As the economic world goes to hell in a handbasket, we’re still obsessed here in B.C. with the idea that someone is riding a bus for free.
To that end, Transportation Minister Blair Lekstrom introduced new legislation today that will 1. Give TransLink new tools to go after fare evaders who are ticketed but don’t pay fines 2. Let TransLink have the money (he estimates $4 million, or half of the potential, and TransLink is still assessing that)
Among the mechanisms TransLink can now use
- have ICBC refuse to issue driver’s licences or vehicle registrations to people with unpaid fines (since only 30 per cent of those people have proven to have driver’s licences, in the past, obviously won’t be a deterrent to the other 70 per cent)
- refuse to sell them monthly passes (This had a lot of us reporters on conference calls confused, as many people buy monthly passes at convenience stores. Would people then have to show IDs and would the convenience-store clerk then have to check if they have fines? TransLink and the minister said this would all be worked out “through regulations” and so on.
- go after them in small-claims court. (This seems straightforward, though time-consuming. Hard to believe that the $173 fine would even begin to cover court costs.)
- take it out of provincial tax refunds. (This would be a worst-case scenario, not lightly employed, I’m told)
- allow various TransLink personnel to issue tickets, not just transit police.
TransLink’s Doug Kelsey also suggested Coast Mountain Bus would be re-examining its policy of drivers not asking people for fares. As anyone who rides the bus knows, drivers simply don’t engage, except in rare cases, in challenging anyone who doesn’t pay.
My guess is that all the publicity around this will produce more of a scare factor and also a cultural-acceptance factor that will induce people to pay for transit, so that the above mechanisms will not need to be used that intensively.
As well, once the Compass cards come into play, along with faregates, that will automatically reduce the possibilities for fare evasion, at least on SkyTrain lines. The B-line, or as the 20-somethings of my acquaintance call it, the free line, will remain an issue. Presumably the transit police will become more of a presence there once the faregates are in place on the SkyTrain system.
52 responses so far ↓
1 Bill Lee // May 7, 2012 at 7:28 pm
Lower the fares and get more users?
At what price of gasoline do drivers consider the bus?
As about 10 minutes of a car is about 1 litre. 20 minutes (about 16 km at street speeds) would be a bus fare.
If the bus is cheaper would more take it on?
Robert Matas showed in the Saturday May 5th Globe and Mail, that a drop in the ferry fare resulted in an increase in both revenue and headcount back a few years ago
See Infographic here: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/british-columbia/bc-ferries-fares-up-traffic-down/article2423792/?from=2423795
Link to story text near top of page.
2 Mike // May 7, 2012 at 9:08 pm
A translink fine is not credit that has been extended to you. There are a number of reason why people may not be able to pay it. Debt, financial problems, etc. For Translink to consider preventing people from buying monthly fares is very cruel and heartless and shows a lack of empathy. Many people use transit to get to work and live on a shoestring and there are dozens of reasons why they may not have paid on particular day (Maybe they had to choose whether to eat lunch or pay their fare, as was my case the one and only time I had a fine). I would certainly be one of the first to contact legal advice should Translink pursue such a course of action. All of this makes me examine why I take the bus and skytrain at all. A monthly pass for me is the same as my car insurance.
3 Michelle S of Mt Pleasant // May 7, 2012 at 10:56 pm
They are getting what they deserve (Translink) I mean seriously, what were they thinking developing a transit system based on a honour system!
Morons should have put in fare gates when they built the skytrains and this whole situation would have never been an issue.
Now its going to cost a small fortune to construct what should have been established in the first place…….bad enough we can’t take City Hall seriously to have to now throw our transit system into the mix…….and who pays for this fiasco….yah your looking at him/her in the mirror.
Talk about doing something assbackwards.
4 Lewis N. Villegas // May 7, 2012 at 11:48 pm
Y-A-W-N
5 Lewis N. Villegas // May 8, 2012 at 7:01 am
Here’s something I could get excited about, Frances, and I bet I’m not the only one here that feels this way.
We lead a Jane’s Walk along Main Street last Sunday afternoon. Beautiful day, but what a dog of a street. Why? Way too much traffic! Rest of the walk was terrific.
The Wenonah Apartments at 11th and Main set the tone of what goes up in the neighbourhood. Robert McNutt explained to the group that when you design with terracota tile, the architect draws a very accurate plan, that in this case got sent to the tile manufacturer in New York. They design each tile individually, number it, box it, and send it back. Seattle architects did that wonderful building in 1911.
The Rize Aliance should build fronting Broadway. The row houses (honest, theyr’re there we stood in front of them) one block north on 10th should be the model for the building fronting Watson on the same property.
