[dunkalunk]

That's crap though! Public transit is already far cheaper than owning and operating a car on a daily basis. The reason people don't choose it, now, is because it isn't at all convenient, or isn't at all going where they need to go. Making driving more expensive does nothing to address that. Nothing at all.

If you give people attractive alternatives, that are also cheaper, than you don't have to lie or manipulate them into switching their habits.

The anti-car lobby is just as shrill and short-sighted as the car-lobby itself was in the 20th Century - and the suggestions they're making are just as destructive.

Weird, I thought I mentioned public transit in that post...

We also need to be seriously working on making transit improvements a reality. I hope this will come from the metrolinx shakeup and in a timely manner.

Oop! There it is!

It would be hazardous to implement road tolls without improving public transit and creating transit-oriented developments. The more people use transit, the less expensive it is to run. Obviously the more people who commute by transit, the more money is left over to run off-peak service, making it convenient. People aren't going to shift from the auto to different modes of transit unless they are forced to by higher monetary costs, or the service becomes more convenient for them.

Transit needs to be part of the solution and not just glossed over, I hope I've made this clear.

 

[dunkalunk]

What about the true cost of public transit? Are we to ignore the true cost of that?

Point taken. Many public transit systems if run privately would not be economically viable. Taking people out of cars and putting them in transit vehicles would make these systems move viable. It's a chicken-egg thing between ridership and investment.

People aren't going to take transit if its not convenient, so they don't. Transit agencies won't increase service unless there is ridership to make it viable, so they won't. Ultimately, somebody has to make the first move.

 

[TOareaFan]

I don't think highways should be tolled unless there is a viable transit alternative, yes, but I don't see that as being as far off as others here. For example, half-hourly service is coming to the Lakeshore GO line this year. Since the QEW/Gardiner services the same corridor, I think there will be the service there and tolling should begin along that route.

With exemptions to all the other daily commuters (Etobicoke, Brampton, North Mississauga, etc.) who also use that road as an integral part of their commute every day but don't have, even, full daily service never mind the 30 minute service which, by your very post, you indicate is your threshold for toll alternatives? How would you administer these exemptions?

 

[TKTKTK]

Weird, I thought I mentioned public transit in that post...

Oop! There it is!

I don't believe I suggested that you'd left Public Transit out of your post? Are you just feeling punchy today? Have some tea, dude.

It would be hazardous to implement road tolls without improving public transit and creating transit-oriented developments. The more people use transit, the less expensive it is to run. Obviously the more people who commute by transit, the more money is left over to run off-peak service, making it convenient. People aren't going to shift from the auto to different modes of transit unless they are forced to by higher monetary costs, or the service becomes more convenient for them.

Transit needs to be part of the solution and not just glossed over, I hope I've made this clear.

People have already shifted from auto use to different modes of transit. As has been pointed out (in this thread? or the other one) the cordon count shows 11% fewer cars coming into the city, which is assumed to be a function of increased public transit use (though probably also accounts for more businesses debasing to the burbs). Was that because of tolls? No. Does that point to us needing tolls to get even more people out of their cars and into transit? No.

You can, absolutely, control people through punitive measures. What I can't quite understand is who would be happy about it? A handfull of smug jerks?

 

[AlvinofDiaspar]

Glen:

What about the true cost of public transit? Are we to ignore the true cost of that?

Sure, if you want to talk about that, be ready to talk about the overall cost of transportation when public transit is absent... Like just how many additional highways have to be built to handle the traffic demands? What of the cost of that infrastructure (not to mention, the additional cost of having to modify existing land use pattersn to enable these links to be built - via expropriation, etc.)

AoD

 

[Whoaccio]

You are conveniently ignoring that fact that in the current scenario we are both the company offering the product and the consumer. We pay the price, indirect as at may be, and enjoy the benefit.

I'm pretty sure I used the term "socialized roads" before, so I clearly am not ignoring that the public is ultimately both the producer (via government) and consumer of roadspace. That doesn't really make any difference whatsoever in that the benefits of free roads (i.e. free roads) only apply to a small section of the population who couldn't justify their travel patterns in a market. The costs, however, apply to those who actually need roads and can justify the economic cost of that need (i.e. truck shipping, people whose job requires them to drive). The end result is that the economy looses billions of dollars per year in wasted time as people who don't need road space use it.

