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Estonia To Become the World's First Free Public Transport Nation (citylab.com)
On July 1st, the country of Estonia will create the largest 24/7 free public transit zone in the world, making it feasibly possible to travel by bus from one end of the 1.3 million-strong Baltic nation to the other without paying a cent. CityLab reports: Estonia is already a world leader in free public transit: In 2013, all public transit in its capital, Tallinn, became free to local residents (but not tourists or other visitors, even those from other parts of the country). The new national free-ride scheme with extend this model even further, making all state-run bus travel in rural municipalities free and extending cost-free transit out from the capital into other regions. The plan will not, however, extend Tallinn's existing free public transit policies to other Estonian cities, and it also won't make riding Tallinn transit free to visitors (at least, not initially). So while most of the country's land area and population -- which is overwhelmingly concentrated around Tallinn -- should get fare-free daily lives, it's not precisely the case that no Estonian will ever buy a bus ticket in their own country again. Further reading: Pop-Up City
There is no such thing as free.
(This is not to say that it is not cost-effective to bother with collecting a user fee.)
Prove anything by multiplying Huge Number times Tiny Number
Given their fairly low homelessness rate (about 1/3 of US) that is not such a pressing need as it would be in some other places.
Automobiles largely donâ(TM)t make sense in most of Europe. Cities are built on human scale without the suburbs we had to build to get away from our wonderful diversity here.
Though I think that many social programs are overblown and too much tax money goes to them, this is actually a thing I support spending tax money on.
There is the societal reason of allowing more people to be able to do things like travel to work opening more opportunities while still not clogging up the roads more. I am all for equality of opportunity, what I detest is the attempt to force equality of outcome.
Then there is the selfish reason too, if there is even bigger difference between public transport and private cars in cost, more people will chose public transportation and a buss takes a lot less road than the equivalent number of people in cars, leaving the roads less clogged for the rest of us.
A little town is not a "nation". You do remember what a "nation" is, don't you? TWAT!
This turns the bus rider from customer to mere recipient. Service quality will plummet, and eventually decisions will become political football, with better 'connected' areas getting better connections.
Worse, it doesn't provide funds for the transit system - the interviewee argues their revenue has doubled, but the only source of funds mentioned was raising parking fees, which could have been done without this scheme.
Found the phone poster.
if having unlimited access to transport without having to pay for it and clean air as a result of more efficient transport pays for the cost of the transportation in increased productivity and health outcomes (all that smog from personal cars is a big impact on heart health) then yes, in a sense it's "free".
Yes, everything has a cost. We're not Gods and we can't make matter and energy from nothing. But you need to consider the costs of the alternatives and that in many cases the alternatives are inevitable. It's like the American Healthcare system. We're gonna spend an extra $17 trillion on our private employer funded healthcare vs single payer in the next 10 years (much of that profits for Pharmaceuticals & health insurance companies). We could pay off the national _debt_ with that kind of dough...
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free (selected definitions):
Generous; liberal.
Thrown open, or made accessible, to all; to be enjoyed without limitations; unrestricted; not obstructed, engrossed, or appropriated; open; said of a thing to be possessed or enjoyed.
Obtainable without any payment.
Invested with a particular freedom or franchise; enjoying certain immunities or privileges; admitted to special rights; followed by of.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
You remember the name of the town, don't you?
No
Estonia is not a poor country. Per capita GDP there is close to France and higher than Portugal.
Estonia is NOT, repeat NOT the USA.
Stop trying to fit their society into your warped view of the world.
The USA in many respects is the cesspit of the world and with your current POTUS, is not something to be proud of.
Unless, you are one of the knuckleheads who voted for him.
For some reason, this made me think that it would be like the whole nation was conveyor belts, just step on and go anywhere. Obviously, this is is true of any nation with roads, but the "free" thing makes a psychological difference: you spend money to go places you have a need to go, but if it's free, you might wander anywhere aimlessly, like a man out for a walk.
The conveyor belt image sent me over to my Heinlein collection to carefully re-read the start of "The Roads Must Roll", confirming what I'd suspected: Heinlein never mentions payment. The entrance to the Road lacks all toll-booths or other mentions of payment. Indeed, how could there be when he describes that you can get on anywhere, just step on the outer 5MPH strip going by, and work your way inward to faster strips if you aren't travelling locally. There are, however, many paragraphs expended clarifying that the whole economy is dependent on them, and they re-designed all their cities around them.
I think Mr. TANSTAAFL actually proposed that moving mechanical roads would be like the asphalt roads they replaced: just free for all to use. The same concept of "public road" that every government ever had to maintain (at great public expense, your city streets department is likely more expensive than either water or sewer) just had the cost of maintaining mechanism tacked on. They already had to up the roads budget 500% to install and maintain asphalt instead of dirt decades ago, this is just the same increase again as society became another 500% richer from the "Douglas-Martin Sunpower screens" and so forth.
Pigeonholing Heinlein as a libertarian, or militarist, or whatever, was never wise; the guy had his opinions, but his imagination that roamed over all sorts of ideas always ruled over that when he had an idea he couldn't resist.