I believe Rize Alliance should wave the Canadian flag a little more, and build something that tips its hat to local hisory rather than do some juiced-up scheme that belongs somewhere else. I challenge the architects to be more contextual, show some leadership and some class.
http://wp.me/p1yj4U-7H
I was at Granview-Woodlands Advisory Council (GWAC) last night talkin’ good urbanism. Big crowd. Knowledgeable people. Andrew Pask attended. Good to see city planners come out and get a feel for the pulse of the neighbourhood.
From woking with RAMP I get the impression that what TransLink should… well, I can’t say that on the Fabulablog… Translink should make the Main trolley a BRT by putting it in dedicated bus lanes. City should give up the pavement to them.
We’d improve the capacity of the line, remove 20,000 cars off Main Street, plant mature trees in medians separating the BUS lanes from the remaining traffic lanes, and turn Main Street into what it really wants to be: A Great Street.
The very same thing should happen to the Hastings B-Line. I will be encouraging GWAC to think along those lines, and to give some thought to implementing a BRT on the Drive as well. How would that work?
Speaking of Granview-Woodlands, did you know that in fact ALL twelve streets from the East End (DTES) to the first government townsite, the Hastings Townsite, is named a drive? Haven’t found a date yet.
Needless to say the Broadway B-Line should be BRT, and the Broadway Local (Bus 9) should relocate elsewhere. Can’t run a local and an express on the same track, I found out. It requires double-tracking, and there are already too many buses on Broadway.
Marpole is also doing a community plan. I’d love to show “The Density Fallacy” to their community association. Oak Street and Granville should also get BRTs.
We need BRTs on the east-west streets, but I will defer to those who really understand transit to offer an opinion as to which streets south of Broadway get service (41st and Marine Drive are no-brainers).
The point that Translink and the City haven’t quite grasped yet is that these implementations should happen at the same time that the community plans are being drafted. We need more certainty around transit to properly vision the next 20 years.
Maybe the Mayor can come on the Blog and tell us what he thinks about this.
The neighbourhood groups, for one, are eager and ready to embrace ‘good’ urbanism. However, as we have seen from the likes of the Rize Alliance, that’s just not coming our way unless we demand it.
Good urbanism for Vancouver and region, means transit implementation and well wrought community plans now.
6 Andrew Browne // May 8, 2012 at 9:27 am
So tired of the fare evasion shtick. The whole thing largely comes from suburban residents who ride skytrain twice a year to a Canucks game or concert and dutifully buy their fare at the ticket vending machine, only to observe hundreds and hundreds of people walk on. In their mind: “Look at all these thieves!” In reality: “Wow, so many monthly pass users!”
Translink and the province will have a fight on their hands if they want drivers to enforce fares. There are huge safety issues here. They stopped enforcing fares for two reasons:
1. Violence against drivers.
2. Time delay to routes from passengers bickering over 15 cents.
I’m still in awe that we consider a multi-hundred million dollar investment in fare gates, with a 45-60 year ROI, a good idea… that money could actually build something.
7 Lewis N. Villegas // May 8, 2012 at 10:18 am
Like BRT.
8 MB // May 8, 2012 at 10:39 am
Lewis 4
Translink should make the Main trolley a BRT by putting it in dedicated bus lanes. City should give up the pavement to them. We’d improve the capacity of the line, remove 20,000 cars off Main Street, plant mature trees in medians separating the BUS lanes from the remaining traffic lanes, and turn Main Street into what it really wants to be: A Great Street.
While on the surface this may suiond like a good idea, it’s easier said than done, Lewis.
I’d like to see the construction drawings, especially for how the dedicated median (with adequate underground root vaults for tree planting) is juxtaposed with several major underground water and sewer trunk lines.
And what does youir idea do to the clusters of heavily-used pedestrian-activated crosswalks spaced one block apart in mid-Main? Do you foresee rapid buses stopping at every block in these sections for pedestrians? Or pedestrians having their lights cancelled prematurely due to approaching buses?
Have you consulted a civil engineer on this? Engineers are, after all, an extremely important component within the multi-disciplinary profession call urban design, at least in firms that actually practice urban design.
Just a few niggling points.
9 MB // May 8, 2012 at 10:50 am
Collecting unpaid fines is one thing. It may deter a relatively small number of repeat fare evaders.
I read a while back that the losses to fare evasion have been calculated at about $7 million a year, so it would take perhaps 20 years for new fare gates to recover their costs. Even then, there are a few who still evade fares, so the costs may never be worth it.
