$20 a Month For Unlimmited Transit Use?

[yoko*]

Originally posted by SEAN!

the reason its not offered is because of simple economics, translink knows that ubc and sfu is full or rich bastards like myself who either dispise transit or have schedules and live in locations where transit isnt a viable option

Parking at UBC and owning a car is so expensive that if students or their parents are capable and willing to pay for them when there is no u-pass the existense of a universal transit pass is only going to get the attention of the poorest students becuase honestly the transit system is shit, and even if it was amazing alot of people wouldnt think twice about giving up their freedom of mobility to grab a ride on the "loser cruiser" What kid would give up his 40k dollar car to ride a bus?

Personally i fuckin hate public transit, there is absolutely nothing you could do to get me to ride it, even if you made insurence twice an much and gas 4 times as much id still drive, and theres alot of people who feel the smae way.

:sick:

[Senior]

Originally posted by SEAN!:
u passes are not simply offered to ubc or sfu students they are a mandatory fee. which amounts to 180 bucks a year, i pay 650 for parking.

I stand corrected.

Originally posted by SEAN!:

i pay for it but i dont even have a u -pass..i use transit like twice a year.

the reason its not offered is because of simple economics, translink knows that ubc and sfu is full or rich bastards like myself who either dispise transit or have schedules and live in locations where transit isnt a viable option(like on campus, even ubc residents have to pay for the u-pass)..if they were to offer it on a community basis the mere success of the program would make it unfeasible(it is unliekly that it would be a success) as you wouldnt have a large percentage of people subsidizing the scant number of transit riders. the trransit authority needs the subsidization from non transit users to run, because our city isn't densely populated the transit systems are incredibly inefficient in both economic and operational terms.

From the sounds of things I'm guessing your either politically savvy (definitely of the neo liberal persuasion), you study economics or both. If there's any truth to this I can see why you would come to this conclusion. Just to make it clear I'm not going to lean on the "your a spoiled rich kid" crutch. The problem I have with your argument is that it's based on a closed system which is leaving out many indirect factors. For example; according to the World Health Organization,

"The prevalence of asthma among adults has been increasing over the last 20 years.
1979 - 2.3 per cent (15+ years of age)
1988 - 4.9 per cent (15+ years of age)
1994 - 6.1 per cent (15+ years of age)

Poor air quality has been shown to increase the number of emergency room visits for asthma. Studies have also shown that asthma is more prevalent in urban areas than in less polluted areas."

So when considering the costs of reducing air pollution people need to understand that there is more to it than a simple economic analysis of profit efficiency. Further more dragging our heals on improving mass transit is going to kick our ass when gas prices' do hit $5 a litre. At this point global oil reserves are declining (we have used more than half of all know reserves) and the cost to produce the oil is constantly rising as we exhaust the easily accessible reserves.

Originally posted by SEAN!:

i go to ubc and from the students i speak to i havent noticed any change in their driving habits whats so ever, so really the effect is marginal. Parking at UBC and owning a car is so expensive that if students or their parents are capable and willing to pay for them when there is no u-pass the existense of a universal transit pass is only going to get the attention of the poorest students becuase honestly the transit system is shit, and even if it was amazing alot of people wouldnt think twice about giving up their freedom of mobility to grab a ride on the "loser cruiser" What kid would give up his 40k dollar car to ride a bus?

What does you or your friends driving habits have to do with the overall effectiveness of this program? I don't know anything about your friends but you've already said that you are anti transit, meaning this program isn't aimed at you. The fact that you equate having a car with personal freedom might have something to do with living in the burbs but I really fail to see why. Not owning a car still leaves you with the same options; take transit, a taxi or if you really need to drive some where your self than rent a car. Anyway it's definitely a personal choice when it comes down to it.

Originally posted by SEAN!:

Personally i fuckin hate public transit, there is absolutely nothing you could do to get me to ride it, even if you made insurence twice an much and gas 4 times as much id still drive, and theres alot of people who feel the smae way.

Maybe a lot of people feel that way but few of them could afford to if that happened.

Originally posted by SEAN!:

the only way to get people to give up their cars is to build denser cities, like manhatten/hong kong density levels, so that traffic and parking are so inconvenaint and expensive that it forces people to use transit. also in these situations the transit system is more efficient so it is self supporting and dosnt require massive subsidization. A second course of action would be to raise gast taxes so gasoline was 3.50 a litre. Either one of these options would be political suicide for any politician

There are actually other ways of building cities besides basing them on cars. I'm off work now so I don't have time to elaborate but anyway...

[cashcow]

do they ask for your Student ID when you buy it? Im gonna make myself a fake sfu student card :D

[-ff-]

you don't "buy it"

the fee is added to your student fees, and then you have to present your student card when you go to pick up your U-pass