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As many of you guys know, I am a conservative. There are many areas where I disagree with conservatives and one of these areas has to do with public transit. Why are conservatives so against improving public transit? I am a professional, college-educated person who rely solely upon public transit in Los Angeles Metro area, which is finally starting to see some much needed improvements. I have noticed that in a lot of conservative areas and suburbs, public transit tends to be scanty and limited. Why is that?
It's about money. I too am conservative and would like to see improvements in Mass transit but I'd rather see the funding come from eliminating the myriad of completely asinine expenditures than additional taxes. I have no problem with taxes as long as I get something in return.
I'd love to see clean well maintained streets with electric buses and light rail that can efficiently move hordes to wherever but not at the expense of more desperately needed services. I constantly see new government offices erected and furnished in the type of opulence Marie lost her head over. I see government employees tooling around in expensive luxury automobiles that cost double or triple what the average working man can afford for himself but had to pay for.
A couple years ago here in Oakland our venerated anti-gun guy Don Perata was apparently carjacked on Telegraph Avenue at gunpoint. For those unfamiliar with Oakland, that's a really great place to be if you feel the urge to be robbed. Of course the anti-gun crowd ignored the forest to focus on a shrub while I had to wonder why my tax dollars (yes the vehicle was leased by the state) were paying for a brand new Hemi-equipped Dodge Charger with the top end custom 21 wheel package. Why he wasn't driving a cheaper car or better yet driving his own car and letting the state buy his gas is a mystery to me. That's just one of thousands of examples to illustrate where the money that could be used for mass transit is going.
Most conservatives have no issue with taxes that are used for the benefit of the people but they also realize that the state and federal governments seem to be unable to spend money with even an ounce of common sense. I can't speak for all conservatives but I just want to see our fearless leaders learn how to balance a freaking checkbook (and preferably set a budget based on real at-hand money) and get their priorities straight.
Any public transport must pay for itself or that is proof that its not really needed or wanted.If they want to pay for it by charging a fee eqaul to the service cost then go for it.We already pay for buses all over the country that can't pay for themselves as it is. We have ariline service all over the country so its not the 1900's. American's choose along time ago to use cars and ariplanes because of distances used in and convenience. We have eno8ugh freight trains blocking higways;making noise in towns and dangerous crossing as it is.
With the exception of some toll roads, roads don't pay for themselves either. Why is one form of subsidized transportation so superior to another?
Fail post , everything you said is false. Highways are PT? What the hell? Freight Companies aren't maintaining most line up to Railway standards and they get away with it. Amtrak isn't losing money on certain lines anymore , Ridership is up and they are going to Replace the Fleet sometime this later year into next. Amtrak has never gotten fair funding its not that its poorly run , although they should cut some lines. And alot ppl know that. Compared to Roads & Airports , the funding they got was tiny. Obviously you are not a Engineer , Rail Buff , or Conductor so i don't expect you would understand how the systems work. Nor any amount of wikipeding or Google will make you understand. Its very complex.
LOLs. Why aren't public highways public transit? They are publically funded. They are maintained by public dollars. They are used by the public. The government sets all rules for them. That's public transportation.
I don't know anything about freight companies. I would assume they keep the tracks in workable condition. Seems to me that is all that really matters. Do the lines function properly? Apparently they do or the company would not be able to perfrom it's job. Then they would be out of business. Since they are in business I would suspect the keep the rails in good enough condition.
Some Amtrak lines are now making a profit? LOLs. After 50 years of trying they are finally making a profit on some lines.
Most of their lines have been losing money since the day they opened. And you admit they should close them. The fact that they don't proves it's not a lack of funding. It's poorly run. If it were run properly then the losing lines would be shut down. If it were run well then they wouldn't need funding from the government in the first place.
How many internet start-ups in the 1990s had millions and millions of dollars in funding and still failed? Tons of 'em. And some of them made it and had virtually zero funding. The failed ones were either poorly run or offered a service people did not want. All the funding in the world means squat if the company is poorly designed and managed. For an example see Amtrak.
And it's not complex at all. Transportation works like every other business. There is nothing unique about it.
As many of you guys know, I am a conservative. There are many areas where I disagree with conservatives and one of these areas has to do with public transit. Why are conservatives so against improving public transit? I am a professional, college-educated person who rely solely upon public transit in Los Angeles Metro area, which is finally starting to see some much needed improvements. I have noticed that in a lot of conservative areas and suburbs, public transit tends to be scanty and limited. Why is that?
Because buses, commuter trains, and subways are a communist plot to take over America while we're all riding to work some morning.
LOLs. Why aren't public highways public transit? They are publically funded. They are maintained by public dollars. They are used by the public. The government sets all rules for them. That's public transportation.
Wrong, public transportation is a shared passenger transportation service which is used by the general public.
As many of you guys know, I am a conservative. There are many areas where I disagree with conservatives and one of these areas has to do with public transit. Why are conservatives so against improving public transit? I am a professional, college-educated person who rely solely upon public transit in Los Angeles Metro area, which is finally starting to see some much needed improvements. I have noticed that in a lot of conservative areas and suburbs, public transit tends to be scanty and limited. Why is that?