Here’s a clip from a post by Stephen Rees on this topic, and a comparison to the London Underground which still sees 2% fare evasion despite gates and hundreds of enforement officers:
As I am sure you all know, London’s Underground has been gated for many years now with gates not too dissimilar to the ones now going in on our SkyTrain stations. // I did some quick sums using data from the TfL Annual Report. I reckon TfL’s fare revenue at around £3bn (that’s our North American billions not the UK’s) so the rate of evasion is about 2% – even with all those gates, and 500 inspectors and a comprehensive enforcement strategy. (A pound is worth about $1.56 Canadian at the time of writing) // The point of this post is simply to re-iterate that the “investment” now being made on our system will not eliminate fare evasion. If we do as well as London – and that would mean we would need penalty fares, the revenue of which comes back to the system, not the coffers of the government, and continued on train and bus fare inspections – we might halve the current evasion rate. I suspect that this actually requires a considerable increase in enforcement resources, which makes the return on capital even worse than anticipated.
http://stephenrees.wordpress.com/?s=fare+gates
10 jolson // May 8, 2012 at 11:34 am
Fare evaders or employment program?
There is no win here as the money spent on enforcement will far exceed the losses to evaders. We knew this when the Expo line was built which is why there are no turnstiles. Someone has caved into the turnstile salesman! This is a sales pitch that should be resisted. What is the true price for the ride? Kindness lost among a sea of uniformed enforcers? If you have the ability to help someone get somewhere then it is a petty change opportunity not a criminal matter. Get a grip folks.
11 jesse // May 8, 2012 at 12:37 pm
From my ridings on transit it’s not clear to me the recovery rate on issued fines will be high. That is, those who evade fares are most likely those who haven’t much money anyway.
While fare evasion may seem egregious from a fairness perspective I don’t see increased enforcement as the best use of a scarce pool of capital.
12 Max // May 8, 2012 at 1:13 pm
During the bad weather I ride tranist every day to work.
I can’t tell you how many time in a week where some teen – 20 something asks a bus driver for a free ride because they have no money – yet have managed to scoop their Strarbuck’s verde, whatever.
Translink has lost $48 M over the last 7 – 9 years. Which is slightly more than what they are currently short. Now they are saying unless they get these dollars from taxes or however, services are going to be cut and plans for expansion shelved.
People are saying why bother with collecting outstanding ticket fees, well here is one reason, because each and every one of us that do pay, end up having to suck up the lost dollars due to those that don’t.
I’m tired of picking up the tab for all those that have an ‘excuse’ as to why they should live for ride for free.
13 Bill Lee // May 8, 2012 at 1:16 pm
Maybe it’s healthier to stand on a bus for a half-hour than drive the distance?
Long commutes take toll on heart health
CBC News Posted: May 8, 2012 12:13 PM ET
People who spend more time behind the wheel to get to work tend to have larger waistlines and higher blood pressure that strains their hearts, a U.S. study finds.
Since that time is generally spent sitting, researchers wanted to see how commuting distance related to health.
“This study yielded new information about biological outcomes and commuting distance, an understudied and habitual source of sedentary behaviour that is prevalent among employed adults and important for individuals with the additional exposure of occupational sitting,” lead investigator Christine Hoehner of Washington University in St. Louis, Mo., and her team concluded in the June issue of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.
“The fındings suggest that commuting distance is adversely associated with moderate-to-vigorous physical activity, cardiovascular fitness, adiposity, and blood pressure but not blood lipids or fasting glucose.”
….A commute of over 16 kilometres was linked with higher blood pressure levels.
People who drove longer distances to work reported less frequent participation in moderate to vigorous physical activity and decreased cardiovascular fitness, and had greater body mass index, waist circumference, and blood pressure.
The link remained when physical activity and cardiovascular fitness were taken into account in the analysis.
An earlier study by Prof. Lawrence Frank, a University of British Columbia researcher, found that for each additional hour in a car, there was a six per cent increase in likelihood of obesity.
….Canadians have shorter commutes
According to another study, Canadians seem to be better off when it comes to their commutes to work.
Canadian commuters took an average of 26 minutes to travel to work on a typical day in 2010, including all modes of transportation, Statistics Canada said.
About 82 per cent of Canadian of commuters travelled to work by car, 12 per cent took public transit and 6 six per cent walked or bicycled.
“The happiest cities in the world happen to have the highest rates of cycling, so it’s not just for the environment, not just for your physical health, but for you mental health, too,” said Janet Barlow, active transportation co-ordinator with the Ecology Action Centre in Halifax…..
