100%, that number has now dropped to 46% (dedicated), and for the new transportation reauthorization Congress is looking to peel even that number back to a paltry 20%. They want to give the rest to transit, rail, earmarks, flexible funds, etc.--anywhere but to the mode most people choose.
Meanwhile, transit funding and infrastructure goes up, transit ridership goes down, congestion goes through the roof, and we're told to blame highways; that we can't "build our way out" with more--but apparently we can build our way out with rail etc. We can do this by spending ten times as much to carry ten times fewer people on fewer, shorter trips, thereby diminishing personal mobility, local GDPs, and everyone's quality of life. More funding for government transit is not the solution--it is the problem.
Anyone who tells you we can solve our problems by stealing yet more money from the private treasury and spending it on modes of travel few people use (transit, particularly rail) is recklessly dishonest.
Posted by: gulliver on March 14, 2010 03:38 PMA freeway lane can carry 3,000 vehicles an hour. That's the limit imposed by human brain processing speed. Replace that with rail, and the number soars to 20,000 persons an hour -- a number unattainable with four-seat automobiles carpooling at maximum. Had we spent money on mass transit that we dumped down the dead end of freeways, we'd all be breathing easier and moving faster.
One hundred years ago, automobiles and airplanes transported very few persons, and even towns had trolley-car transit. We've spent huge amounts of public funds on subsidizing automobile and airplane transit. One has failed us, and one is such a huge success we almost forget that humans lacked powered flight for most of our history.
Posted by: tensor on March 14, 2010 05:47 PM(1) If you want to complain about the 30% highway subsidy, make sure the alternative you're proposing does better than that. Right now, as Wendell Cox notes,
"Because most of the cost of highways are paid out of gas taxes, subsidies to driving are very low and are mainly by local governments for local roads, not the interstate or state highways. Most airport costs are also paid by air travelers in ticket taxes and fees. So subsidies to both autos and air travel average a penny or less per passenger mile, while subsidies to Amtrak are more than 20 cents per passenger mile and subsidies to transit are more than 60 cents per passenger mile. Even counting social costs such as pollution, says University of California economist Mark DeLucchi, autos are far less expensive than transit."
If you're still struggling for ideas, take a look at Seattle rail and its farebox recovery (e.g., the 13.5% for the Sounder, which means the rest of us are paying the other 86.5%). You can start by abandoning that.
(2) A Star Destroyer can carry more than 100,000 people an hour--it's just not cost-efficient.
(3) And if only Sound Transit shared your exuberance! They forecast fewer than 20,000 trips a day in 2009--and failed!: in reality Link saw 15.5k daily on the year. Guess they didn't know it could carry 20k an hour.
(4) Also, it would be impressive that rail can carry 20,000 trips per hour if it carried people where they wanted to go. Since it doesn't, your number--even if true--is meaningless.
There's a reason Central Link still has 15k to 16k daily boardings, and here's a free tip: it's not for any of the reasons that rail nuts delude themselves with. That means it's not because people "don't know about it," or because they're waiting on the "[cardinal direction] extension" etc.--it's because people have deemed it not to be worth their while.
--
Tensor: all in all, your post was breathtaking in its sophistry, and its complete ignorance of the basic fact of transit funding vs. transit ridership (in ANY narrow category).
I do like the studious refusal of transit fanatics to admit the convenience of the automobile. Everything would be hunky-dory if we would all just relinquish another half of our incomes and allow social engineers to come in and reduce our mobility, GDP, and quality of life--in "world-class" style.
Forget about rail for a second, because the mode itself is a distraction when what is being considered are its limitations. We could be talking about gondolas or roller coasters or anything that cannot divert from its narrow axis.
There are trillions of possible combinations of trips people would need to take. Cars can take you to all of them, and by that I mean FROM YOUR DRIVEWAY to the FRONT DOOR of your destination. On its fixed axis, rail can get you not to, but NEAR, a few thousand of them. Unless you live in one train station and do business in another, this is comparatively INCONVENIENT. And this is its most obvious limitation, which would-be transit despots stake their entire credibility on ignoring.
