The prospect of WRTA going out of business in five to seven years can hardly be called news to anyone who works in public transportation here in this city.
I drove a taxi for a few months in 1970. Back then, the flat rate for a taxicab from Worcester to Boston was $50. Today the flat rate from Worcester to Boston is $100. Meanwhile, actual consumer index inflationary trends would make that fifty 1970 dollars worth $265.58, as of last year. (Check it out yourself with the online inflation calculator)
Nobody's going to pay over two hundred and fifty bucks for a cab ride to Boston. And yet, that's the 2006 equivalent of what was routinely charged for the same trip thirty-seven years ago when a gallon of gas cost under a half a buck, and the annual premium for insurance on a taxicab was a tenth of what it is now. Actual costs have risen by a factor of ten, while actual gross income has risen only by a factor of two.
Meanwhile, in order for the WRTA to be a viable business today, riders would have to fork over a routine fare that would have to be somewhere between eight to twelve dollars, just for a one-way ride on a city bus. About the same cost, oddly enough, as a taxi ride across the city.
So, the question that really needs to be asked in pondering subsidies for public transportation in Worcester is, "Who's gonna pay the difference? The people who USE public transportation, or the ones who have no slightest need for it?"
The basic fact of life in the new millenium is that everything in this country has changed over to a market driven economy, as of a quarter of a century ago. The change is fundamental, and yet here we are over two decades later still subsidizing a business that's not only unviable, it's just bleeding public funds all over the place.
Just let it die a natural death. The fact is that it died years ago, and now it's time to disconnect the life support tubes and pull the plug.
In its place will be other businesses that will easily take advantage of the existing market. Those businesses are already here in the city, in the form of livery vehicles. The only difference between livery and taxicab is the 24 hour rule, ie- you've got to book the livery at least a day in advance. If the WRTA goes out of business, the business of livery service vans will sprout up like mushrooms in the night. A pre-arranged pool van's cost can easily be shared by people needing regular transportation to and from their jobs.
Meanwhile, the taxi business, which can be used for spur of the moment rides and pre-arranged rides, would hardly suffer.
The way it is now, however, All the public transportation elements in the city are on the verge of starving. Why? Because nobody in local government has awoken to the fact that our whole planet has changed to a market driven economy. Just because I don't particularly agree with the ideological forces that caused this change, that doesn't mean I can pretend that my ideological preferences can function in direct opposition to this larger economic milieu without the clash ultimately bubbling up into view, as it does now with the problems facing the WRTA.
The longer we put off the pain of withdrawal, the more painful the inevitable change will be. It's time to pull the plug on the life support tubes feeding the WRTA, and let the public transportation market sort itself out here in Worcester.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
6 comments:
Jeff, you've GOT to read Robert Reich's Supercapitalism on just this thing! As it happens, he (and I) don't agree with letting them die. But the whole idea that if it doesn't pay for itself, we should be rid of it, is what is running the world right now. But think of what that leaves out: schools, parks, and so much else that is valuable, but valuable in other ways not measurable by market forces!
The situation with bus service isn't a matter of a publicly funded municipal service being privatized, it's the other way around. And now that the state isn't going to keep pace by increasing subsidies to cover the growing cost bus service in the city, who's going to end up trying to pick up the slack? City tax dollars?
No freakin' way!
I am flat out amazed at how many people feel that funding for public transportation need not come out of their own pockets if it's something that they themselves do not use.
Wait and see what happens in this city when the buses just stop running. Not when they stop running for a few weeks but when they just flat out stop running. Public transportation, especially in a large urban area, should just be a part of the budget of a city.
If the WRTA is done away with we will all regret it in time.
Well, this is the whole point. If the bus service is going to be run as a municipal service, then the privatization paradigm doesn't make sense. If state and federal funding is clearly decreasing, then continuing to move towards privatization of the bus service makes even less sense. As a commercial enterprise, it's a completely unviable operation. It can't "pay for itself" and it never will.
So, where is this service going to get funded from?
I agree that bus service is an integral part of a healthy municipal scene, especially in this city. It's a part of the overall picture that bus service stays...
But who's going to PAY for it?
What about people who can't afford to pay for livery and cab service to do their every day life activities? Do you propose that they stay in their homes and waste away? Or does the public subsidize them through some other program trading one human service program for another. Whether or not you look at it this way transportation is a federally and state funded human service program - maybe we should stop wasting money on the WIC program and food stamps, hey how about cutting out that nasty medicare/medicaid service too.....Look, we need to find better ways to do things, but that doesn't necessarily mean pulling the plug. What other state in the union do you know that funds so many different departments of transportation? Let's see, Mass Highway, Mass Turnpike Authority, Executive Office of Transportation, and the Regional Transit Authorities - too many chiefs and not enough indians I'd say. Why can't MA set up a DOT and eliminate all of the duplicative waste and inefficiencies of the current system. Let's talk about where the problem really lies.
Where the real problem lies... voter apathy.
Post a Comment