More at: http://www.cbc.ca/news/health/story/2012/05/08/commute-heart-health.html
14 West End Gal // May 8, 2012 at 1:37 pm
Andrew Browne
“So tired of the fare evasion shtick. ”
Good. Speaking of Vancouver, you rather take it with the Mayor… oh wait a moment…
Better take it with the Opposition Leader… oh wait a moment…
15 MB // May 8, 2012 at 1:41 pm
@ Max 12, I’d hate to see local government fork over $100+ million for fare gates at SkyTrain stations as well as $10′s of millions to beef up security on buses.
Seeing that the federal government pays less than 4% of the costs of municipal infrastructure (cities arguably generate as much or more economic activity than our natural resources do), then perhaps they should pony up more for transit.
16 mezzanine // May 8, 2012 at 1:54 pm
Preventing fare evation and increasing enforcement should help those who are more car-dependent to accept things like road-pricing and increased parking taxes.
Like this person.
I also find the smugness of non-car users dismaying. I happen to find myself driving more than I’d like because I currently have a life that isn’t very amenable to transit….That situation applies to many working families in this region who have to find housing they can afford in places not always transit-friendly and get their kids around to activities that are scattered here and there.
Powerful reasons all around.
Since you seem to think it’s no problem, perhaps you won’t object, then, when the same abrupt, no-notice change happens with TransLink fines?
Since you asked, I would have no problem with that. Heck, make it retroactive…
17 Max // May 8, 2012 at 2:03 pm
@MB #15:
Well, hate to break it to you, but thankfully turn stiles are on their way.
And just as a side not – close to that $100 M mark you don’t want to shell out has been lost due to fare evasion since the sky train (who the NDP of that time fought tooth and nail against ) was installed.
Everybody wants/claims Vancouver is a world class city – well guess we can join the ranks of other world class cities were people actually pay for public transportation privledges. All people. Not just some of the people.
18 boohoo // May 8, 2012 at 2:10 pm
“Everybody wants/claims Vancouver is a world class city – well guess we can join the ranks of other world class cities were people actually pay for public transportation privledges. All people. Not just some of the people.”
Public transportation as a privilege. LOL. I don’t even know where to go with this. All people have been paying for the privileged to drive around for 75 years too, you mean that kind of privilege? The privilege of bottomless pockets when it comes to highway widening/bridge building/brand new highway construction etc?
19 MB // May 8, 2012 at 2:47 pm
@ Max
… thankfully turnstiles are on their way. … And just as a side not – close to that $100 M mark you don’t want to shell out has been lost due to fare evasion since the sky train (who the NDP of that time fought tooth and nail against ) was installed.
Well, thank the lord for a 26-year payback period. Without interest, of course.
20 Max // May 8, 2012 at 3:18 pm
@MB #19
Did your parents / teachers never tell you that there is no such thing as a free ride?
21 Mira // May 8, 2012 at 3:24 pm
Max #20
I beg to differ. Can you put the dot on DiX?
22 David // May 8, 2012 at 3:38 pm
“Everybody wants/claims Vancouver is a world class city – well guess we can join the ranks of other world class cities were people actually pay for public transportation privledges. All people. Not just some of the people.”
You might want to scroll up in the comments to where it says fare evasion in London (fare gates, on-the-spot penalty fares and 500 enforcement officers) is still 2%. Sure 98% is better than 96%, but don’t kid yourself thinking that fare evasion is going to disappear from SkyTrain.
Anecdotally I’d say compliance on most buses is excellent, better than the numbers on SkyTrain.
The glaring exception is of course the free-line (#99). Pretty much everyone not pushing a stroller boards using the back doors. While I’m sure a fair number hold a valid ticket or pass, I wouldn’t be surprised if more than 10% don’t. Enforcement is pretty much impossible on that line and everyone knows it.
On that point we need to remember that the purpose of public transit is to provide benefits to society. Tax already subsidizes roughly half the cost. If it had to subsidize a little more would it really be a big deal? We used to have a free bus operating downtown. Arguments in favour of it included encouraging people to come downtown and reducing the need to build more parking.
I personally believe that users should pay a share of costs, but there are valid arguments for doing away with fare collection and making all public transit free.
Re the subsidy given to drivers, just look at what has happened to the railroads.
When there was sufficient demand to move people or goods from one place to another private enterprise built and maintained a railroad connecting those points. Today railroads are shutting lines and moving capacity from rail to long haul trucks. Why? It costs money to maintain a railroad, but they can use the roads for free.
This arrangement is strongly supported by those who otherwise argue that the free market should reign. Why compete on a level playing field when taxpayers will subsidize you?