This limitation could be surmounted, but never to equal the convenience of the automobile, and only by building a rail network close to the magnitude of highways. Yet judging from the $2 to $3 billion cost of the current 15 miles of Central Link, the Sound would have leveraged the lifetime earnings of the next 100 generations of residents before that would happen. What makes you and I different is that you're apparently willing to commit them to that.
Go and find an ant farm to play with somewhere else, kid, and go to Europe if you want to be a European.
Posted by: gulliver on March 14, 2010 06:34 PMMetro forcing riders to light rail. Closing down bus routes to make people ride the light rail.
As far as why that's bad, well, we spent billions to build a train that basically replaces a bus route. One that was just as speedy, and a lot lower cost. With 15,000 riders per weekday, and $4 billion in costs, and a 40 year lifespan, we'll subsidize $26 per rider, not including the interest on the bonds and debt.
Posted by: Shanghai Dan on March 14, 2010 08:11 PMI don't have a driveway, and several Metro routes run to THE FRONT DOOR of my office building. This is (in part) because I don't feel like shoveling out money for an automobile and insurance. (Where, in your yammering about the sacred "private treasury", are those costs?)
There are trillions of possible combinations of trips people would need to take.
You're just not going to admit that such expensive sprawl is the result of governmental subsidies for private automobiles, are you?
What makes you and I different is that you're apparently willing to commit them to that.
You're not going to admit we voted for public transit, are you?
Go and find an ant farm to play with somewhere else, kid, and go to Europe if you want to be a European.
While it would be nice to have a higher per-capita GDP, I remain proud to be an American. Your efforts to make me ashamed have failed.
Enjoy the huge conveniences of auto insurance, gas prices, and traffic jams; I'll wave to you from the bus, tram, or bicycle as I speed by you.
Posted by: tensor on March 14, 2010 09:33 PM***
Is saying "several...routes run to the front door" your way of disputing that an automobile can typically get you from door to door while transit cannot? If so, you have come up short.
***
Before you get self-righteous about subsidies--which is a ludicrous position for a runaway subsidy beggar like yourself to take--I would like to see ALL transportation funded out of user fees.
***
"Sprawl," as urban elitists now derisively call it, has occurred specifically because it is cheap, not expensive. I'll leave you to handwring about all the intangible social costs such freedom has "imposed" on the collective, while the rest of us enjoy its measurable benefits.
***
We voted for public transit? Like when it was voted down in 1968 under "Forward Thrust"? Or when it was voted down in 1970 under "Forward Thrust II"? Or when it was voted down in 1995 under "Sound Transit"? Or in 2007 when a tax increase to support it was voted down?
No--you probably mean in 1996, when planners wised up and lied about the costs and benefits, since that was the only way they could get a 'yes' vote. Let me jog your memory about those lies:
Mileage claim: 21 to 25
Reality: 13.9
Phase I Completion: 2006
Reality: July 2009
Cost: $1.8 billion
Reality: $2.9 billion
Etc. etc. This is not what people voted for, for all the conniving "we voted for it, now shut up!" claims of dishonest transit nuts.
***
As to your denial of Europhilia--from the WSJ:
"US output has always outstripped Europe and was 25% higher last year during the recession."
You must be proud.
***
I don't sit in much traffic, tensor, because I don't waste much of my time in the Imperial City of Seattle--I just help to pay for YOUR rides. Mind throwing me the difference in subsidies next time I pass you as you stop at 12 other places before getting to yours? Or how about when you're walking the rest of the way to your destination?
Posted by: gulliver on March 14, 2010 10:30 PMUm, no, it's my way of expressing an objective reality in simple words of english. I can understand how this confuses you.
Before you get self-righteous about subsidies--which is a ludicrous position for a runaway subsidy beggar like yourself to take--I would like to see ALL transportation funded out of user fees.
So you admit our decades of federal subsidies for private automobiles was a mistake? Thank you for agreeing with me on that.
"Sprawl," as urban elitists now derisively call it, has occurred specifically because it is cheap, not expensive.
