Jan 10, 05
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Jan 10, 05
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Jan 10, 05
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Jan 10, 05
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dude, if i knew how to give you karma i would!
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Jan 10, 05
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cuz i don't have tits
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Jan 10, 05
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Jan 11, 05
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oi vey.
kids, its inflation. deal with it, its going to keep on happening too. it sucks alot, it really does, im a student without a u-pass. i still pay $69 a month for my bus pass, however i dont bitch. i dont mind paying more for the transit system i am using. if i was driver, and did not depend on transit\never used it, i would be completely pissed that i was paying more taxes to pay for a system i never benefit from. in another 5 years, this wont be an issue. and my question still stands, when was a union made for bus riders? why dont i know about it? im on transit every day, do i qualify? plus how does everyone plan to walk onto the buses\trains and not pay? are the drivers involved? personaly, i'd like to have a strike for the union of chocolate bar eaters due to the fact that their prices have been raised. its an injustice to us all that eat candy, and i think we should raise taxes on fruit so our chocolate bars can stay cheap.
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Jan 11, 05
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^
Its not a real 'union' its a grassroots organization that advocates on behalf of transit riders. If you're actually curious, you can check out their website at: http://bru.resist.ca/home And no, it is not inflation. If it was inflation, the fares wouldn't have gone up 3 times in 5 years. Its the translink exec getting fat raises and the RAV line.
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Jan 11, 05
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^ not inflation? ok how about paying for a massive event happening in and around our city in 5 years?
personally, i'd much rather slot of small increases over a peiode of time, then one large massive one all of a sudden... kinda like what happened with tuition. it really sucked when mine went up 70% all at one stab. and seriously, we are paying for what we WILL receive. they cant snap and make it happen. the RAV line is a great thing, we need it. we are a growing city.
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Jan 11, 05
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hmm
they went up in calgary too wierd
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Jan 11, 05
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from start of service to 6:30pm, monday to friday, there are 3 zones. 1 zone of travel = $2.25 2 zones of travel = $3.25 3 zones of travel = $4.25 so if you travel 3 zones to and from somewhere, before 6:30pm, you pay $8.50. now, after 6:30pm monday to friday, all day on weekends and holidays you only pay one zone, so $2.25.
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Jan 11, 05
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one thing i feel compelled to mention, if you all are really so opposed to the $0.25 increase, why not just pre-buy your tickets?
they didn't increase ALL fares. fare saver ticket books, senior fares, and children/secondary student fares are still the same. if you go 3 zones, twice a day, then you can save $0.50 by purchasing a daypass for $8.00. or you can do the same by purchasing the book of tickets. in fact, those books are actually cheaper since you get 10 tickets for the price of 9.
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Jan 11, 05
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Traffic jams not only use more gas, and waste people's times but are also harder on a car. That's why when shopping for used cars people often boast that the car was almost entirely highway driven. This creates a bit of a catch 22 though. To get more people out of cars you need to build capital intensive mega projects (like RAV) that won't add enough new customers to the system to pay for themselves for many years. The other side of things is that in Vancouver we are limited geographically in that to get from point A to B there is almost always going to be a bridge to cross which will bottle neck the traffic. Public transit by default loses money, the reality is that if it wasn't subsidized it would be of a similar cost to driving and people wouldn't chose to use it. This leaves us with the decision of how to raise the taxes. The benefits of having a faster transit system are obvious one would think. If you can get where you're going in the same amount of time as driving and save money it's an obvious win, win for the user. This is the best formula for attracting new riders. The obvious examples of this are the West Coast Express, sky train lines, and to a certain extent the B-Line express buses. I can get to UBC from DT in 25 minutes for $2.25 (actually less with a pass or bus tickets). Compare that to a 20 minute drive plus finding parking and the bus works out very well. With a sky train though this is even more exaggerated. If we have cleaner air it would also seem to be an obvious benefit for everyone. Less lung disease means less strain on the health care system as well as better productivity. If you want to look at the business argument look no further than proliferation of business along the sky train routes. Does anyone remember what Metro town looked like before the Expo line went in? It was generic suburbia with a minimal shopping district. Then with the addition of the Expo line higher density residential towers became viable which provided a large enough base to justify a major shopping center. Look at all the new developments at Commercial and Broadway with the addition of the Millennium line. In short if people save money on not having to own a car they have more money to spend on other things. Add to this the fact that people are more likely to stop in a store and buy something if they are walking versus driving. Looking at the larger picture our society has been very well sold on the idea of the automobile and suburbia. The problem is that under all of the gloss, celebrity endorsements and neon lights we have backed ourselves into a corner. The problem with the entire set up we have created is that it's based on cheap oil which like or not is running out. So in addition to everything else we need to looks at modes of transportation that consume less energy. This means replacing our trucking system with an upgraded freight rail system and building extensive urban light rail as well as Sky Trains. As mentioned in my previous post we also need to implement an aggressive conservation program to decrease the amount of fossil fuels we are using. As for the issue of racism. Personally in this instance I see it more as being an issue of poverty. As was mentioned by many people we need to raise more money to pay for the expansion of the system. Raising fare's is an obvious way to do this. For an average person like me I can afford to pay for the increase and might complain a bit but in due time will forget about it and move on. However for a single mother the small amount of money the increase will mean could be food out of her and her child's mouth. I could list examples but the main point is that for people who can not afford an increase we need to create provisions.
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Jan 11, 05
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As a side note other cities have actually used the business argument to raise money for mega projects. The city would include shopping and residential developments as a part of the proposal. They then sell off the development rights for a very large fee. Investors are still on it because they will still make lots of money in end.
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Last edited by Senior; Jan 11, 05 at 01:18 PM. Reason: addmore content
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Jan 18, 05
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such as cash to pay drivers, the lack of sober drivers (lol), the cost of maintaining the busses ect...
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Jan 18, 05
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This hike has turned me even more off of transit. Unlike other citys ive been too where transit runs around the clock in all areas, you are charged by distance since I take alot of shorter distances that are probly only worth $1. My experince with the exchange system in north van is horred as buses never meet ontime therefore im stuck waiting an other 30 min. Alot of the beses in North Van get stuck in traffic too making it even worse then the drivers. I only see our transit system doing well with mon-fri comuters... especialy heading towards down town.
Im really hopeing to get a car in the next couple of months. PS: Why was so much money spent on new "pretty" bus stops... there even wetter and colder than the ones before!?! PPS:Please take off the "best transit system 1996" stickers.
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Jan 18, 05
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I read in the paper the other day that Translink had a $13 million dollar windfall from extra property taxes (the result of the appreciating property values around the Vancouver region) that they were considering giving back to home owners. Right, so lets charge dirt poor bus riders an extra couple of hundred dollars a year to pay for a needlessly expensive skytrain to the airport, but hand back the extra 13 million we've already collected. That makes tons of sense.
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