Homeless shelters on wheels, decreasing quality, running out of money... all things that were expected when this was implemented in Tallinn. None of that actually happened, it worked out great. Buses are on time, go pretty much everywhere and are as clean as ever, it totally works. Mind you, this scheme was cooked up by a political party I otherwise despise, I guess even a blind man hits a bulls-eye every now and then. Of course, its not free as air, its just payed out of your taxes, but as far as use of your taxes go - it's a pretty good one.
You need to keep in mind that setting aside who pays for it, public transportation is just cheaper than a car in every way. You need less infrastructure and roads are expensive, a bus just takes less room than equivalent amount of cars, on roads and on parking lots. A bus itself is cheaper than equivalent number of cars, as Estonia has to import both, public transport is good for import/export balance. Buses use less fuel per passenger than cars, again something you don't need to import as much. And the improved air quality is worth something too.
From state perspective, more public transport is a very good thing and if done right its pretty convenient for a citizen too. You can look at it as extra tax on car owners, not a very big tax at that.
I live in a place with higher gasoline taxes than vast majority of the EU states, and there are still arguments over where service goes, how much it's funded, and a section of auto-users who would like to shut everything down, not because of ideological hostility to the government, but hostility to anyone taking their lane....
tl;dr: The lack of ideological hostility to the government does help, but there are always issues of allocation and degree.
I'm an estonian and this news to me. Yes, general free public transport has made the news few times, but thats about it. There are no plans and there is certainly no set date. Where does 1st July come from?
Ever been to Europe? Many of the larger cities do have suburbs, and while they are less sprawling and (much) better served by public transport than those in the USA, most people living there still find themselves in need of owning a car. Even people in the cities themselves own cars for a variety of reasons: most often people find that travelling by car is faster and more convenient when travelling between cities or from and to the suburbs, even in heavy traffic.
If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
Just another word that has been redefined within a generation.
Free public bus transport was the initial idea. Now nobody is sure because there is so much hurry and miscommunication involved. There was and idea that counties can choose: to open new bus routes, lower the ticket price or to set the ticket price to zero. Many counties would prefer to use the money to open new routes so that is will help more people.But now the central government declared that the counties that will not give free rides to everyone cannot give free rides to anyone. There is a long-standing tradition that pensioners and students are driving either free of charge or have heavily discounted tickets.
Knowing the minister involved, all this will change the next week. It already has changed so many times.
Btw, it is all for intra-county bus transport only. And counties in Estonia are max 150km from one end to another. When you want to drive from Tartu to Tallinn then that plan is for no use.
it's the dues you pay for civilization.
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Also, 1.3 million people is 0.4% the US population and its area is 0.5% of the US area. Estonia is small, which helps looking after your people.
Despite the insults, I actually agree with part: Estonia is not the USA. And the USA is not Estonia. What works in Estonia will not work in USA and vice-versa. In many cases commutes over here would extend beyond the borders of Estonia. Not an insult, just a fact. Orders of magnitude of people more over here, too. And BTW, the USA pays a lot more to keep that bear on the other side of the border ON the other side of that border than Estonia does (or for that matter, the rest of NATO). So that allows more money to be spent on things like "free public transit for everyone".
I've traveled all around Europe and what you say doesn't ring true at all.
True, but it also limits your resources too
As a whole, they're going much better :)
We have zones which are concentric rings from the centre of our cities. Travelling across zones incurs a fee, however, within zones are free. Generally going to the shop costs nothing because of this.
[SOURCE]
I've traveled all around the big cities of Europe and what you say doesn't ring true at all.
FTFY
My German colleagues who live in smaller towns and cities tell me that have to own cars because things like taking the train to the airport in the nearest big city just isn't doable. And many of the smaller towns don't have bus service like the big cities, so things like shopping and dropping the children at school requires that they own a car, or cars. And for vacation they load up the van and head for the seashore, or where ever. Taking a train would still require that they have a car once they get there, so in the end they forego the train and just take the car the whole way. Much less expensive too, even at $5-6 per gallon for petrol.
(I've traveled around Europe too.)
What the hell do you think you are doing? Economics for the rich and infamous 101: Continue to collect more and more tax while selling off the services, that the tax is supposed to pay for, to corporations. We do not want citizens from other states to realize that their governments are shafting them. Get your act together.
Per capita GDP is almost 30% lower than France. Slightly higher than Portugal, true, but Portugal is acknowledged one of the poorest countries in the EU.
Are they just guessing based on people's appearance? Is it on the honour system? How do they know who is a local and who is a visitor? Or do they make even locals use some kind of card to identify themselves?
and the American fleet is aging since people can't afford new cars. What matters is what the allowed spec is and what the spec is "in the field", not the theoreticals we extrapolate from a car's spec when it came off the line. And that's before we start talking about stuff like the many, many cheating emissions scandals going on right now.
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Their ENTIRE NATION is just a little smaller than the state of OHIO. They geographically have LITTLE area. Try doing that in the ENTIRE United States! More fake news, so to speak.