To the extent it was "cheap" (which, BTW, is not necessarily a synonym for "inexpensive"), it was because of the massive, chronic, big-government subsidies which you have mentioned. Major cities have thrived for centuries in this (and many other) countries without automobiles.
"US output has always outstripped Europe and was 25% higher last year during the recession."
I wasn't claiming that Europe produces more of whatever; I was noting Europeans' higher quality of life. (Breathing so much auto exhaust will do that to you.)
...I don't waste much of my time in the Imperial City of Seattle--I just help to pay for YOUR rides.
Hey, thanks for your effort to improve our quality of life here; it is greatly appreciated! Now, as to subsidies -- you do understand that metro King County sends money to the rest of the state, via the government in Olympia, right?
Or how about when you're walking the rest of the way to your destination?
Um, I already told you the bus stops AT THE DOOR OF MY OFFICE, right? As for any other walking I do, yes, physical exercise does a body good. Not that you'd know.
Posted by: tensor on March 15, 2010 12:42 AMThe Link Light Rail does go from downtown to the airport, yes, faster and without worry as to traffic causing a rider to miss an airplane departure; but it goes via a completely different route. I do like how us voters receiving a service upgrade for which we had voted somehow counts as a negative. (You must now be well-used to having reality eviscerate your philosophy.)
Posted by: tensor on March 15, 2010 12:50 AMI'm sure you would support a hike in bus fares so that mass transit isn't subsidized at an 80%+ rate, right? Just to keep it fair?
After all, those same evil roads are used by the buses. And the police. And the fire department. And Medic One. And the post office. And the grocery store deliveries. And on and on. They're not just a single-use object like, say, a bus.
Posted by: Shanghai Dan on March 15, 2010 08:32 AMSubsidies: again, stop acting uppity about subsidies--you're not against them, you only disapprove of them where they grant people the most efficiency, personal freedom and mobility. You WANT them in areas that are calculated to be inefficient and wasteful. I am against them categorically, even if the comparatively meager subsidies to roads have on balance produced a brighter future.
Sprawl: first, elaborate on "subsidies for sprawl." Second, is your claim that suburbs would not exist in the absence of subsidies? Third, I see that you have taken the bait and made a parenthetical comment about intangible social costs, as I predicted. Mix it up, tensor!
Europe: first, elaborate on the quality of life thing. Second, can you drop the "proud to be an American but the Europeans do it better" shtick and just admit you're culturally and intellectually insecure and that you look to Europe for the approval you never got from your father?
Metro: are you telling me that Metro produces more revenues than it consumes? That's great--we'll pull the plug on subsidies then!
Walking: first, I noticed you didn't dispute that I might pass you as you stopped at 12 other bus stops before getting to your destination... Second, assuming you're telling the truth, which is not a "given" for an aspiring social engineer, enjoy the 1 place that gets you NEAR your destination--because there are 99 that don't. Again, you have done nothing to diminish the significance of transit's comparative ineffectiveness at getting you from (not near) where you are to (not near) where you want to go.
Fitness: this is the most laughable thing I've EVER been accused of. I was discharged in 2008 from a combat unit in the Marine Corps, I run up to 30 miles a week and lift throughout, and yet I have some limp-wristed Seattle transit metrosexual making Internet slams about my fitness. You've just embarrassed yourself.
Voting: when are you going to abandon the "we voted for it" thing? You've seen that we shot these rail measures down 4 times over 40 years, and that they had to lie about costs and benefits to get a marginal 'yes' vote. Now we can SEE that's a lie, so drop the "we voted for it!" thing.
Posted by: gulliver on March 15, 2010 11:16 AMYou mean 58% approval in 2008, Sargent Metrosexual? Straighten out your wrists, you ninny.
Posted by: John Jensen on March 16, 2010 06:26 PMJJ: Uh-oh, here comes the "we voted for it" canard!
John, I call it a "marginal" 'yes' vote because rail measures were voted down in 1968, 1970, 1995, and 2007. When they finally realized they had to understate costs and overstate benefits to get a 'yes' vote, they still only got 56.5% (1996) and 57.02% (2008), both of which were before people had a chance to see if it worked. Now that they know it doesn't, they have no recourse, particularly since the 2004 court decision denying a second vote now that the costs and benefits had been exposed as wildly inaccurate.
