[QUOTE=alphaboi867]
How does everything thing you buy get to the store? :rolleyes:
[/QUOTE]
Who cares? If those businesses can’t profitably operate without a massive subsidy from Federal, state, and local taxpayers in the form of roads, then they don’t have a right to exist, right?
[QUOTE=Robot Arm]
Mass transit is as legitimate a use of federal transportation funding as highways, but trying to justify it by the number of cars it takes off the road is the wrong way to go about it. You have to design and build something like this to improve the commute of the people who do use it, not the people who don’t. Otherwise, you wind up with an expensive boondoggle that serves nobody’s needs and that nobody uses.
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I’ve always liked the proposition that improvements in mass transit should be accompanied by efforts to make driving less appealing, otherwise the purpose is defeated in pouring money into expanding both mass transit and highway/street systems.*
*Notice I said less appealing, not impossible.
[QUOTE=black rabbit]
Who cares? If those businesses can’t profitably operate without a massive subsidy from Federal, state, and local taxpayers in the form of roads, then they don’t have a right to exist, right?
[/QUOTE]
To me, the response to the line of questioning that got us here is that the businesses that need to the goods delivered to the store (manufacturers, wholesalers, retailer) should pay for the infrastructure that allows that to happen. Then that cost is only passed on to those who actually buy those goods.
Can I opt out of my school taxes since I don’t have (and never will) any children?
Public transportation sucks. It’s noisy, dirty, and inconvenient. No matter how you moralize it, your desire for everyone to use public transportation doesn’t give you or anyone else the right to put punishment taxes on alcohol and rental cars to fund it. If you really want mass transportation to survive, you need to make better than a personal car to enough people to properly fund it, because I can guarantee that down the road there will be yet another tax being laid down on the people to pay for shitty mass transit that is nearly bankrupt again.
Then they ought to pay to fully fund the buses they’re using. I don’t tax their drinks and bus tickets to pay for my car.
Apparently that bus black rabbit rides on doesn’t use roads, either.
[QUOTE=catsix]
Then they ought to pay to fully fund the buses they’re using. I don’t tax their drinks and bus tickets to pay for my car.
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No, but you benefit from the roads that their taxes have paid for. Think of public transportation as benefiting you indirectly. All those folks who ride public transport aren’t driving making traffic even worse. Imagine if there were no public transport and all those folks were driving.
[QUOTE=catsix]
Public transportation sucks. It’s noisy, dirty, and inconvenient.
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That’s because we make it that way. We’re always uneasy about what it will cost to really do it right, so we pull our punches, either by limiting the scope and service of new systems, or by cutting service and maintenance on old ones.
[quote]
If you really want mass transportation to survive, you need to make better than a personal car to enough people to properly fund it
[QUOTE]
I quite agree. Unfortunately, it is never going to be a truly public utility. The country is just too big, spread out, and free-market oriented to think of it that way. Passenger railroads were always private enterprise here, and when private enterprise found them unprofitable, away they went.
[QUOTE=Robot Arm]
Mass transit is as legitimate a use of federal transportation funding as highways, but trying to justify it by the number of cars it takes off the road is the wrong way to go about it. You have to design and build something like this to improve the commute of the people who do use it, not the people who don’t. Otherwise, you wind up with an expensive boondoggle that serves nobody’s needs and that nobody uses.
[/QUOTE]
Hmmm - yes, true enough. You can’t entirely discount the benefits to the non-users, since that is one of the benefits. But you’re right - if it doesn’t benefit enough users, then it’s really pointless and those users are right back on the roads 
No matter how great it is, there will always be people for whom it doesn’t work. Pre-kids, I worked in downtown DC and I always took mass transit, with perhaps a half dozen exceptions in 5+ years. Sure, it too longer on an average day but that was a reliable commute time that rarely varied. It was cheaper than parking downtown, easier on my nerves, and sure saved wear and tear on my car. When I had kids, my needs changed even though I was still working downtown - I needed flexibility and access to transportation that ran on my schedule. That commute, however, would have been intolerable if it weren’t for the fact that the transportation system worked well enough, for enough other people, that the roads were (almost) acceptable most days.
[QUOTE=catsix]
Public transportation sucks. It’s noisy, dirty, and inconvenient. No matter how you moralize it, your desire for everyone to use public transportation doesn’t give you or anyone else the right to put punishment taxes on alcohol and rental cars to fund it. If you really want mass transportation to survive, you need to make better than a personal car to enough people to properly fund it, because I can guarantee that down the road there will be yet another tax being laid down on the people to pay for shitty mass transit that is nearly bankrupt again.
