Free Public Transport - It works

Free public transport @ Yahoo!7 Video

Wired Magazine - "The logic of free public transit is compelling"

The logic of free public transit is compelling: Despite the high costs and massive subsidies implicit in driving, forking over a relatively small fee to ride a bus or subway is a psychological barrier to getting people out of cars. Even the most efficiently run buses can be crowded and slow, but by running at frequent intervals on dedicated lanes between fixed stops — as the Circulator does — delays can be kept to a minimum. The bus might not stop next to, or even near, every rider’s point of origin or destination, but it ensures a measure of proximity for most riders. Rare indeed is the mass transit system that shoulders its own financial burden, and the free bus systems that last generally have dedicated sources of income aside from direct subsidies. Baltimore’s system is financed by a 16 percent tax on parking, which will raise about $5 million annually.

Read More http://www.wired.com/autopia/2010/01/circulator-brings-free-transit-to-baltimore/#ixzz0dJQBcwlT

Metra fare increases are a step in the wrong direction

...the RTA's MagicCard which gives seniors free travel on the CTA, Metra and Pace all 24/7.
Despite efforts in Springfield to limit or eliminate this program last fall, it survives for all of us over 65. I'm a firm proponent of subsidized transit for everyone, paid for by much higher GAS TAXES. So rather than eliminate the MagicCard, I hope free subsidized transit someday becomes available for all, as a step toward combating Global Warming, the US's massive balance-of-trade deficit, the destruction of our urban neighborhoods, and the country's increasing class segregation and sprawl, all made possible by the car. Next month's fare increases are ridiculous wrong-way legislation. Comment by Clark on ChainLink discussion of Metra Fare increase

Stop the subsidy, the system doesn't work

The autosprawl system just DOES NOT WORK. Let's face it. We have tried everything. Look at the Tri-State, we have filled in thousands of acres of farmland with cement and we still have gridlock and mayhem. Now we are trying traffic enforcement by camera. The money changing hands is just more out the pocket of the public to support the profits of the fossil-fuel and auto companies. Public money for private profit is subsidy. Let's put an end to it.

...For example, in Roselle where two cameras are up at Lake Street and Gary Avenue, nearly $298,900 in fines was collected over nine months. Of that, $117,333 went to the camera company, RedSpeed, according to information culled from Freedom of Information requests by the Daily Herald as part of its Seeing Red investigative series.... DailyHerald

What is a good transit system?

1.A Good Transit System has Frequent and Convenient Transportation for all.

2.A Good Transit System Helps Strengthen the Community.

3.A Good Transit System Helps Encourages People to Leave Vehicles at Home and Help out our Environment.

4.A Good Transit System Helps Individual's become More Physically Fit.

5.A Good Transit System Helps Reduce Traffic Grid Lock.

6A Good Transit System Helps Reduce the COST and NEED for PARATRANSIT.

7.A Good Transit System Helps Reduce Road Construction.

8.A Good Transit System has Free Public Transit.

9.A Good Transit System works on Barrier Free, Benches and Shelters.

10.A Good Transit System Treats their Employees with Respect.

from Catmeow Transit - Salt Lake City

Do you feel crowded?

ATU Leader advocates free public transit

...This is a model that Kelly says he’d like to see instituted full-time, as well. Members of ATU 308 would prefer to see a “no fare” system for CTA, Metra and Pace, where the systems would instead be entirely funded exclusively from dedicated long-term sources of revenue, he said.... chicagocurrent.com

Protesters picket Chicago Transit Authority board meeting

The demonstration was organized by NoCTACuts.org, ctariders.org and Little Village Environmental Justice Organization. Protesters yelled chants demanding that the board members step down and that the layoffs and cutbacks be stopped. Seniors at the protest also stood up to demand that the free rides for seniors program remain in place, a policy that has been targeted by lawmakers for elimination. Party for Socialism and Liberation

Greenland ice melt accelerating

"It does show that the [ice loss] trend has accelerated, and the reported contribution to sea level rise also shows a significant acceleration - so if you multiply these numbers up it puts us well beyond the IPCC estimates for 2100." BBC

The cost of autosprawl: coal externalities

The subsidy of autosprawl is broad and deep. It is much more than direct taxpayer handouts, "cash for clunkers", $30 billion in road stimulus money...etc. The costs of fossil fuels, the auto, and sprawl are very high, but the prices have been kept low. The difference is externalized costs - a subsidy by force. Here are some of the costs of coal that the builders of car-only-accessible, spread-out, individually-heated-and-cooled, taxpayer-bank-bailed-out homes do not have to pay:

Tales of damaged homes, of contaminated water supplies, of divided families and communities. Accounts of severe flooding, of sludge and coal ash spills, of alarming asthma and cancer rates.
These stories represent the true costs of coal being paid by the citizens of Kentucky—indeed, by all of us gathered here, regardless of region—a price due in large part to mountaintop removal mining. Jason Howard-On the Margins