That raises the question: why did you lie and round up to 58%? Not even ST does this:
http://bit.ly/9Dby98
http://bit.ly/d53761
Finally, the "Sargent" thing, which is spelled inaccurately by the way, is weird and sophomoric, even for a foppish pedant like yourself.
Posted by: gulliver on March 16, 2010 11:04 PMA 57-43 victory is not "marginal." Ancient history from 1968 and 1970 has nothing to do with today, even though the '68 vote had majority support. The 2007 vote went down because of your prized highways -- and it apparently didn't reflect much on mass transit, since a similar plan passed just a year later. You overlook other votes including the 2006 "transit now" vote for buses and the numerous other votes since 1970 that have funded bus service.
You seem to think voters are stupid or that their votes shouldn't count. Let me say that I disagree with your support of tyranny. I believe that the will of the voters must be respected, and they have repeatedly expressed a desire to expand mass transit. You can't win the votes, so you have to blame the campaigns or the process or whatever else.
Your argument is that transit is subsidized, as if that somehow makes transit wrong. You want to overlook or delegitimize the fact that this subsidy has been approved many times over by voters. Yes transit is subsidized, because voters want to subsidize it.
As for "virtually nothing promised in 1996" being around today, I guess the light rail I took from the airport on Sunday and the 522 I rode to work this morning are more liberal lies, right?
PS Sophomoric? What kind of adult leaks this the following idiocy online: "some limp-wristed Seattle transit metrosexual"? Can't take what you so inartfully dish out? Not surprising.
Posted by: John Jensen on March 17, 2010 03:13 PM1968 and 1970 are literally not "ancient."
I can see why you insist on getting so hung up on the word "marginal"--it distracts from some very basic facts. Among them, that 4 out of 6 rail measures in Seattle have FAILED. Also, that...
"VIRTUALLY NOTHING PROMISED"
...the rail reality today has far higher costs and far fewer benefits than originally promised. Would you dispute that, as of today, the:
>Capital costs were higher than promised (Link+Sounder)?
>Operating costs were higher than promised (at least Sounder)?
>Farebox recovery is less than promised (at least Sounder)?
>Completion dates were later than promised (Link+Sounder)?
>Number of trains were fewer than promised (at least Sounder)?
>Ridership was less than promised (Link+Sounder)?
>Length is less than promised (Link+Sounder)?
If you don't, you by extension agree that virtually nothing promised in 1996 was delivered as described. Even for the 2 successful votes (one of which was held before the public could even see how distorted the costs & benefits were). This is called a bait and switch, and I would appreciate it if you would stop using the "we voted for it" thing to describe this B&S. You can no more say "we voted for it" than a guy who says he can get you a Ferrari for $1000 if you just vote for it can say it when he delivers you a Hyundai for $10,000. Voters voted for something else--not the current boondoggle.
And quit playing the tyranny confidence game--we all know you and the STB social engineers condescend to and want to control us, even if you personally have no practical uses for your own solutions. You're the kids with an ant farm, so knock off this weird game of intellectual chicken.
That transit--rail, specifically--is subsidized is not my only complaint against it.
The "metro" comment was a response to an irrelevant and uniquely inaccurate slam by tensor--one of your compatriots, no doubt--about my fitness (it's good to see just how nuanced and averse to stereotypes sophisticated urban Marxists are). It was between he and I, it was none of your concern, and you can act like you've risen above it when YOU stop making creepy comments about effeminacy.
But let's get down to brass tacks: my basic claim is that you think a large majority of the money--perhaps all--should be taken away from the mode of transportation (roads) which as of yet carries a large majority of both transit and mode share in the region, and given to a much more heavily subsidized mode of transportation (transit, but rail specifically) which as of yet carries a comparatively tiny minority of mode and transit share in the region.
I think you would try to spin this to make your tyrannical position look like a flattering one, but I also think the basic facts are in order.
