Kansas City, Missouri, made national headlines last week when its city council voted to make bus rides free, becoming the first major metropolis in the U.S. to provide no-fare public transit starting next year. The cost to the city will be $9 million, which is roughly what the Kansas City Area Transportation Authority brings in annually from the current $1.50 bus fares and $50 monthly passes.Will the desired goal materialize, or might the Tragedy of the Commons come into play? It will be interesting to see what happens in 1, 2, 5 years.
The hope among lawmakers and transportation officials is that the city will recoup that expense, and more. By increasing mobility overall, KC is looking to boost economic activity. And proponents of the plan say that helping marginalized communities move around more easily will translate into deeper benefits...
A number of news articles pointed out that free fares aren’t a panacea for ailing ridership or service gaps, citing a 2019 report from the think tank TransitCenter that warned as much. “This will reduce barriers to access to people, which is great, but very few routes run frequently,” TransitCenter spokesman Ben Fried told Streetsblog. “If you reduce barriers to access to a system that doesn’t do a great job connecting people where they need to go, it’s only helping people so much.”
Thursday, January 02, 2020
Free Transit in KC
The road to Hell is paved with good intentions, and these are certainly very good intentions:
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3 comments:
Might be better than L.A.'s approach. Here, they are spending billions building light rail lines, most of which are lightly used (my kid actually is a regular on one of the busiest routes.) They also raised fares significantly a few years ago. A family of 4 now has to spend $248 a month on bus passes. For almost $3,000 a year, you might as well get a cheap car. A one-time ride will cost you $1.75, and you can't transfer if you paid in cash. Meanwhile, the buses are horrible and getting worse, despite remaining the primary public transportation mode here. They're dirty, run late, run on the wrong routes, have to contend with the terrible road conditions, etc.
Not surprisingly, ridership across the system is in decline.
For the amount of money they are spending on rail, they could have made the buses free for decades, or at least lowered the fares and improved ridership.
On the other hand, they are intentionally making driving worse by putting the city on a "road diet": eliminating lanes, adding traffic circles and lights, etc. They want people out of their cars but won't do the one thing that could actually make that happen: make public transportation more affordable.
This, I believe, is what the Federal experiment was all about: a whole bunch of test laboratories for various ideas and policies, so we can see if they work or not.
I bet if it doesn't work it will be difficult to explain exactly why...unless you're a leftist, then it's never leftism at fault.
I predict that one of the first results will be increased taxes, with the greatest complainers being the people who cannot use the service.
I am a fan of public transportation, but don't use it because it doesn't go where I need to go. The only thing that I miss about living in NJ/PA is that both New York City and Philadelphia were easily accessible by train.
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