23 boohoo // May 8, 2012 at 4:07 pm
Hey good news everybody! Christy is letting us choose our new holiday! What a peach!
http://blog.gov.bc.ca/bcfamilyday/
(Cue the crying about how much this website cost? Nahhhh, I doubt it!)
24 MB // May 8, 2012 at 4:34 pm
Max 20, just want to see good value for public projects, like transit.
25 MB // May 8, 2012 at 4:39 pm
@ David 22
It costs money to maintain a railroad, but they can use the roads for free.
Excellent point.
If transit fare evaders are scofflaws, what does that make drivers on roads? Why aren’t all roads beset with “fares”, just as transit is beset with “tolls”?
26 Silly Season // May 8, 2012 at 5:02 pm
Howdy, transit geeks.
Wherein, your agent supplies you with this handy (and somewhat measurable) “farebox recovery ration” from transit systems all around the world. See below.
FRR is defined as “Ratio of fares to operating costs for public transport systems”
Not all info is there, of course, including numbers on fare evasion in each jurisdiction. Would also have been handy to be able to look at total ridership or trips, size of area coverage, etc. for all jurisdictions listed.
But do take a look at those places that have the highest fare recovery rate and think about size of populations, size of transportation catchment area, type of recovery system used, type of pricing used, possible differneces cultural mores, and proportionate size of governmental subsidies that offsets the farebox.
Is the government subsidy (taxes) provided to offset the lack of fares in each jurisdictio (you’ll note that several Asian cities actually are over 100% on farebox recovery in order to run their metro transit. I understand that farebox recovery is over 100% for SkyTrain (!) operations, but that bus subsidies are what really require governement funding)?
Is it part of a jurisdictions general policy to provide tax funding—or a necessity to offset the lack of farebox capture?
Anyone care to posit on any possible correlations?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Farebox_recovery_ratio
27 Morry // May 8, 2012 at 10:50 pm
What have they lost in revenues? 40Million?
By those numbers if they would had turnstiles in place on day one; they would be 20-30 million ahead of the game.
BOZOS
28 Diverdarren // May 9, 2012 at 7:05 am
Part 1, Division 1 Authority continued, 2 (3) The authority [Translink] is not an agent of the government.
But it looks like the government is an agent for Translink.
The next time the Minister says “we can’t do anything regarding Translink; they are not an entity of the government.” I hope we all see through their BS.
The Province wont use ICBC so Vancouver can collect on parking tickets (so Van changes their prosecution from the courts to an adjudication system), but they collect on behalf of a ‘private company’.
ICBC, Translink and the Province are all one big machine designed to take uncountable money from the people; plus they offer politicians a scapegoat. “upset with ICBC/ Translink, that’s not the province they’re private.”
Ya, right.
29 Roger Kemble // May 9, 2012 at 7:41 am
Lewis @ #5
“ Robert McNutt explained to the group that when you design with terracota tile, the architect draws a very accurate plan, that in this case got sent to the tile manufacturer in New York. They design each tile individually, number it, box it, and send it back.</B? Seattle architects did that wonderful building in 1911.”
Ummmm, not excited yet!
What possible use is that nugget of distraction to Mount Pleasant, a run down neighbourhood, in a city besieged by off-shore currency hedgers with no let up in sight?
“ I was at Granview(sic)-Woodlands Advisory Council (GWAC) last night talkin’ good urbanism.”
Don’t tell me they were lapping up your “Density fallacy yunno lay thu tower on its side . . . ? It doesn’t work and you have no business misleading hopeful audiences. Try laying the Rize towers on their side and stuffing 241 suites with amenities on 1.25 acres? And no, your 120 acre distraction doesn’t work either.
Who the hell cares about “street aspect ratio” when 90% of sales go to Mainland China shoving real estate prices thru the roof while we are lied to about it? But, hey, you’re impervious. Nothing gets thru!
Watch out Mount Pleasant here comes your own Joel Osteen or, worse, Terry Jones . . .
As for “talkin’ good urbanism. NOT! You are a noisy rabble-rouser . . . unqualified, untalented and inexperienced QED.
30 brilliant // May 9, 2012 at 8:54 am
@Mike 2-Boo-Freakin’-Hoo. Maybe you condone those poor downtrodden masses stealing food from Safeway too? If they can’t afford it they can move.
31 IanS // May 9, 2012 at 9:01 am
IMO, while turnstiles might have made sense if put in from the beginning, the cost / benefit of putting them in now doesn’t really make a compelling case for their installation. In saying that, I’m relying in large part of calculations done by Mr. Rees (referred to in MB #9 above).