[/quote]
Actually, I think the DC area Metro ranks among the top public transportation systems I’ve seen anywhere in the world. It has financial difficulties, but it is clean, efficient, goes to the right places (except for Dulles), quite reasonably priced, and popular. Hell, one of the major challenges to Metro is that it will soon be unable to keep up with the demand of commuters coming from Northern Virginia to DC.
Let’s keep in mind that the Federal government invested huge sums to build the system that today is a pretty great success story. This area would be an enormous disaster if we had an additional 600,000 plus people on the roads today. Public transportation isn’t a for-profit enterprise meant to enlarge our treasury, it is a public convenience that benefits those who use it AND those who don’t in a hell of a lot of ways (less congestion, less pollution, lowers price of gasoline, helps me get back home safely after getting hammered at the Tune Inn, etc). The thought that additional investment in the system - and others like it around the country - is needed isn’t moralistic, it is practical.
And it also requires about putting a little bit of thought into planning for the future, which for some people I understand can be difficult.
[QUOTE=catsix]
Public transportation sucks. It’s noisy, dirty, and inconvenient.
[/QUOTE]
Can I ask you a serious question? Where have you used public transit? I’ve thoroughly enjoyed my use of public transit in Budapest, Chicago, Vienna, London, England generally, Sendai, New York, Hudson County NJ, Baltimore, DC, and San Diego.* I’ll admit that in LA it is pretty retarded, though.
ETA: Phily
*I swear, that list got longer as I got typing!
[QUOTE=catsix]
Public transportation sucks.
[/QUOTE]
Roads are also “Public transportation”. With few exceptions they are built, maintained, expanded, and rebuilt every so often entirely with tax collected money. Your local taxing body uses some of your property taxes for local road maintenance. Your state uses a decent hunk of your sales tax payments for road building and maintenance. And if you don’t think roads are “Public” transportation check out the last federal transportation spending bill. A freaking monster. Paid for by you and me.
[QUOTE=catsix]
Then they ought to pay to fully fund the buses they’re using. I don’t tax their drinks and bus tickets to pay for my car.
[/QUOTE]
Huh…you and I tax property, sales of nearly every god damn thing, and income to pay for the roads we use, so why do you have such a hard-on for funding buses?
Unless you think all roads should be privately funded as well, your argument is no stronger than the jokers who come here every now and again to assert that, “I ain’t got no kids, so why do I have to pay for the damn schools with my property taxes? Waaaa.”
We all benefit – as a society – from good public transportation including roads, light rail, commuter rail, buses, etc.
[QUOTE=Neidhart]
This area needs rapid transit to Dulles. Has needed it since 1963. Forty fucking years of plans and studies, and construction is finally set to start. And you kill it.
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The Fed’s didn’t kill it, your State and Local governments killed it by relying upon Federal funding. I agree with Uncommon Sense- if you need it so bad, fund it yourself.
**
InLucemEdita**- wrong- or at least wrong in CA, where various Registration and gas taxes, etc. pay more in than roads/highways take out.
[QUOTE=catsix]
Public transportation sucks. It’s noisy, dirty, and inconvenient.
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Well, the buses around here are, anyway. In the suburbs they mostly run once an hour during offpeak times and every 30 minutes in rush hour, which isn’t nearly enough. And nobody really cares about improving them, because the tacit assumption is that buses are only for day laborers, maids, welfare recipients and the like – and they certainly don’t deserve better than a few scraps contemptuously tossed their way. After all, if they were real Americans they’d get better jobs and earn enough to drive their own cars, right? :smack: :mad:
[QUOTE=DrDeth]
The Fed’s didn’t kill it, your State and Local governments killed it by relying upon Federal funding. I agree with Uncommon Sense- if you need it so bad, fund it yourself.
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For the record, Federal funding for this project was supposed to be about one billion out of five, or 20%.
The Federal government ten years ago committed $750 million to extend BART to SFO. The total project cost was estimated to be $1.5 billion. Now you may have opposed that project, too, but you’ve got to admit that the Metro project is leveraging Federal dollars in a much better way.
