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The issue I have with that is property, payroll, and sales taxes have a higher burden on the wealthy. Going to a more "user fee" tax is going to shift the tax burden. One of Obama administration's proposed idea is to assess at $10/barrel fee on oil production to pay for the money it's having to put back into the surface transportation budget. Not exactly the same thing as the surface transportation budget disproportionately is spent on public transit and not roads so it's just another user fee that driver's pay to subsidize transit but it has a lot of the same problems. Take a city like Portland. Sure you could raise the fares by 500% to cover the cost and get rid of the .73% payroll tax (which funds 54% of transit operating costs) and whatever else is funding the other 28% that's not funded by the payroll tax and fares... but raising the fares by 500% is going to hurt a lot more than a roughly 1% cut in other taxes for the lower income.
It depends where you are but not really. Mostly the suburbs have cheaper housing so living out in the suburbs and closer to work is often advantageous from a cost basis. After the transit fares are jacked up by 500% it won't be that less expensive. When transit goes from costing $100/mo to $500/mo, it gets a lot less attractive for the low income to use transit. That's barely more than it costs to own and operate a small sedan driving 15,000 miles a year, $6,729 per AAA's figures. And that's the cost of buying a brand-new vehicle every five years and driving it 15,000 miles a year. Most people don't buy new cars. The used market is about three times the new market. Doing so would make owning and operating a car cheaper than the monthly transit pass.
Which is nearly the same as doing nothing as most people who use transit are low wage earners. And it's counter productive. We're trying to coax people out of cars. Jacking up the price by 500% and then giving poor people welfare isn't going to help do that. If you're someplace like Portland (transit users 79% of area median income) or Denver (64%), that's just not going to help change the perception that transit is just a form of welfare of last resort for people who can't afford cars or can't drive. Forget about it in LA.
No, if you look at Toronto compared with must of America it's more like the triple platinum standard. Even if you look at cities with relatively good transit, Toronto is at least the gold standard barring perhaps NYC MTA which is struggling with a $3 billion/yr shortfall. $30 million shortfall sounds great even given the size difference.
So why do you think Portland's transit system is so inefficient?
Maybe in some cities it makes more sense to encourage people to live in a way that they're a shorter drive from the places they need to go rather than encouraging transit use? That could result in changes in land use and travel patterns that would eventually make transit more viable. The transportation welfare wouldn't necessarily have to be limited to transit, maybe it could be used for gas and car payments too, and it's up to the person to decide what the best use of the money is?
So why do you think Portland's transit system is so inefficient?
Maybe in some cities it makes more sense to encourage people to live in a way that they're a shorter drive from the places they need to go rather than encouraging transit use? That could result in changes in land use and travel patterns that would eventually make transit more viable. The transportation welfare wouldn't necessarily have to be limited to transit, maybe it could be used for gas and car payments too, and it's up to the person to decide what the best use of the money is?
Well, it's not all that inefficient compared with most US cities. Slightly better than average, actually. It's just they built too much of it without sufficient funding to pay for it. If it's actually particularly inefficient the only place it is is on the management side and being too top heavy. That's a frequent problem with any business organization and one that particularly plagues the public sector. It's easy to end up management heavy and then in the public sector it's hard to get rid of them. I don't know that they are.
In general, US cities have too much transit given the level of demand to be all that efficient. Buses run mostly empty most of the time. They run them because accessibility is a bigger consideration than providing transportation efficiently. That mentality is shifting. For example, where I live they cut one of the neighborhood routes that used to run through my neighborhood and rerouted the second one so it no longer wastes time diving in and out of the subdivisions. Nearest bus stop went from being about 200 feet away to about half a mile away. Nobody really misses it because that was one of those circuitous routes that just went meandering around that would eventually meander around to a bus stop that would get you somewhere where you could transfer. It took too long for anyone to use it so nobody cares that its gone. The second one spent so long diving into and out of subdivisions it's also faster even though it's a 10-minute walk.
Previously, that half-mile distance to the nearest bus stop would have been considered unacceptable minimum levels of service. Whenever they got any money they'd throw money at that and provide some useless bus routes to ensure you wouldn't be that far from a bus stop. By cutting a bunch of those minimum level of service circuitous route to nowhere buses, they were able to run express buses with limited stops to the junior college, mall, and downtown every 10 minutes at peak hours. Then those become overcrowded so they replaced them with higher capacity articulated buses. Stupid routing was part of it. Transit still isn't up to pre-recession funding levels here and works better but has higher ridership today than it did then because of the mentality shift away from minimum level of service being the most important factor.
The other half of that is what that does to development. Nobody gave transit any consideration in development when it was all these stupid circuitous routes to nowhere. There hasn't really been a whole lot of TOD, which is what they're hoping to accomplish, yet but there has been some limited infill. Hard to say, but I suspect they would have developed my subsivision (built in the '70s) at least slightly differently. They've added in a decent amount of infill on the giant parking lots with the businesses located as far as possible on from the road that are doing pretty well. Meanwhile the CVS location that was abandoned for one near a busy bus stop and closer to the street is still vacant going on three years now. Developers respond to market forces and when they're seeing locations closer to the road with potentially more foot traffic from the nearby bus stop renting despite being in lower scale shopping centers while they're seeing vacancy in ir higher scale shopping centers that are less accessible... well, they respond to it. The infill of strip malls with business closer to the street has been successful and is pretty common. Eventually my guess is they'll completely tear down and redevelop that particular strip mall. They've done it with a couple in the area already.
Likely this is really about a developer trying to sell more units in the same building under the pretext of "encouraging" residents to use other modes of transportation, e.g., walking, biking, bus, taxi, and private transportation services".
