Cities Need More Public Transit, Not More Uber and Self-Driving Cars (xpost from GD)

[unc70]

8. All transit is subsidized -- public or private

What is your point? All modes of transportation are subsidized in some way: roads, airports, sidewalks, rail, buses, etc.

Before Chapel Hill eliminated fares from the bus system, we were a typical transit system where the revenue from fares and sale of passes provided a relatively small percentage of the total operating cost of the system. The standard "solution" to that problem is to raise fares and cut service, which then reduces ridership and in turn reduces total revenue in spite of the fare increase. A classic death spiral.

Chapel Hill, Carrboro, and the University needed a bus system that worked. Given that we were already subsidizing most of the cost of the system, why not go all the way and eliminate fares for everyone? The towns voted in an extra property tax, the UNC students increased fees, etc.

And the fare boxes were gone! It was a lot harder and more complicated than that, but it worked. Routes ran faster without the delay to collect fares and check passes, and you could now board the buses at any door, not just at the front. It eliminated all the administrative overhead of dealing with cash on every bus.

But the big news was that ridership immediately doubled and kept increasing. Thankfully, there were Federal programs at that time based on ridership that helped us drastically increase the fleet size to meet the demand.

CHT has all the challenges of any public transit system. But it delivers a great SERVICE to our entire community.