I can hear the train as it moves past

[sovay]

I appreciate that the MBTA's newly voted fare hikes are not as comprehensively gouging as they could have been, but it's a kind of negative appreciation. The system needs real money and it needs to come out of the state, not the ridership. I am one of the people who doesn't have a car in Boston; I shouldn't feel penalized for not contributing to the congestion of the streets and the atmosphere. Or for not being able to bike everywhere, rain, snow, or shine. Five miles is walking radius for me, but sometimes I am sick or exhausted or carrying groceries and sometimes I have a lot farther to travel. I really wanted a governor who cared about public transit. Dammit, ethical artichoke.

Comments

[ckd]

Personally, I think that all MBTA fare hikes should be accompanied by proportionate raises in the state gas tax. (For that matter, I think the gas tax should be adjusted based on the increase from the 1980 $0.50 fare.)

[sovay]

Personally, I think that all MBTA fare hikes should be accompanied by proportionate raises in the state gas tax.

I would at least feel less personally chiseled if that were the case, yes.

(For that matter, I think the gas tax should be adjusted based on the increase from the 1980 $0.50 fare.)

I'm going to need that unpacked a little.

[edit] You have an excellent icon for this conversation.

[ckd]

Whatever the gas tax was in 1980, multiplied by 4.8 ($2.40/0.50), should be the new gas tax baseline. Since I think the current tax is 24cpg and I'm guessing the 1980 tax wasn't 5cpg....

[kitewithfish]

Totally agree. They are acting as if this is a "business as usual, let's gouge the poor" hike and it's absurd to punish people who are opting to do the thing we want to become *more* popular.

I hope the congestion pricing gets passed and it all goes to helping the buses.

[sovay]

I hope the congestion pricing gets passed and it all goes to helping the buses.

+1.

[asakiyume]

Hear hear!

[cmcmck]

We choose not to run a car and they've just put up train fares yet again.

For all the talk about the environment from 'they' we're yet again punished for attempting to be green............

[sovay]

We choose not to run a car and they've just put up train fares yet again.

I think this is the problem with trying to solve on an individual level problems that need to be solved institutionally.

[desireearmfeldt]

Yeah.

[sovay]

Yeah.

Solidarity.

[choco_frosh]

newly voted fare hikes

shit.

[sovay]

shit.

Ta-da.

[kitewithfish]

The MBTA serves a huge number of people and makes living in metro Boston possible for a lot of people - I came back here partially because I could structure my life without having to drive all the time. I do end up biking more than anything else because that works better for me and my slightly broken feet, but the structures of dense city living depend on the T and this just feels meanspirited.

[sovay]

The MBTA serves a huge number of people and makes living in metro Boston possible for a lot of people - I came back here partially because I could structure my life without having to drive all the time.

That makes a great deal of sense to me and I'm sorry the city is letting you down.

"Meanspirited" is a good word for it.

[kenjari]

I do have a car, but this is still annoying. I don't want to drive into Boston or even Cambridge at all if I can help it, and fare hikes undermine that in so many ways.

[sovay]

I don't want to drive into Boston or even Cambridge at all if I can help it, and fare hikes undermine that in so many ways.

That's the thing I'm really worrying about, in addition to the general financial panic. It's so counterproductive. How do they think people are going to travel? We're already seeing the personal equivalent. The Green Line Extension has already disrupted the schedule of the 89 bus, which now appears to run whenever it feels like it and sometimes less often. It's our major bus. spatch especially relies on it to get to work. The unreliability of the bus times now causes him to have to take taxis two or three times a week, which is way more expensive than using his monthly purchased bus pass and way more inefficient environmentally speaking. We just want public transit that runs at reasonably functional intervals and doesn't cost the earth. I can't believe it's a unicorn. It's the systems around it that feel broken.

[asakiyume]

ethical artichoke has his limitations...

[sovay]

ethical artichoke has his limitations...

I want more limitations on terrible government and more opportunities for government that actually works!

[selkie]

I don't want to widdle on anything no one in the conversation can change, but: $2.40 flat each way? Where do I sign up?

I pay $3.05 to get to work and $3.65 to get home (Metro essentially has surge pricing and I commute with everyone else in the evening), plus $2.00 each way for the bus. We do not have a functional bus pass system because our regional buses do not harmonize and I use buses in two states.

All for the same mythical schedule and on-fire service. Sigh.

[sovay]

(Metro essentially has surge pricing and I commute with everyone else in the evening)

I consider surge pricing on public transit especially bullshit. The Metro-North had "Peak" and "Off-Peak" fares and no imagination should be required to guess which one was commuter hour.

I include the D.C. Metro in my list of "American transit systems that need major overhaul yesterday." I'm just not sure how to get it in an efficient and non-grafty fashion. Privatization is Not It.

[selkie]

Me, driving, is definitely Not It. I've killed many a car and I don't want to start on squishier things. I want to save all my murders.

[sovay]

I want to save all my murders.

One does want to be discriminating.

[brigdh]

Ugh. My sympathies. I had thought the state vs city issue of public transit funding was unique to NYC, but I suppose I shouldn't be surprised that all of the US mistreats its public transportation in similar ways.

[sovay]

I had thought the state vs city issue of public transit funding was unique to NYC, but I suppose I shouldn't be surprised that all of the US mistreats its public transportation in similar ways.

As I understand from selkie, the D.C. Metro is underfunded to the point of being frequently, non-metaphorically on fire. What's the situation in New York?

[brigdh]

A significant portion of the MTA (NYC's metro) funding comes from state legislators, who are not always interested in voting in support of something that costs a great deal and doesn't benefit their region. We still haven't fixed all the damage from Hurricane Sandy (which was in 2012), and the system has hit the age where the infrastructure is falling apart and badly needs to be updated, but there's no money for that either. We luckily haven't had any actual fires (!!!), but delays have become so frequent that it's driving ridership numbers down. It's also appallingly un-accessible, which affects not just the actually handicapped (including me, when I was on crutches last fall!) but everyone in the city who has to transport carts or loads or large items. A woman died just a month or two ago, carrying her baby's stroller down a flight of stairs when she slipped and fell. (The baby was luckily unharmed, though not like having a dead mother is "lucky".) Less than a quarter of subway stations are accessible; after this recent misfortune, politicians made speeches promising quicker building of elevators, but again, that depends on actually getting the funding to do so.

[sovay]

A significant portion of the MTA (NYC's metro) funding comes from state legislators, who are not always interested in voting in support of something that costs a great deal and doesn't benefit their region.

Yep, we've got that. Western Massachusetts does not want to pay for the MBTA. I keep feeling this problem should be amenable to, say, patching the Pioneer Valley Transit Authority into the Massachusetts Bay Transit Authority, so that no one in Shutesbury feels like their tax money is just getting sucked eastward with no return, but it doesn't seem to happen.

We luckily haven't had any actual fires (!!!), but delays have become so frequent that it's driving ridership numbers down.

We are definitely dealing with that and I don't like it.

Less than a quarter of subway stations are accessible; after this recent misfortune, politicians made speeches promising quicker building of elevators, but again, that depends on actually getting the funding to do so.

I hope it happens. A death should be galvanizing.