reason to catch the airport bus to downtown (then rent a car as needed) (Pittsburgh: leases, credit)

[pman]

Originally Posted by greg42

Check Phoenix, among many many others. Again, not to say it's a great thing necessarily (although I would say such entities have made many worse choices), but it's pointless to single out Pittsburgh for something that happens everywhere.

like i said...borderline gouging. just because phoenix did it to fund stadiums doesnt make it right. whats this funding again? its not like this is the only tax paid.

[Copanut]

Originally Posted by pman

like i said...borderline gouging. just because phoenix did it to fund stadiums doesnt make it right. whats this funding again? its not like this is the only tax paid.

I agree, I couldn't believe my final bill, and when I questioned it, was told it was for the stadiums. I'm not a big fan of taxing out of towners, sends a bad message.

[BrianTH]

Since this is really going to pay for the airport we overbuilt to USAir's specifications, and since we only need the money because USAir went through bankruptcy and got out of its lease, and since the revived USAir is off competing in other markets to the benefit of air travel consumers in those markets--I'm really not all that concerned about targeting out-of-town folks to pay a little more.

[pman]

Originally Posted by Copanut

I agree, I couldn't believe my final bill, and when I questioned it, was told it was for the stadiums. I'm not a big fan of taxing out of towners, sends a bad message.

there's an insult price that you cant cross. $7/day plus 11% is pretty close to it.
I know I've bad mouthed albany in part because of the taxi racket they have..just left a bad taste in my mouth. I fail to see why out of towners should pay for the county's incompetence. seems like they should grow traffic rather than screw existing customers. I guess they figure they can bend you over the barrel cuz the airports almost in west virginia and you're not getting a cab

[BrianTH]

So who should pay the airport's excess construction debt? Taxpayers who may not even have been in the County at the time USAir made its promise? Airlines (which would slow traffic growth)?

There are no painless, perfectly fair solutions available.

[Copanut]

Charge the airlines a higher landing fee.

[BrianTH]

Originally Posted by Copanut

Charge the airlines a higher landing fee.

Which they have done as well. Problem is, at a certain point that becomes self-defeating because airlines will cut back landings in response.

[greg42]

As a local, I'd rather they increase the rental car fee than the airline landing fee because I actually do fly more than I rent cars there. That is why they do this.

*shrug*

Dunno, this isn't one I get bent out of shape about. I actually DO rent cars about 10x per year, most of them locally, but not typically at the airport anymore. I was much more peeved about the state and county per day taxes that came about all of the sudden. These apply everywhere, not just at the airport. At non-airport locations it's far more likely that locals rent. But not enough people do rent very often, so there isn't much outrage.

I'm quite familiar with the gouging I pay when I fly out somewhere on a trip and rent a car. My point is that it's typical to be gouged on the car. It's not something that's really going to surprise anyone who travels and rents cars. The estimates given by the car rental company always include all the taxes and fees. No surprises really.

I'm not particularly a fan of taxing things that mostly affect out of towners either, but the reality is avoiding it in this case doesn't achieve anything useful.

[pman]

seems pretty high to me...its not nyc. wasnt a big fan of the state fee either...especially since it applies to car sharing services. its like anything, raise the price and you get less of it...hence the title of the thread.

[greg42]

It's true that as an increase, it's a large increase. It's like tacking on an additional 10% fee if the average rate is only $30/day. (I'm guessing the average rate will be a little more than that.) So it's a large increase at once in the gouge, but it's an average total gouge when compared with all the other like-type gouges.

I don't know what the average daily base rental rate is at PIT. If it's $40, say, then that would put the average total rise in cost from base rate ($7/day, plus 11.11%) at 28.61%. I don't have a whole list, but that sounds very middle of the pack when looking at the top 10 and bottom 10 here: Travelocity Newsroom - Press Release That data is also 4 years old so many of those are bound to have gone up. Even if it's $30/day average daily base rate the average percentage total rise in cost would be 34.44%. Not even very close to cracking the top 10 looks like.

A few extremely cost-conscious leisure travelers may attempt to avoid this. If they got a dirt cheap rate, the $3/day could be well over 10% plus the 11.11%, all of which could be avoided at another location. Business travelers, who pay the highest rates on cars just like airfare and hotel, won't be bothered. The reality is in the grand scheme of these fees it is not especially high, nor especially low. It's in the middle. You can say it sounds pretty high to you. And well, if you compare it to the kind of rise in cost we get from regular sales tax or such, it is. But when you compare like items it's fairly average.

The number of additional people catching the bus specifically because of this will be small. The hours are shorter in other rental locations, and rates of other locations such as downtown for weekend or weekly rentals are often higher than weekend airport rates, offsetting some or most or in some cases all of the savings.