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Kansas City is first major city in U.S. to offer no-cost public transportation

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Re: Kansas City is first major city in U.S. to offer no-cost public transportation

#181

Post by munk-a »

nostromo wrote: post #151
epicureanideal wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is it that's preventing us from forcing our politicians to offer better options? I would vote for a solution to this, and even donate money to it, if enough other people were doing the same. Don't most people feel the same about this issue? What systemic problem is preventing a huge mass of people who agree on this from making a meaningful change happen?

It's just a much harder problem to solve than you realize it is. The truth is a lot of the homeless people that aren't in shelters choose not to go to shelters. Why? The biggest reason is because shelters don't allow drugs or alcohol, and if you're an addict that's an immediate pass. There are other reasons too. Sometimes couples want shelter together, but most are separated by gender (and for good reason: to prevent…

I think it's to start treating addiction as a mental health issue and reopen facilities dedicated to treating more serious mental disorders - in a lot of places mental institutions were closed because of perceived (sometimes quite real) mistreatment but they were never replaced, society just moved on - so now you've got a mix of folks on the street, addicts, inherently mentally disabled and the jobless.

Jobless homeless are easy to solve and is generally a transient condition, it's extremely dangerous period of their lives but most people will recover in a small number of years with the right support structures - the mentally disabled without support structures are a permanent problem and we just need to provide funding for permanent support workers for them - lastly, addicts are heavily ostracized but their condition is potentially recoverable - still, addiction treatment is a multi-year or decade process and addicts need solid support structures including a stable living situation to dig their way out.

So more beds won't help, the funding going into care is pathetic and it has constant exponential costs on society - more drug users on the streets today means even more tomorrow as more people fall into that cycle. I think legalization of the softer drugs would help, we've done it with MJ up here in Canada and we have yet to devolve into a lawless anarchy, but I really don't know about things like heroin or meth.

Re: Kansas City is first major city in U.S. to offer no-cost public transportation

#182

Post by g_langenderfer »

opportune wrote: post #29
mrep wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Everyone kicks and screams about transit systems "paying for themselves" If you mean paying for themselves with fares, then no, as most public transportation does not cover the costs with just fares [0]. For example, I'm in Seattle currently and the fares only cover 20-40% of costs [1]. Not that I am complaining as I take the bus to work everyday, but it's not a slam dunk case of invest more because it has a positi…

Not all of the ROI can be captured with fares. For example, public transit takes people off the road and keeps commutes for other people reasonable (or at least makes them less bad). Which is why it makes sense for public transit to be subsidized by people working in a region even if they aren’t necessarily using it. If public transit is good enough, it can even make it so people don’t need to purchase their own cars…

A large portion of routes are low demand and have few passengers. Does an empty bus reduce congestion?

I'm not sure what percentage of routes are like this, but I assume it's non-trivial because predicting demand is a tough problem.

Re: Kansas City is first major city in U.S. to offer no-cost public transportation

#183

Post by [deleted] »

bilekas wrote: post #168
nostromo wrote: post #23

Seattle used to have this for an area of the city. It was called the "Free Ride Zone" - and it had some unexpected consequences. The primary problem is that homeless people would get on the bus because it's warm, and would fall asleep. The busses became rolling homeless shelters. This caused other people to take the bus less, because of public safety concerns, as well as simple quality-of-life issues like unpleasant…

Not to be rude, but don't you guys have security to just take them off ? It's a public disorder no ? I do feel for the homeless, and of course its a refuge etc, but its a public service and so can be removed from the tram/service. Its not a difficult solution to have to just grab a free ticket which could take you to the end of the line. In which case, no ticket (even free) no pass. I have a high opinion of Seattle i…

[deleted]

Re: Kansas City is first major city in U.S. to offer no-cost public transportation

#185

Post by reaperducer »

edmundsauto wrote: post #139
reaperducer wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've seen people speculate about homeless use of transit as a deterrent to ridership, but I've never seen any actual numbers on that, and I think it's mostly overblown. Either way, homeless people making homes on transit isn't a transportation issue, it's a law enforcement/social services issue.