Having said that, taking steps to enforce fines makes sense, IMO. Raise the fines and put into place some relatively simple enforcement mechanism, such as the necessity of paying fines when renewing a drivers license (and, yes, I realize that not everyone has a drivers license) would be a good idea.
Apart from cutting down on fair evasion and, hopefully, taking in money to help fund transit, setting up a system like that will send a message to transit users generally that Translink is doing what it can to make sure that everyone is paying their way. (That responds to concerns expressed by some that it’s not fair that the people who do follow the rules pay for those who do not.)
As for some specific comments in this thread:
@David #22:
“I personally believe that users should pay a share of costs, but there are valid arguments for doing away with fare collection and making all public transit free.”
I agree, though I think we should be honest about the alternative proposal. Doing away with fare collection will not make transit “free”; it will merely shift the costs away from transit users to taxpayers generally.
I think that is a debate which is definitely worth having, although I would hope to see a realistic assessment of the effect of such a proposal. How much would taxes be raised? How much would that lower the amounts spent on other services? Do we cut back on health care or education to fund transit? There are definitely some difficult issues there.
@MB #25:
“If transit fare evaders are scofflaws, what does that make drivers on roads?”
The answer to that, of course, must be “drivers on roads”. Unless fares or tolls are actually imposed, I don’t see how “drivers on roads” are “scofflaws”.
32 MB // May 9, 2012 at 9:50 am
Ian S 31
IMO, while turnstiles might have made sense if put in from the beginning, the cost / benefit of putting them in now doesn’t really make a compelling case for their installation. In saying that, I’m relying in large part of calculations done by Mr. Rees
It’s not easy and ususally a lot more expensive to retrofit such things after the fact. I agree, it;s better to design for the future today.
Unless fares or tolls are actually imposed, I don’t see how “drivers on roads” are “scofflaws”.
That’s my point.
33 Julia // May 9, 2012 at 10:08 am
when I don’t pay the Translink tax that is part of my property tax bill – they eventually seize my house. When I don’t pay the transit tax on my hydro bill… they eventually cut off my power.
Transit needs money – and EVERYONE needs to pay their share. That includes those that use it.
34 jolson // May 9, 2012 at 10:21 am
-soup of the day-
Fare evaders???? This whole story is about the politics of meanness. It’s an appeal to the far right, the law and order folks, the people that are bringing us the F-35 Fighter and now the $2.50 Evader. Do you realize the hidden costs? The new turnstiles, the new uniforms, the new tasers, the small army of architects, traffic engineers, accountants, lawyers, judges, legislators, consultants of all stripes, paper shufflers, writ servers, and pension administrators? All this and more because a guy on a platform or at a bus stop has an attitude or is short a quarter? Wouldn’t it be easier and better all around to help the guy out of your own pocket? Step up and quit with the stone throwing, we live in Canada!
35 mezzanine // May 9, 2012 at 10:36 am
@David 22, IanS 32,
IMO free fares in larger cities is a non-starter.
Jarrett Walker had a great post on this, when guangzhou had free fares on its transit for the asian games- all services became ++jammed and travel on transit was made even more difficult.
http://www.humantransit.org/2010/11/guangzhou-abandons-free-fare-experiment.html
Fares are the source of so much controversy and hassle that it’s always tempting to try to make them free. A quick scan of “success stories” in this regard shows the pattern: You can do it in rural areas and small cities where demand is low. You can do it in university-dominated towns, where students are most of the market and are riding anyway. And you can do it in a downtown area, specifically to make short trips within downtown easy.
Could a big city transition gradually to totally free fares? Sure, but only in the sense that an American city could build 100 mi of subways in the next decade: i.e. if money were no object. If you assume that eliminating fares would double ridership — including on the peak — then you’d have to double your fleet, double your workforce, and duplicate any track or roadway that’s already congested with full trains or buses…. Would you save a small bundle on fare equipment and staffing? Sure. Would that be enough to pay for all that new capacity? Not even close.
36 brilliant // May 9, 2012 at 11:08 am
@jolson 34-Oh for a rolleyes emoticon. The tired “fight the man” rhetoric belongs in the Sixties. And I see no reason to pity or subsidize downtrodden fare evaders like Gregor Robertson and Adrian Dix.
37 Silly Season // May 9, 2012 at 11:52 am
@Jolson. #34
Groan. You forgot “sense of entitlement”.
Believe it or not, there are people (many in suits) who feel it’s perfectly acceptable to grab that “free ride’.
