
Commuters Don't Stop Driving to Work Unless You Take Away Free Parking - jseliger
http://www.citylab.com/commute/2016/02/commuting-driving-work-free-parking-transit-subsidy-benefits-parity-congress/462963/
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spc476
The light rail between Ft. Lauderdale and Miami (really between West Palm
beach to Miami) runs alongside I-95 (the Tri-Rail, named so because of the
tri-county area) and that's it for light rail in South Florida. So unless your
work is near a Tri-Rail station, or you're willing to transfer to a bus,
working just about anywhere doesn't make it work while for most people.

Now, it just so happens that there's a Tri-Rail station _right next_ to the
building I work in, and I happen to live less than a mile from a Tri-Rail
station. When when I ran the numbers a few years ago, it was still cheaper to
drive than to ride the train (mainly because I work from home two days a
week). It's not a time factor either---I drive during non-rush hour (a perk of
being a programmer) and either way, it takes about the same time to drive as
to take the train (I have taken the trip once or twice).

Now that gas prices have plummeted, even if I had to drive into the office
five days a week, it would still be cheaper.

That said, there are people in the office that take the train, but they live
further from the office than I do and for them, it is cost effective, even if
they arrive late to the office about 10% of the time (mostly due to suicides
and people stopping on the rails).

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jurip
I'd guess that in most places, unless there's road tolls, driving is going to
be cheaper than public transit if you already have a car. The nice thing about
cities is you can make not having a car a viable option.

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upofadown
It's something like $7k a year to run a car. It's something like $2k a year
just to leave the car in the garage. So $5k/12=$417 per month. Where in the US
does it cost over $400 for a monthly bus/rail pass?

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spacecowboy_lon
For information for my 70 mile commute to London my season ticket (not a pass
) is over $500 a Month plus another 70$ for bus/taxis to get to the station

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iofj
Given that this mostly indicates that cars are just a better product than
public transit for the individual, one might hope that this would be
interpreted as a challenge : can we make public transport as good as having a
car ?

I wonder if public transport would still be cheaper than having lots of cars
if it were demanded to provide the same service : pick up anyone anywhere,
including goods, and bring them to their destination, without having to change
vehicles halfway.

The thing for me is, even with absurd levels of traffic, my car takes me to
work in ~50 minutes, 20 minutes if there's no traffic. The only public
transport option would do 1.5h, and would always do 1.5h (with regular delays
to 2h I might add). Furthermore, I wouldn't be able to take much more than a
laptop bag on public transport, whereas with my car I can do groceries on the
way home.

And the only thing the government is talking about is making public transport
more expensive.

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victorhooi
The thing is, cars are heavily subsidised, more than people realise.

For one, there are heavy negative externalities associated with cars.
Governments choose to ignore those - and hence are in essence subsidising car
users for free. If drivers actually had to pay the full cost of cars in terms
of environment and health impact, they would be up in arms.

And of course there is infrastructure - car owners don't even cover a fraction
of the actual cost of this - it all comes from general taxation.

So yes, we as a society have chosen to heavily subsidise car use, possibly for
cultural or emotional reasons.

But ultimately, the piper will have to be paid. That's why I think we should
all do our part to, as you say, encourage public transport use - and more
walking/cycling.

My dream is that car usage might actually one day be charged at its true cost,
instead of asking society to foot it's bill - but I think that's a long way
off.

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saiya-jin
yes and no - roads are such a critical piece of infrastructure, no state can
100% function without them. Government uses them, military too, and vast
amount of business is done via them.

we all pay for it, and we all indirectly use it (how do you get groceries to
your shop for example?), and most of us directly too.

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pjc50
US public transport is often _deliberately_ bad:
[https://www.longislandpress.com/2013/11/30/robert-moses-
the-...](https://www.longislandpress.com/2013/11/30/robert-moses-the-last-
master-builder/)

"Moses’s parkways are also defined by ultra-low seemingly impenetrable
bridges, designed, says Koppelman, to keep buses of poor city people out.
Koppelman even once measured the overpasses on the Wantagh Parkway himself to
verify that they were in fact deliberately built too low."

~~~
chrisseaton
How can measuring something verify that it was _deliberately_ built too low?
As opposed to built too low out of ignorance, incompetence, by accident, or
for some good reason that you aren't aware of but unrelated to the politics
you think it is?

~~~
Spooky23
In the case of Robert Moses, he pointed out his disdain for blacks and Puerto
Ricans in public on a regular basis.

Robert Caro wrote an epic biography of the man with intense details of how he
ticked.

~~~
chrisseaton
You can measure something and determine that it's probably too low. And you
can look at someone's public statements and determine that it's probably
deliberate. But you can't determine someone's intentions with a tape measure.

~~~
Spooky23
I'd suggest reading the Caro book.

The author literally spent decades studying the man and traced the arc of his
life from his teenage years to political boss. It's pretty clear that the man
was a racist, and personally drove publics works projects to keep races he
disliked away from public parks, beaches and other things.

~~~
chrisseaton
I don't think you understand my point because whether or not the man was
clearly racist isn't relevant to it. The original quote was

> measured the overpasses on the Wantagh Parkway himself to verify that they
> were in fact deliberately built too low

I'm questioning _how the measurement of the bridge allows it to be determined
if the bridge is deliberately, or accidentally too low_ , in the absence of
other information. You're suggesting that there is copious other evidence that
the bridge was deliberately too low, but that kind of proves my point. The
measurement didn't show that it was deliberate - other evidence did instead.

But this is becoming a bit of a ridiculous conversation for such a trivial
point. I was just pointing out that it was sloppy writing.

~~~
manicdee
You have a statement of claim from the guy who built the bridge.

You then go and measure the bridge to verify the statements made by the person
who built the bridge.

Read the book :D

~~~
chrisseaton
But what you're saying agrees with me :)

The measuring doesn't verify the 'deliberate' claim, does it? It's only
verifies the too low part. So

> measured the overpasses on the Wantagh Parkway himself to verify that they
> were in fact deliberately built too low

is nonsense. He measured the overpass to verify that it was too low. And he
used statements from the person to verify the deliberate part. The measurement
by itself doesn't prove the intent.

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Tempest1981
Another thing I heard is that if you put jobs near transit, you get far more
riders than if you put housing near transit.

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Tempest1981
Is anyone else surprised by the 1-2%? Eg: 62.3 to 63.8%. Looks like $250/mo
doesn't go very far. But then below, it mentions Newark where the results are
staggering: those taking transit increased from 4% to 57%. I must be missing
something; can someone summarize?

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jheriko
not enough to put me off... never had free parking.

try no parking (really no parking, not just what people think of as "no"
parking) and a congestion charge... and actually i would still drive if not
for traffic. trains are rubbish.

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tuukkah
Some heavy rail (train, subway, overground) systems are great. It depends
quite a bit on the surrounding cityscape and culture though. Same goes for
light rail (tram) and bus rapid transit systems although the requirements are
more lax.

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x5n1
viva la automated cars.