Are you doubting that homeless people tend to have worse hygiene? Or that people don't want to use public transit when it smells bad?

What I doubt is the notion that the number of people who don't use transit because of the homeless is statistically significant.

The people who seem to complain about it most are also the sort of people who won't ride transit anyway and just use it as an excuse to stay in their cars.

Re: Kansas City is first major city in U.S. to offer no-cost public transportation

#186

Post by tubaguy50035 »

robsinatra wrote: post #184

Kansas was running on fumes for a long time by not taxing. Now, this? One group of idealists were replaced with another with no more sensibility than their counterparts.

You're mistaking Kansas City, MO with Kansas City, KS. Kansas (the state) was running on fumes for a long time. Kansas (the state) also has nothing to do with this.

These are literally the first three words of the article: "Kansas City, Missouri"

Re: Kansas City is first major city in U.S. to offer no-cost public transportation

#187

Post by tzs »

nostromo wrote: post #23

Seattle used to have this for an area of the city. It was called the "Free Ride Zone" - and it had some unexpected consequences. The primary problem is that homeless people would get on the bus because it's warm, and would fall asleep. The busses became rolling homeless shelters. This caused other people to take the bus less, because of public safety concerns, as well as simple quality-of-life issues like unpleasant…

That kind of (unintentionally, I'm sure) makes it sound like they introduced the free ride zone, quickly attracted a lot of homeless people, and so cancelled the program.

It actually ran for almost 40 years. It started in 1973, and ended in 2012.

Re: Kansas City is first major city in U.S. to offer no-cost public transportation

#188

Post by astrodust »

patcon wrote: post #133
astrodust wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's because your transit system is taking up the slack in other parts of your municipal system that are failing, not because public transit is bad. It's because "fuck poor people" is happening across a broad spectrum.

This. imho transit ridership bears more of the burden of the "fuck poor people" undercurrent of America. It's maybe the snowy after image of the American Dream: Anyone can make [if they work hard] / It must be their fault if they don't make it.

Even in its most dysfunctional state, like busses that are total shit and run once an hour on a drunkenly erratic schedule, it's still operational as compared to other things like homeless shelters, drug rehab centers, and mental health care which don't exist or are completely overwhelmed.

Re: Kansas City is first major city in U.S. to offer no-cost public transportation

#189

Post by beamatronic »

epicureanideal wrote: post #142
farss wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not just the free fare - it's the abysmal lack of shelter options and the attempts by cities to criminalize encampments and force people to find somewhere indoors to avoid arrest.

What is it that's preventing us from forcing our politicians to offer better options? I would vote for a solution to this, and even donate money to it, if enough other people were doing the same. Don't most people feel the same about this issue? What systemic problem is preventing a huge mass of people who agree on this from making a meaningful change happen?

The problem is that as soon as they increase your taxes to pay for something that you want to pay for, they will take that money and use it for something else.

Re: Kansas City is first major city in U.S. to offer no-cost public transportation

#190

Post by nothrabannosir »

uneekname wrote: post #173
bilekas wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not to be rude, but don't you guys have security to just take them off ? It's a public disorder no ? I do feel for the homeless, and of course its a refuge etc, but its a public service and so can be removed from the tram/service. Its not a difficult solution to have to just grab a free ticket which could take you to the end of the line. In which case, no ticket (even free) no pass. I have a high opinion of Seattle i…

I live in DC so this might not be comparable, but our bus drivers are too focused on driving to worry about fare collection. How do you keep someone off a bus who refuses to pay the fare, and stay on schedule? There's really no way to make someone cough up $2 on a bus like there is on the Metrorail.

In London, drivers turn off the bus entirely and rely on peer pressure to solve the problem. I’ve seen it happen multiple times. Sometimes it works out, sometimes passengers turn on the driver. But not paying? The bus just won’t leave until you do.
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