July 8, 2008
Hot Hot Heat, House Folds, TTC Not Free
It's really hot outside! One of the best ways to tell if it is really hot outside is to check on any elephants who live near you. If it's too hot for them, it's too hot for you.
Madonna House, a Catholic organization whose founder won the Order of Canada, is returning their medal in protest of Henry Morgentaler's appointment to the Order. One of the House's directors told the Globe that: "We value this....It has been a family treasure. And on a human level, it's with sorrow that we have to give it back. However....We're trying to live according to our consciences and our consciences won't let us keep it." Ah, so they're putting the medal up for adoption. Always a difficult choice.
The TTC won't be free any time soon, says Adam Giambrone. Stay tuned for Torontoist's interview with Giambrone later today, in which we will ask him whether the TTC will build its new streetcars out of candy canes and puppy kisses.
The Toronto-East York Community Council has recommended banning cars from turning left on College between Dovercourt and Lansdowne, and on Queen from Dovercourt to Gladstone. The turns would be banned eastbound from 7 to 10 a.m. and westbound from 3:30 to 6:30 p.m., so that the candy cane and puppy kiss rides could travel unimpeded.
From The Star today: crime crime crime crime crime crime. Hope you like feeling disheartened!
Photo by bruce grant from the Torontoist Flickr Pool.
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Ah, so they're putting the medal up for adoption. Always a difficult choice.
I see what you did there, and I like it.
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FREE TTC
Actually, there are some good arguments fro free public transit.
"Passenger transport should be a universal public service financed from general city revenues. Visitors could be charged a hotel tax if the costs of providing for their transport must be recovered. No-fare systems are easy to use and impose no additional delays on the passenger. Alternatively, freight rates could be set high enough to cover the total cost of operating the metro system."
http://www.carfree.com/pax_trans.html
His book goes into more detail on how this is achieved financially, but it is not a silly as it sounds on the surface.
Cheers,
Tuds
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So how would you tax people who live just outside the city but go to say Finch or Kipling everyday for their commute to work? And what about people who don't stay in hotels but are still visitors? I have lots of non-Torontonian friends who stay with me. And, more than anything else, how would you add *that* much capacity at one time? YUS can barely hold the current amount and that will only ease slightly when we get the new subway cars in 2012.
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The author quoted above (J.H. Crawford) says only "if the costs of providing for their transport MUST be recovered".
Basically, if you live, work, or study in the city and need to use public transit (even if you start from outside the transit system), there is still no fare to ride. Your property taxes, tuition, or your employers business taxes cover your use.
As for visitors to the city, I say let them have a free ride. They tend to use the system off peak anyhow, and not during rush hour.
In the short run, some people will not take transit if it fills to capacity. But as we add more capacity that is fare-free, people will be induced to fill up the new capacity. It is a win-win situation.
One of Crawford's major points is fare-free public transit is less expensive to run as you eliminate maintenance and monitoring of fare boxes, ticket machines, gates and so on. You also reduce labour costs. and the benefit to the rider is barrier free entry, faster loading of streetcars and busses, and a pleasant euphoria of efficient urban transit.
Cheers,
Tuds
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Excellent book.
I agree with Crawford on making public transit free, it should be covered with general revenues in every area when they collect a carbon tax.
This could be done gradually so we have time to build more infrastructure and add drivers.
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Tuds, your argument is just slight of hand. The cost of running the system is a constant. It must be paid. Whether it is paid directly by the user or indirectly throught the tax system, you are still paying for it. Arguments for free transit need to demonstrate why it is preferable to use the tax system(s) (you list a number) to using the fare box. The author you quote seems to rely on it being "easier to use" transit if it is free. I think we need a bit more.
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Yes, let me correct myself. There is no free lunch.
In my second comment I did more carefully state there would be no fare: that is, fare-free. This does not mean public transit is free, as the residents of a city will have to pay through regular taxes.
The author not only says that transit will be easier to use, but also that it will be less expensive to run. Is reducing the cost of transit not a laudable goal?
"The TTC is funded from two major sources: fares and property taxes. It also receives one-time grants from other levels of government for specific projects.
In other cities around the world, provincial and federal governments are partners in paying for transit. The Ontario government used to share half of the operating costs now covered by the City, but this is no longer the case."
$835 million in Fares
$285 million in Property Taxes
$ 91 million in Provincial Gas Tax
http://www.toronto.ca/ttc/myttc.html
We need the provincial government to step back in and provide 50% of the $1.211 billion needed to run the TTC. It is also estimated that 10% of operating costs can be saved through elimination of fares*. I also believe we should double the gas tax to encourage more public transit use.
