There has been some outrage in cities around Cleveland that are losing their circulator buses. The circulators make more frequent stops in a smaller area.
The Plain Dealer reported this morning that the circulator for Lakewood cost $470,274 a year to operate and average 20 riders per hour. I did a little math and if the buses run for 12 hours a day 365 days a year it works out to about $100 dollars an hour. Now the only way I can see for these buses to keep running would be to charge $5 bucks a head.
However public transportation doesn't work this way. Every time an issue over fares comes up no one wants to pay what it cost even to break even. Government subsidizes a mode of transportation that so few people want to use that it isn't viable.
This is why government has such a hard time working within a budget.
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I wonder if it would be possible for a large city to privatize public transportation. Let's say that the city government licensed such companies, and allowed them to use bus stops -- but only those companies could use bus stops. Then the companies can set up routes that are profitable and directly reflect where the transportation market creates demand.
ReplyDeleteI'm not entirely sure but I think this is the way taxis work to a certain degree.
ReplyDeleteI think where we really get into trouble with buses is that we meaning the government are trying to help the poor so we try to keep the fares low. This sets an artificial floor because they can't operate at profitably at these rates.