Posted by: gulliver on March 17, 2010 04:52 PMYour basic claim is made up: I supported creating new revenue sources for transit, not taking away funds from roads. The federal highway trust fund contribution to transit is minimal and doesn't even come from the gas tax. The general fund has been used routinely over the past years to fill the highway trust fund. It's no surprise you're inventing straw men to argue with.
Voters have decided to fund transit and reaffirmed their decision less than two years ago. You want to attack a made up, parody version of my beliefs? Go ahead, gulliver, but recognize that my vision is affirmed by voters and your vision of a rail-less future is explicitly rejected by them. It is incredulous -- and I'm flummoxed -- that you continue to focus your argument around how there isn't popular support for rail, and issue you are demonstrably wrong on.
I agree with the premise of removing subsidies for transportation. Toll every highway and road and street and parking lot, and make transit cover its operations with fares. Make roads pay for themselves, which they absolutely do not, and make transit pay for itself. It would be fine to have an even battle and see how the market would gravitate. The problem is that, in reality, we cannot have this parlor game. Given that roads are extremely subsidized and given that transportation is not simply a right of the rich (society has concluded), we should also subsidize mass transit. We shouldn't find the right balance through tyranny, like you advocate, but instead by listening to the voters.
It is hilarious to see you ride the moral crusade after one of the most childish personal assaults I've ever seen on Sound Politics -- a feat for sure. Metrosexual? What is this, 2004? Perhaps your displeasure over my barbs illustrates that you should treat others as you wish to be treated. Am I above it? Perhaps not; but I wasn't being serious and you were, pretty boy.
Posted by: John Jensen on March 17, 2010 08:40 PMEven during the period you're trying to get us to focus on, rail measures failed at the ballot--twice, in 1995 and 2007.
What's more, the idea that the 57% 'yes' vote in 2008 is proof of Sound Transit's superior "performance" is laughable--67% of the funding appropriated for that vote went to a Link light rail system the people hadn't even gotten a chance to see. You can be "proud," I guess, that ST managed to sneak ST2 in before people had a chance to see the truth about Link's costs and benefits, but that's very different than some kind of overwhelming public approval of ST's "performance."
Also, the 1996 vote was made by a public that had been assured of particular costs and benefits. THESE COSTS AND BENEFITS DID NOT UNFOLD AS PROMISED, and the present reality of light rail is NOT what they voted for. As I discussed earlier, capital costs, O&M costs, farebox recoveries, ridership figures, trains, stations, lengths, completion dates WERE ALL OFF.
But go ahead and keep trying to make it look like Seattle metro was on the cusp of a violent revolution if it didn't get light rail now. You're only embarrassing yourself.
So you don't support directing ANY federal gas tax revenues to roads? That would shock me, please confirm.
Yet in any case, as far as I know, this much of my claim about you is intact: in 2010, you think a large majority of the money--perhaps all--should be given to a much more heavily subsidized mode of transportation (transit, but rail specifically) which as of yet carries a comparatively tiny minority of mode and transit share in the region.
If you support removing subsidies from transportation, and you think automobile-related subsidies are a bad idea, why do you want to exacerbate the problem by doubling--no, quadrupling down--on subsidized transportation with rail/transit? This to me suggests you don't really support removing subsidies, and the "but this is not the reality so we need more subsidies thing" seems calculatingly disingenuous. Moreover, you claim transportation is "not simply a right of the rich," projecting/citing "society" as your source. In other words, transportation ought to be a means of welfare and wealth redistribution. How can I believe you when you say you want to remove subsidies? This is clearly not the case. It is in fact clearly the case that, like many liberals, you aim to do "good"--but mainly with other people's money. News: that's not "good."
John, I'm not riding a "moral crusade"--YOU ARE. Again, tensor made an unsolicited and irrelevant crack about my fitness, I pointed out that nothing could be more inverted than his demographic claiming my demographic was unfit, then YOU came in with a few blows in the same vein, and finally started getting self-righteous with the "that's childish/juvenile" thing--in between the same behavior you're accusing me of. I'll happily admit that it's a juvenile p*ssing match, albeit a retaliatory one--I just want you to stop acting "above it all" if you're going to continue participating in the games.
Posted by: gulliver on March 18, 2010 07:41 AM