$600 million in funding from the province (based on 50%)
$120 million in Savings* (based on 10%)
$309 million in Property Taxes (8.4% more)
$182 million in Provincial Gas Tax (based on a x2 increase)
Don't whine about the increase in property taxes, as that is about $200 per year on average. Each household with only one Metropass would then save $1,300 per year. And, yes, I know that fare-free transit will increase use, so these ratios will need to change rapidly in the first 5 years. I am no naive.
Green Sulfer and X, please don't just criticise my idea. Offer some detailed solutions like I do, or help me by trying to find citations* to my claims that I haven't been able to track down yet. Let's work together.
Cheers,
Tuds
* citation recalled from either http://www.vtpi.org/ or Crawford's book "Carfree Cities".
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"It's time to give people a free ride on public transit.
And here's proof it works."
http://www.alternet.org/environment/57802
Cheers,
Tuds
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Any increase in property tax (or a hotel tax) is another reason for people to move out of the city (and jam the streets commuting in for work) or vacation/host conferences somewhere else.
I would rather use road tolls, congestion charges, traffic ticket surcharges (or whatever you'd call that), and gas taxes to fund public transit. And jacked up advertising rates on TTC property. If that means a shortfall then leave a fare of $1.
How feasible would that be?
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"The Toronto-East York Community Council has recommended banning cars from turning left on College between Dovercourt and Lansdowne, and on Queen from Dovercourt to Gladstone."
So, they're banning left turns on Queen to Dovercourt, and on two VERY short side streets. Map.
That's not even worth the space the newspapers wasted on it. Its ONE left-turn restriction at a traffic light and TWO turn restrictions at very minor side streets. This will make a difference of exactly zilch, zip, nada.
When the TTC said they wanted to pursue left-turn restrictions, my first thought was.. "but that's not the problem", and this measly banning of left-turns on a 400m stretch of road is just utterly ridiculous. "See? We put in some restrictions! Problem solved!"
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Rek, I agree to use "road tolls, congestion charges, traffic ticket surcharges (or whatever you'd call that), and gas taxes to fund public transit", but I would not retain a dollar fare. One of the major benefits is eliminating the cost of fare collection itself.
Cheers,
Tuds
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The only thing that is gained financially is the 10% estimated savings from not running the fare box. Everything else you quote is irrelevant to the proposal to eliminate fares - its all government funding out of tax revenue that could be applied whether you eliminated fares or not. I think you could get the same savings by installing some form of smart card system that eliminated the need for employees, since those are the operating costs. there would be a capital cost to creating the system and a small operating cost for its upkeep.
I think the proposal has problems on equity grounds - generally, the party that obtains a benefit should pay the (entire, or at least majority) or the burden. Shifting the funding to unrelated taxes violates this principle. Also, each of the taxes mentioned distorts, punishes or creates incentives and disincentives entirely unrelated to their objectives. Price also works as a rationing measure to eliminate congestion.
While we are thinking bigger thoughts, I'd like to consider eliminating council oversight of the TTC and running it as a business. This is not "privatization" - the service would still be dependent on government funding, like, say, arts boards or olympic organizations, but would not be subject to political interference by persons who lack the skill set to run a business properly. The main benefit would be to allow the TTC to raise money as any other business can in the capital markets - a long term, low yield bond issue could fund capital expenses in perpetuity, the revenue stream could be securitized, purchasing could be done without misguided political interference to subsidize Canadian businesses, etc. Its frankly bizzare to cut a capital intensive business off from the capital markets and instead make it solely reliable on farebox receipts and tax revenues.
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x, when we pay property taxes, it funds schools, fire stations, and policing. Even if I don't have children attending schools, I chip in a little to fund it. And even if I do not have children, I benefit indirectly as those educated children grow up to work in my business, or become my dentist, or whatever.
In the same way, fare-free public transit is an indirect benefit to those who do not use it. Many of their employees will use it to get to work, maybe even your dentist will.
Public transit is definitively a "public" service. It is almost universally agreed a city needs a strong public transit service. Although private transit works in some places like here in Japan, I don't think the two are directly comparable on this issue.
But my main point of my first post was simply that fare-free transit is possible, affordable, and is indeed being done successfully in at least one other North American municipality. Why not in Toronto, then?
Cheers,
Tuds
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Because right-wingers can't stand the idea of 'getting something for nothing' (in their worldview, anyway). They think that any idea like this is 'Pol Pot' socialism, so it must not be done, otherwise the heavens will fall and the Earth will blow up.
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To follow up: I have disagreed with Tuds before (and may do so again), but on this point, he and I can agree.