Must be an urbanophile's dream come true - making residents transit-dependent by not providing places for cars. I suspect all this does is ensure that these people will have to park their cars somewhere else (yes they will have cars). The marketing is that the building offers all these amenities and conveniences to the residents. If you have to get somewhere every day (like to a job), this isn't going to be very convenient. No doubt fools will purchase. I suspect the turnover rate will be high as people find out how inconvenient this is.
What is chuckle worthy is Dane_in_LA forgetting that most of North America does not have the LA climate (if you are in fact from LA).
I am, but I also lived in Denmark. In fact, I fond Los Angeles to be almost too mild for bicycle commuting.
Take the Northmost city in the US that's not in Alaska - it's still South of every Danish city. Weather is something you dress for.
We can theorize how about it's not possible and impractical and can't be done - yet there are modern million-inhabitant cities that do make it possible.
I am, but I also lived in Denmark. In fact, I fond Los Angeles to be almost too mild for bicycle commuting.
Take the Northmost city in the US that's not in Alaska - it's still South of every Danish city. Weather is something you dress for.
We can theorize how about it's not possible and impractical and can't be done - yet there are modern million-inhabitant cities that do make it possible.
That's an awesome picture.
More bikers == [more heat generated, improved wind resistance, higher visibility]
Critical Mass, in Chicago is of the same volition but that's done once a month while I imagine this is a picture of a normal snowy day in Denmark.
I am, but I also lived in Denmark. In fact, I fond Los Angeles to be almost too mild for bicycle commuting.
Take the Northmost city in the US that's not in Alaska - it's still South of every Danish city. Weather is something you dress for.
We can theorize how about it's not possible and impractical and can't be done - yet there are modern million-inhabitant cities that do make it possible.
Copenhagen is at the same latitude as Labrador and northern Quebec, where there's still about 1-2 feet of snow on the ground left to melt. Even if whatever snow falls in Copenhagen never melts (it usually melts pretty fast), it would take probably a couple winters to accumulate 1-2 feet of snow.
Minneapolis is at about the same latitude as Padua, Italy, and the summer weather is similar, but the winters are more comparable to Lulea in northern Sweden - colder than Tromso but a bit warmer than Lapland.
American cities are in the sweet zone of 10-25C a lot less than European cities. Doesn't mean it can't be done, but Europe isn't ideal as an example due to the much more moderate climate. Somewhere like China would be better, the climate is more comparable.
I am, but I also lived in Denmark. In fact, I fond Los Angeles to be almost too mild for bicycle commuting.
Take the Northmost city in the US that's not in Alaska - it's still South of every Danish city. Weather is something you dress for.
We can theorize how about it's not possible and impractical and can't be done - yet there are modern million-inhabitant cities that do make it possible.
Where is this picture from? Minneapolis is the coldest major city in the US (I think), colder than Moscow in the winter, hotter than Moscow in the summer. My daughter lives there. While you hear a lot about the MN biking community, you don't really see that many people out riding a lot, and I've never even been there in winter.
Where is this picture from? Minneapolis is the coldest major city in the US (I think), colder than Moscow in the winter, hotter than Moscow in the summer.
(Moscow)
That photo is from Copenhagen, it's in the link title.
The northernmost major US city [he said northernmost not coldest] is Seattle not Minneapolis. Seattle's warmer than Copenhagen year around. While Copenhagen is free from the temperature extremes many American cities get, its winter temperatures hover in the 30s with frequent drizzle. Cold rain is nasty to bike in; it can soak through easily and chill. I'd rather bike in light snow over cold rain. Of course, Seattle has the same cold rain issue though it's not quite as cold.
That photo is from Copenhagen, it's in the link title.
The northernmost major US city [he said northernmost not coldest] is Seattle not Minneapolis. Seattle's warmer than Copenhagen year around. While Copenhagen is free from the temperature extremes many American cities get, its winter temperatures hover in the 30s with frequent drizzle. Cold rain is nasty to bike in; it can soak through easily and chill. I'd rather bike in light snow over cold rain. Of course, Seattle has the same cold rain issue though it's not quite as cold.
LOL!! It winter hovers in the 30ies....
Try Chicago. We can get freezing rain, up to 11 inches of snow from snow storms, wind chills that make the place feel like it is -10F outside. And days when it might only rise to 3F. None of the people in that photo are dressed appropriately for Chicago's worse(they have too much skin exposed!-). Frankly I would rather stay warm and dry in an Car and not put up with being exposed to weather.
That photo is from Copenhagen, it's in the link title.
The northernmost major US city [he said northernmost not coldest] is Seattle not Minneapolis. Seattle's warmer than Copenhagen year around. While Copenhagen is free from the temperature extremes many American cities get, its winter temperatures hover in the 30s with frequent drizzle. Cold rain is nasty to bike in; it can soak through easily and chill. I'd rather bike in light snow over cold rain. Of course, Seattle has the same cold rain issue though it's not quite as cold.
OK, somehow I missed that. I kind of figured it was Copenhagen, and not Minneapolis or Chicago, Toronto, Denver or any other snowy city because 1) the horde of cyclists, and 2) few are wearing helmets.
Be that as it may (which I knew), the coldest major city in the US is still Minneapolis. And it's colder than Moscow, let alone Copenhagen. A lot of Europeans don't seem to understand the climate over here, think that latitude tells the whole story. Heck, Denver, Champaign IL and Pittsburgh are all at 40 degrees north (roughly) which is the same latitude as Thessaloniki Greece and Madrid Spain in Europe. I used to correpsond with a relative in Sweden; he'd talk about how cold it was, I think to be cute, and I'd respond that it was colder in Denver!
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