This only works in what, 5 - 15% of the US? Public transport isn't viable for commuting in most of the country. If you factor in time and the raise in tax required to subsidize it there it is likely that it is more cost effective to own and maintain a used car.
Perhaps not for most of the country by surface area, but far more than 5-15% of the population could be effectively served by better public transportation.
I agree but the issue becomes any sweeping legislation or tax increase to fund such a program will negatively many millions of people without any benefit to them. These people are marginalized already and can't take a hit like that so their more wealthy counterparts in the cities can have a higher standard of living. It can only really be implemented at the city level in a fair manner, thus it isn't really a national solution.
>I agree but the issue becomes any sweeping legislation or tax increase to fund such a program will negatively many millions of people without any benefit to them.
Except, you know. Less drunk driving, less traffic, less pollution, fewer road fatalities, and less tax money spent on road maintenance. Those little things.
And what "many millions of people?" Public transit is mostly paid for by municipal taxes, not federal. Federal taxes paid for a bloated highway system that negatively impacts many people even though we have long since hit the point of diminishing returns on more highway infrastructure.
> Except, you know. Less drunk driving, less traffic, less pollution, fewer road fatalities, and less tax money spent on road maintenance. Those little things.
How do people who are not served by public transit feel any of these effects?
> And what "many millions of people?" Public transit is mostly paid for by municipal taxes, not federal.
My point exactly, this is how it should be but municipalities are rather cash strapped at the moment so you likely won't see increased spending on anything. Thus "more public transit" isn't really possible without federal intervention.
> Federal taxes paid for a bloated highway system that negatively impacts many people even though we have long since hit the point of diminishing returns on more highway infrastructure.
This ignores the positive impacts. If only local roads existed very little trade would be able to take place vastly lowering GDP. Can the system be run in a more cost effective manner, certainly but that would require pushing out the public sector unions that demand unrealistic wages. Pick your poison.
>How do people who are not served by public transit feel any of these effects?
What? You realize air tends to circulate right? And people tend to know other people in their lives who get hurt by accidents? And less traffic on roads is an externality that benefits people who drive. As does giving drunks a safe way to get home.
>My point exactly, this is how it should be but municipalities are rather cash strapped at the moment so you likely won't see increased spending on anything. Thus "more public transit" isn't really possible without federal intervention.
Road infrastructure and sprawling development are the reasons they're cash strapped. If they had adopted more transit-centric development patterns they would have raised their tax base to pay for it rather than exporting the people who use their infrastructure to unincorporated 'bedroom communities' where they don't pay into anything.
If we subsidized transit to the extent that we subsidize sprawl this wouldn't be a problem.
>This ignores the positive impacts. If only local roads existed very little trade would be able to take place vastly lowering GDP. Can the system be run in a more cost effective manner, certainly but that would require pushing out the public sector unions that demand unrealistic wages. Pick your poison.
Please review what I wrote. I didn't say not to have highways. I said we hit the point of diminishing returns long ago and additional spending in this direction is no longer beneficial.
If only local roads existed: Trains would have continued to serve most locations cheaply. The federal highway system did great damage to the far more efferent but far less subsidized train network. Trans take less land, less capital, fewer workers, less fuel, and cause fewer deaths.
I suggest you look into the history of that. Rail lines created massive monopolies that had a stranglehold on American businesses until the creation of highways. Why are goods even transported via trucks if rail is such a viable and cheaper alternative? Are business owners simply dumb?
> Why are goods even transported via trucks if rail is such a viable and cheaper alternative?
Multi billion dollar subsides subsidies. Markets are only rational when left alone, toss more than $425 billion dollars just to build something and then maintain it with government funds and efficiency takes a back seat.
What roads would public busses use if the ones created by those subsidies didn't exist exactly? Do you propose some sort of all terrain bus? Or shall we build train tracks to everyone's home? Won't that be lovely in the dead of night.
FYI: a great deal of the funds for highways come in the form of tolls or gasoline taxes. A great deal of the cost of public transit on the other hand is subsidized by state and local sales taxes and income taxes. It is public transit that is subsidized in the real world not the other way around.
Current federal funds are only a small part of the overall picture especially when you start including the gas subsidies. The system is designed to be complex to hide overall costs, but toll roads are a great reminder of the actual cost per trip. Further, only 1/4 of miles driven are on the highway system so people have plenty of other ways of getting around.
Anyway, public transit is not what I am talking about, the US rail system continues to exist due to efficiency not subsides. Passenger rail is currently a tiny and largely ignored minority of overall traffic.
> Passenger rail is currently a tiny and largely ignored minority of overall traffic.
Exactly. Why do you assume it can scale to the point that it can replace all other forms of transportation? Rail is only cheap and efficient because those are the markets they selected to service, it won't scale up.
If it can why not get some investors and prove everyone else wrong?