My taxes also pay for those roads, which is fine by me because everybody’s using it and everybody’s paying. They are not paying for my car, and so why the fuck should I be forced to pay for their buses?
I don’t care if they ride tricycles, as long as they pay for the tricycles themselves. Shouldn’t you be telling them to pay a tax that goes to fund my car since they’re benefitting by me not being on their bus crowding it up?
And every time I go to DC, I drive, because nothing beats my car. If you like the bus or the train, that’s fine. Use it. Just don’t stick your hand in my pocket to pay for the bus and the train.
In a lot of places, unfortunately. I avoid it like the plague now.
Forcing me to fund a bus company is rather the same as if the government forced you to fund my car. Comparing taxes that are laid down to pay for buses to taxes that pay for roads is dishonest.
Again, taxes don’t pay for my car why should they pay for your bus?
I fund my ability to move about in my car 100% without charging people an extra 50 cents on a 5.00$ beer. I pay for the car, the upkeep, the gas, and the insurance. So the least that you who ride buses should be doing is paying for them, 100%, without sticking your hand in other people’s pockets.
If you want it to be better, pay for it. I’m sure if you were willing to make worth the bus company’s efforts with your cash in hand, they’d have champagne and hookers on every bus.
catsix, assuming that a mass transit system cannot survive without federal funds, do you honestly think that we’d be better off to eliminate them? Do you not mind that teenagers and 90-year olds would have no choice but to drive, endangering you as well as themselves? Or people trying to get home from bars? Do you like that roughly half the land in your suburb is covered with asphalt, and dedicated to automobiles (roads, parking spaces and driveways)?
[QUOTE=catsix]
My taxes also pay for those roads, which is fine by me because everybody’s using it and everybody’s paying. They are not paying for my car, and so why the fuck should I be forced to pay for their buses?
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You, a regular car user, are getting a disproportionate amount of benefit from the highway system. It seems only fair that you return the favor by contributing to public transport that you do not use on a regular basis.
Your own car, on the other hand, serves you and nobody else. Surely you can’t expect people to subsidize that.
I to am curious which specific places you’ve used them. IMHO there isn’t a single public transit system in the USA that serves as an example of a good public transit system. Boston and DC aren’t horrible, but by first world standards they are still incredibly noisy, dirty and uncomfortable.
Because it’s not my bus. It’s a public transit system.
[QUOTE=catsix]
My taxes also pay for those roads, which is fine by me because everybody’s using it and everybody’s paying. They are not paying for my car, and so why the fuck should I be forced to pay for their buses?
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catsix I’m usually so attracted to you, I can’t believe you are really this stupid.
No one forced you to buy a car, you CHOSE to buy a car. If you didn’t want to assume that expense you didn’t have to. And all of us (those of us who use the roads directly and those who only benefit indirectly) pay to build and maintain the roads on which you get to use your precious little purchase. Your car ain’t worth shit without all of us paying for all of those other elements of the “car” transportation system.
We ALL pay for all forms of transportation and their direct and indirect costs.
Just because you choose to buy a car in order to use the roads doesn’t exempt you from paying your fair share of our society’s transportation costs.
You should pay for their buses (trains, whatever) because you derive benefit from those buses whether you use them directly or not. Just like they pay for your roads (which make your choice to use a car possible) because they derive benefit from them whether they use them directly or not.
[QUOTE=catsix]
I don’t care if they ride tricycles, as long as they pay for the tricycles themselves. Shouldn’t you be telling them to pay a tax that goes to fund my car since they’re benefitting by me not being on their bus crowding it up?
[/QUOTE]
Actually, current thinking is that the costs imposed on others by car users (you and I and others) that remain unpaid by the users themselves (externalities) are a far greater subsidy than the money that goes to mass transit. That is, you are NOT paying the actual costs of using your car. The pollution you create, the congestion you contribute to, the noise, the garbage your discarded car and parts create, are all paid for collectively by society…not by you. Not to mention the roads, bridges, police patrols, emergency response…it is fucking endless the expense you impose on others. If only you paid for the true costs of your car your whine, “as long as they pay for it themselves” might not fall on deaf ears.
[QUOTE=catsix]
And every time I go to DC, I drive, because nothing beats my car. If you like the bus or the train, that’s fine. Use it. Just don’t stick your hand in my pocket to pay for the bus and the train.
[/QUOTE]
YOU are forcing other people to pay for the true costs of your car. Put your own hand in your back pocket and try to pull your head out of your ass.