38 Andrew Browne // May 9, 2012 at 12:34 pm
@ David #22
Re: 99 B-line
This is (one of?) the only bus routes in the region that operates with dual/triple door boarding and formally without fare checking because:
1. The buses run on headways typically as short as 2 minutes, and due to traffic “waves”, often 30-90 seconds especially at terminals such as Commercial Drive. With the volumes boarding you would easily spend 5-10 minutes per major stop simply dealing with fares.
2. The time consumed with ticket checking would be enormous and it would not be possible to move that many people, cascading to a general transportation failure on the corridor.
3. This route is interesting in that I would say it occupies a slightly different purpose than a typical transit route. The fast and efficient movement of people on this route is critical to the day-to-day functioning of Broadway more than any other bus route in the region. The priority here is to move as many people as possible just to keep the road barely with its head above water. Checking tickets would bring all of this to a grinding halt, including Broadway for all road users.
On another front: Car equivalent of far evasion == buying US gas. Had a friend’s Dad (in South Surrey, no less) proudly mention that he buys every drop of gas in Washington. He then went on to complain about his commute, the Massey, the Alex Fraser, various highway congestion, etc.
My response:
*twitch*
Perhaps another reason why tolling the Port Mann is actually fair, as it increasingly sounds like a huge number of people south of the Fraser routinely skip on gas taxes and therefore a bridge toll would merely bring them to even. (Nevermind the fact that the toll has bought them a new bridge with twice as many lanes… I can’t stand the talk about tolling other bridges, such as the Second Narrows, that have been around for 55 years and are not being improved or expanded. Tolls arise with improvements, which is fair.)
39 Sean Nelson // May 9, 2012 at 12:52 pm
@mezzanine #35
“If you assume that eliminating fares would double ridership — including on the peak — then you’d have to double your fleet, double your workforce, and duplicate any track or roadway that’s already congested with full trains or buses…. Would you save a small bundle on fare equipment and staffing? Sure. Would that be enough to pay for all that new capacity? Not even close.”
BUT – what if the shift from cars to transit meant that you could defer or eliminate investment in roads? Is it possible that the savings on roads would substantially pay for the improvements needed to the transit system? What if, for example, instead of spending several billion on Port Mann and Highway 1 improvements, that money went to beefing up the transit system and drastically lowering fares? Would it reduce commuter traffic enough to eliminate the need for the highway upgrades? If so, wouldn’t that be a good thing?
40 mezzanine // May 9, 2012 at 1:13 pm
I would still see goods movement being an issue if we didn’t do the gateway improvements. eg. the golden ears bridge allows traffic from HWy1 to the intermodal yard at pitt meadows, and just ongoing container traffic growth at lynterm/vanterm.
But why not start road-pricing? If making transit free causes overcrowding and travel delays, and starves the service from funding, why not view car traffic in the same way?
41 Bill Lee // May 9, 2012 at 1:41 pm
Bill 51, the TransLink reform legislation tabled Monday, indicates that any mayors’ rep who resigns from the [new] Translink board can never serve on it again.
Have you read Bill 51? [ about 6000 words, 20 pages if printed ]
http://www.leg.bc.ca/39th4th/1st_read/gov51-1.htm
Also:
” The province’s plan to put two Metro Vancouver mayors on the appointed TransLink board – which makes all decisions behind closed doors – will create a tricky new dynamic that civic leaders say will be uncomfortable at best.
The tweak to the governance structure unveiled by Transportation Minister Blair Lekstrom installs the chair and vice-chair of the regional mayors’ council as directors on the TransLink board, joining nine other appointed directors.
Burnaby Mayor Derek Corrigan called it an attempt to co-opt the chair and vice-chair of the mayors’ council – District of North Vancouver Mayor Richard Walton and Langley City Mayor Peter Fassbender.
“It puts them in a very awkward position,” Corrigan said. “We would have two of our people there making decisions on our behalf but they won’t be able to come back and tell us what they decided in-camera.”
He said the province is trying to muzzle mayors by giving them an ineffectual minority on the board, adding he will urge his counterparts to reject the offered seats and hold out for more robust, democratic reform of TransLink’s structure.”
More on the Translink funding and governance struggles from Jeff Nagel at surreyleader.com/news/150697785.html
42 Guest // May 9, 2012 at 2:34 pm
On the flip side, I’m glad we’re not run like Toronto, where TTC is run by councillors and they can’t even decide which lines to build.
Do you know that you can’t even buy a fare at a TTC fare machine using a credit card or debit?