Using your logic, we could just have the public (indirectly) own everything and have it provided for "free" to the public. We would "pay the price... and enjoy the benefit." Of course this logic violates the most basic tenants of economics. Short of a market mechanism to most efficiently ration goods, shortages and economic dislocations inevitably ensue. Bread lines in Venezuela, congestion in Toronto. Same principle.

There are exceptions to this, goods which due to their nature can't be dealt with through markets. Public goods. The most obvious one available is security (i.e. the Army & Police). Inevitably someone will refer to highways as public goods, even though they are not. Given that you can clearly sell access to road space, it is by definition not a public good.

EDIT: Just to be fair, I do think that we should have the long term goal of both ending subsidies to public transit and, eventually, trying to spin it off into private operations. As a long term matter of policy, publicly owned transit operators have been pretty ineffectual at delivering quality and reliable transit.

 

[TKTKTK]

There are exceptions to this, goods which due to their nature can't be dealt with through markets. Public goods. The most obvious one available is security (i.e. the Army & Police). Inevitably someone will refer to highways as public goods, even though they are not. Given that you can clearly sell access to road space, it is by definition not a public good.

You can clearly sell access to anything. A lack of ingenious sales methods isn't what concretely defines something as a public good.

Our highways and roads are a public good. I can't really even think of where to hinge an argument against so obvious a fact. *shrug*


Editin':
I forsee us going back and forth and back and forth on this, so lets just get the definitions and specifics out of the way now:
Roads are a Common-pool resource owned by the Government as public goods.

 

[AlvinofDiaspar]

whoaccio:

As a long term matter of policy, publicly owned transit operators have been pretty ineffectual at delivering quality and reliable transit.

Not to argue the current level of performance at the TTC is desirable - but do recall what was the impetus of the original TTC was and its' effectiveness compared to private operators at the time.

AoD

 

[AlvinofDiaspar]

TKTKTK:

Our highways and roads are a public good.

Yes, and what we have right now is tragedy of the commons.

AoD

 

[Glen]

Glen:



Sure, if you want to talk about that, be ready to talk about the overall cost of transportation when public transit is absent... Like just how many additional highways have to be built to handle the traffic demands? What of the cost of that infrastructure (not to mention, the additional cost of having to modify existing land use pattersn to enable these links to be built - via expropriation, etc.)

AoD

I never suggested that one shouldn't. We can also add sales tax revenue, income taxes from auto and steel and parts workers as well from the production of auto's. The list goes on and on. Which was my point.

 

[AlvinofDiaspar]

Glen:

Then we should also talk about what relationship there is between automobile ownership and driving patterns, and whether transit access (like GO) resulted in individuals not buying cars. Before you know it, it's time for dinner.

AoD

 

[Whoaccio]

You can clearly sell access to anything. A lack of ingenious sales methods isn't what concretely defines something as a public good. Our highways and roads are a public good. I can't really even think of where to hinge an argument against so obvious a fact. *shrug*

You can sell access to anything? How can you sell access to the police? National security? Sidewalks? Local roads? Parks? The air? There is no practical way to sell access to these things. Without suggesting Jetsonian solutions to charge people for the amount of air they breathe, you don't have to be a master logician to see there are clearly goods we all find valuable which are impossible to deal with in a normal economic manner.

It doesn't take an "ingenious sales method" to sell roadspace on limited access roadways. There are on ramps, there are off ramps. They are designed to be excludable and non-excludability is one of of the definitions of a public good. Quoting from the Wiki article you posted, "In economics, a public good is a good that is non-rivaled and non-excludable. This means... that no one can be effectively excluded from using the good." Highways don't meet the other qualifier, non-rivalrousness, either. My usage of a given patch of highway at a given time, thanks to the laws of physics, clearly prevents someone else from using an approximate space at the same time.

I'm not breaking any economic conventions here, the articles you posted on "public goods" in the first line describes them as "a good that is non-rivaled and non-excludable. This means, respectively, that consumption of the good by one individual does not reduce availability of the good for consumption by others; and that no one can be effectively excluded from using the good." How does a limited access roadway meet either of your two criteria?

 

[Glen]

Whoaccio,

I was merely pointing out the deficiency of your analogy.

I understand your points, this whole argument is a rehash from another thread. My problem with tolls is that they are already on top of taxes which were implemented for the same purposes. Furthermore they are just as poor as gas taxes in appropriating the true cost/benefit from the users.

 

[Glen]

This is fun!

I guess we should expect downtown surface commuters (public and private) to pay more as well. After all the value of land that they occupy is more 'valuable'.

 

[lordmandeep]

no point yet.


The time has not come...