[QUOTE=catsix]
Forcing me to fund a bus company is rather the same as if the government forced you to fund my car. Comparing taxes that are laid down to pay for buses to taxes that pay for roads is dishonest. Again, taxes don’t pay for my car why should they pay for your bus?
[/QUOTE]
Talk about dishonest. Comparing your car to a bus is entirely dishonest. Your car is a vehicle that benefits ONLY you while imposing costs on everyone around you. You proceed to use it without even thinking of all the payments that are made by everyone so that you can benefit from the use of your chosen and most convenient form of transportation. Then you suggest that we should all help PAY for YOUR car just like we help pay for mass transit vehicles? Jesus christ Princess why don’t we all just form a line outside your house so we can carry you around on our backs at your beck and call?
[QUOTE=catsix]
I fund my ability to move about in my car 100% without charging people an extra 50 cents on a 5.00$ beer. I pay for the car, the upkeep, the gas, and the insurance. So the least that you who ride buses should be doing is paying for them, 100%, without sticking your hand in other people’s pockets.
[/QUOTE]
And the rest of us pay for all the other costs that allow you to use your car. No one expects you to thank us…but at least don’t bitch when asked to cough up your fair share for the OTHER public transportation costs of society.
Do you understand the concept of SOCIETY?
[QUOTE=DrDeth]
InLucemEdita- wrong- or at least wrong in CA, where various Registration and gas taxes, etc. pay more in than roads/highways take out.
[/QUOTE]
Could you be more specific about what I wrote that was wrong?
You aren’t suggesting that California roads shouldn’t be considered public transportation (the point I made) because they don’t receive public funding…are you? Do you really think no federal, state, or local tax dollars go for road transportation in California?
They’d find away, much like the millions of people who live in areas that have no buses and trains find a way.
I’m contributing more than they are already by purchasing gas and paying to register my car and have it inspected every year.
Nowhere I was ever pleased with them, and that includes Toronto.
It’s a bus. And the people who want to have a bus, should pay for that bus.
I pay for those roads in more ways that one, and in ways that the bus-riding person doesn’t. And they do use them, directly, unless the bus is able to fly.
When was the last time someone else paid for my gasoline tax and my car’s annual registration and the two inspections it has to have every year? Never. That’s when.
See how irritating it is when people insist you pay for their stuff and fork over for their lifestyle too?
[QUOTE=catsix]
I’m contributing more than they are already by purchasing gas and paying to register my car and have it inspected every year.
[/QUOTE]
Wow. You’re a regular philanthropist.
[QUOTE=catsix]
When was the last time someone else paid for my gasoline tax and my car’s annual registration and the two inspections it has to have every year? Never. That’s when.
[/QUOTE]
When was the last time random taxpayers got to use your car? Oh, yeah…never. That’s when.
[QUOTE=catsix]
See how irritating it is when people insist you pay for their stuff and fork over for their lifestyle too?
[/QUOTE]
Non-sequitor. But I still think you’re cute.
Hey, what’s the name of that gameshow where two severely retarded people sprint toward each other at full speed and smash their foreheads together? Some foreign channel, I think, really late at night?
[QUOTE=catsix]
They’d find away, much like the millions of people who live in areas that have no buses and trains find a way.
[/quote]
This attitude is just so incomprehensible to me. You honestly think that the government (local or federal) shouldn’t try to make sure that everyone has a means of transport? Do you not think that a public transit makes the city/town a better place to live?
Public transit improve the city/town in so many ways. It allows a concentrated and convenient downtown area, because you don’t have to have 4-lane roads and wide-open parking lots right in the middle of downtown. It allows mobility to members of your society who cannot or do not wish to drive (children, students, the elderly, low-income families, etc) allowing them to function as independent and valuable members of society rather than people who are dependent on welfare or kindness of others. It improves air quality. It save lives (you do know how common traffic deaths are among teenagers, right?) But you think none of these are goals worth spending taxpayer’s money on?
Maybe a petty person like you don’t want to pay for the bus, but I think a lot of of taxpayers do. I’ve never used the bus in my city but I’d still vote for any politician who promises to increase funding for public transit, even if that means raising taxes.
When’s the last time you went anywhere on your car without using a taxpayer-funded road? When’s the last time a bus used the residential street that leads to your house? How many fewer lanes would your commute route need if everyone took the bus?