The first reason is no mass transit system pays for itself. That means each ride is paid for by someone else. Why are you or any mass transit rider entitled to my money?
Next, the energy used per passenger mile per bus nationwide is greater than the energy used by a private vehicle. If every bus were replaced by a car, there would be a net reduction in environmental load, in taxes, and in imported energy.
Mass transit is only justifiable in large urban areas that are extremely population dense. This would qualify only a handful of cities in the U.S. Even with that, the passengers don't pay the full cost. Additionally many non-dense areas such as Los Angeles desire mass transit mostly for political reasons despite it not making economic or environmental sense.
For example the Los Angeles transit system fare is less than 10% of the system cost. Your fare would have to be about 11 times what you currently pay to justify the mass transit system you love so much. Tell me if you paid 11 times each way, would it still have the appeal?
Note, fares generate 264 million in revenue, but the total cost is 2.863 billion. Why do you deserve 93% of the cost of your trip to be paid for by someone else?
Far from protecting the environment, most rail transit lines use more energy per passenger mile, and many generate more greenhouse gases, than the average passenger automobile. Rail transit provides no guarantee that a city will save energy or meet greenhouse gas targets.
While most rail transit uses less energy than buses, rail transit does not operate in a vacuum: transit agencies supplement it with extensive feeder bus operations. Those feeder buses tend to have low ridership, so they have high energy costs and greenhouse gas emissions per passenger mile. The result is that, when new rail transit lines open, the transit systems as a whole can end up consuming more energy, per passenger mile, than they did before.
Even where rail transit operations save a little energy, the construction of rail transit lines consumes huge amounts of energy and emits large volumes of greenhouse gases. In most cases, many decades of energy savings would be needed to repay the energy cost of construction.
It turns out driving around solo in a Honda Insight is more energy efficient than light rail, mini bus, regular bus or any form of mass transit (with the sole exception of the east Japan rail line). If you want to save the environment, save the country, and reduce energy costs, drive an Insight.
With the exception of some toll roads, roads don't pay for themselves either. Why is one form of subsidized transportation so superior to another?
That's what the gas tax is supposed to be for. In reality I'm sure governments use it for general revenue but that is another problem. The gas tax is one of the fairer taxes if it is used to pay for roads because the more you use the roads the more tax you end up paying. Someone who never used the roads doesn't pay the tax, except a few cents when they fill up their lawn mowers.
Mass transit asks other people to pay for it because it is subsidized-- heavily subsidized in most cases. To give you an example, the elevated rail in Miami (Metrorail, or metroFail as we call it) would cost $24 each way without subsidizing. Of course, no one would use it at that price.
If people are ok with subsidizing mass transit then what about airlines. Why not charge $5 a seat to fly anywhere and have the government (i.e. taxpayers) pay the rest? Transportation is transportation, right?
The last thing conservatives don't like about mass transit, other than the costs, is the idea that it reduces individuality and individual freedom. No matter how invasive mass transit is in your city it will never go exactly where or when you want it to. It will go where some policy maker says it will and on a schedule some bureaucrat says it should. Your car is your freedom. Mass transit is government holding your hand and telling you when to cross the street.
It is an interview with William Lind, director of the Center for Cultural Conservatism at the Free Congress Foundation. Needless to say he is a conservative, and he supports public transportation.
As many of you guys know, I am a conservative. There are many areas where I disagree with conservatives and one of these areas has to do with public transit. Why are conservatives so against improving public transit? I am a professional, college-educated person who rely solely upon public transit in Los Angeles Metro area, which is finally starting to see some much needed improvements. I have noticed that in a lot of conservative areas and suburbs, public transit tends to be scanty and limited. Why is that?
I can only speak for one conservative...............As a Conservative I just do not believe that the government is the best solution for everything, public transportation is no exception. Here in Washington State we have one of the largest Ferry systems in the world, it is costly, slow and inefficient, when I am sitting in a parking lot on I5 and a Bus goes flying by me in the pool lane and it has 6 people on it,that tells me it is grossly inefficient. Bottom line is I am not for throwing good money after bad, Public transit has a very, very, poor record, when it comes to getting the most value from tax payer dollars.
Wrong, public transportation is a shared passenger transportation service which is used by the general public.
Roads are a passenger transportation service. And they are used by the general public.
Are they not?
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Highways are PT? What the hell? Freight Companies aren't maintaining most line up to Railway standards and they get away with it. Amtrak isn't losing money on certain lines anymore , Ridership is up and they are going to Replace the Fleet sometime this later year into next. Amtrak has never gotten fair funding its not that its poorly run , although they should cut some lines. And alot ppl know that. Compared to Roads & Airports , the funding they got was tiny. Obviously you are not a Engineer , Rail Buff , or Conductor so i don't expect you would understand how the systems work. Nor any amount of wikipeding or Google will make you understand. Its very complex.