43 Dan Cooper // May 9, 2012 at 3:12 pm
Allow non-cops to enforce fares and issue fines like they do everywhere else in the world than VanCowFord? Right on! Collect fines that are issued? Great! Waste a huge amount of money on installing fare gates to stop the actually relatively small percentage of fare evaders? Ridiculous! Refuse to sell passes (in other words to take money from) to people because they did not pay for a ticket in the past? Has to be one of the most insane things I’ve heard! Talk about cutting off your nose to spite your face.
44 Max // May 10, 2012 at 10:30 am
@Mira #21
Last night on the news, it comes out that Dix as well as other politicians, gets money deposited to his bank account, quarterly, that is suppose to be used for a transit pass. And yet he was still caught riding free.
Aren’t we lucky to have such upstanding citizens representing us….. money in the bank and free rides all courtesy of the tax payer.
45 keith♠ // May 10, 2012 at 2:26 pm
The fare gates are not just for stopping fare evasion, but for the convenience of smart cards.
I avoid the transit mainly due to the lack of change for fares, and bus passes are too expensive for the number of times I would use the system. The smart card is perfect for the time I would use transit.
46 Tessa // May 10, 2012 at 3:27 pm
Here’s something I don’t get: Why would Translink refuse to sell monthly fares to anyone? What’s the benefit? So that person is told they can’t legally purchase their fare, you think they will stop evading fares? They’re going to just jump the turnstile or ride the free line, and now Translink again doesn’t have the money. That’s the stupidest idea I’ve ever heard.
Seriously, fare evasion is not some big boogeyman stealing our money (and this is coming from someone who pays her fare). The cost of the faregates construction and maintenance cannot be recouped through the change: fare evasion will continue, and many who do evade fares now will choose other ways to get somewhere. So, in the end, us fare-paying customers are going to get a worse deal.
The only people who win in this scheme are those who sell or maintain or work in faregates. Transit riders are poorer with the faregates, Translink itself is poorer with the faregates, and the provincial government and taxpayers are poorer with the faregates. What a waste.
47 Andrew Browne // May 10, 2012 at 6:23 pm
I’m not looking forward to all the station lineups.
I know that things will still function, but they’re annoying. Having to queue 5-20 people deep to get to a turnstile in NYC or London at rush is not really fun. I love being able to just walk onto Skytrain (WITH my monthly pass, I might add).
48 Michelle // May 10, 2012 at 8:01 pm
So, does this means they are going after Dix?
49 mezzanine // May 11, 2012 at 8:52 am
@Tessa 46
“Here’s something I don’t get: Why would Translink refuse to sell monthly fares to anyone? What’s the benefit? So that person is told they can’t legally purchase their fare, you think they will stop evading fares? ”
I would think that penalty is to deter one form of fare evasion: “aggressive” use of a concession/1 zone/ expired by regular users of transit who should know better.
Ken Hardie is quite diplomatic about this:
Hardie said many of them may have made errors that auditors also record as fare evasion – such as mistakenly buying a one-zone ticket but riding for two or three.
“In 2010 we were dealing with so many new people on the system,” he said. “A lot of people may have been detected as misusing when they just didn’t know.”
….
Hardie said fare evasion covers not just riders who outright refuse to pay but those who “stretch” a ticket to more zones than allowed as well as those who may actually have monthly passes but forgot them at home.
Langley Times
50 Dan Cooper // May 12, 2012 at 11:33 pm
keith♠ writes, “I avoid the transit mainly due to the lack of change for fares, and bus passes are too expensive for the number of times I would use the system.”
That’s why, “thank God and Translink” to slightly modify a phrase from one of my favourite country songs, they have those nifty ten-tickets packs of faresaver tickets. No harder to carry around than a smart card, either (and harder for them to use to eventually start using to charging charge for each station traveled instead of by zones, or twice as much for a certain line, or other such unpleasantness). I always keep a few in the back of my business-card case, just *ahem* in case.
51 Dan Cooper // May 12, 2012 at 11:41 pm
Oy, I need to take a grammar and editing class. (:
52 Erin D // May 14, 2012 at 6:08 pm
Some months I’ve paid double for transit. Lost my pass last month on the 3rd and paid for a ticket or
Day pass for every ride. Once last April it was a gorgeous +20 day and I left my jacket at work, forgetting my pass was in it. I got “caught” 1 stop
from home and offered to buy a ticket from
the machine or ride the two stops back
to work and grab my pass. Cop agreed I should buy the ticket (even though I could have walked home, I thought I was paying my fare honorably). When I got back from the ticket machine, he had a nice shiny “ticket” for me and said I would have to fight it in court. I felt tricked. They sent me the court summons on th LAST possible day. Doesn’t matter the thousands I’ve spent on transit since moving here. I’m just another fare evader.
Leave a Comment