It's interesting how different cities take different approaches to free public transit. In Tallinn, public transit is free for locals but not for visitors, whereas in the Swiss city of Basel, it's free for visitors but not for locals. (The city government supplies transit passes to hotels, which then distribute them to their registered guests. Conveniently, visitors can still avail themselves of free travel while travelling to the hotel to check in: all they need to do is show the ticket inspector their reservation.)
I'm so sick of other places that charge taxes to subsidize or sometimes fully fund state-run transportation networks. As someone that has serious problems with the fundamentally barbaric nature of taxation, this comes as a very welcome alternative.
Automobiles largely donâ(TM)t make sense in most of Europe. Cities are built on human scale without the suburbs we had to build to get away from our wonderful diversity here.
Europe have areas less dense than the most rural areas in the US.
It covers a larger area and a larger population with way more diversity.
Talking about Europe as a country will make sure that you are wrong most of the time.
Helps the poor get to jobs and helps the environment
Estonia is small, which helps looking after your people.
Come on, what kind of argument is this?! US has more homeless veterans than most other countries have military personnel in total, that shouldn't be possible when talking about the most wealthy country on the planet
oh no... Trump has found his way onto /.
"The hands that help are better far than lips that pray." - Robert Ingersoll (1833-1899)
i'm currently sitting on a bench of the second biggest city of Estonia (Tartu).
It's my first time in the country and i crossed it (from Tallinn) by train.
While the public transportation in Tallinn are OK (not more) the rest of the country is far from having that chance and will still highly rely on individual means of transportation (especially in the rural areas where villages/houses are very distant from each others or transportation network).
Two days ago i discussed the changes in traffic planning with a young mother and she was not really happy about them (the streets of Tallinn are congested at rush hours and riding bicycle is almost suicidal). In a way, it's like putting frightening pictures on tobacco to discourage unhealthy habits (without forbidding them).
I should have asked her which future she wishes for her child...
Estonia is a country of long term thinking, bold and courageous moves. I believe that makes it a great country.
Few nations are involved in armed conflicts and none have the sheer volume of engagements that the U.S military has, The homelessness problem among U.S veterans is greatly exacerbated by mental and substance abuse problems , PTSD causes on soldiers that have suffered battle trauma or fatigue
Estonia is small, which helps looking after your people.
USA has a 3x higher GDP per capita and a higher urbanisation rate making it easier to look after people and you more capable of doing so.
Maybe you need to find a different excuse.
You would think, but that is also a very narrow view, especially after actually visiting Tallinn.
Train is not as important as light rail(actual rail, and busses with power wires on top), combined with flexible bus routes.
A quick summary would read something like:
As a former communist nation, Estonia has a spread out infrastructure, with a lot of smaller towns surrounding Tallinn, and a lot of space between the populated areas and the industrial areas. A Soviet war insurance one could call it, but not centralizing the population centers, but rather rely in infrastructure for the expansions. This results in that even in a expanding city as Tallinn, there is a lot of space left to expand upon, and a lot of existing infrastructure that already is capable of some massive expansions.
The entire point of the free public infrastructure is for "borgers", or "Citizens" or "Headhunted foreign IT workers". Which means the company can acquire a space that do not need a lot of parking, and settle the workers around the cities tram lines. Which means that even with massive expansion, there is not a insane housing inflation, and Tallinn can freely expand, and even have entire enclaves of Scandinavs, Balts, Finns and Icelanders who want to experience a new world of IT, working abroad, for a few years. And they would move there, because quality of living combined with wages and housing cost is competitive with hellholes like Oslo or Stockholm, even more so with free city wide transportation.
And it has another great benefit: You now have a massive infrastructure that can also be used for tourism.
You go to Estonian, and basically pay a symbolic sum free usage of all transportation inside of Tallinn. It was amazing, even if you needed a phone app to avoid dealing with the horrible maps at each station.
And this has been tested since 2013, so either they want to puff up other areas of Estonian for off shoring, or they realized the costs are worth it for the convenience & commerce it brings its citizens.
They have to deal with criminal russians instead.
It's a pretty reasonable argument. Comparing the U.S. to Estonia borders on laughably absurd. Estonia has the population of Phoenix. You'd never try to compare the U.S.-at-large to a polity of 1.5 million people.
But then the corrupt politicians decided to do away with that because - well they never did give a good reason. So now there are fewer buses, costing more, and the subsidy is still greater than the amount brought in by ticket sales.
Must have been that someone wasn't getting their cut somewhere - or was it that they wanted to use the money to build a new toy train that few use, costs more per rider, and still has massive subsidies.
Take a look at Estonia; 17,000-and-change square miles, 1.3 million people -- IN THE ENTIRE COUNTRY. California has enough budget surplus that they could buy Estonia, I'm pretty sure, and there are cities in the U.S. that have more people in it than Estonia has in it total. 'Free public transit for everyone' would not scale up.
Libertarians such as myself believe in limited government. They are therefore assumed to be in total opposition to transit. But that's not always the case. While in a perfect world, markets would evolve to address transportation and most if not all other human needs, the world in which we actually do live is one in which cars, roads, oil, and other car-related infrastructure has been heavily subsidized in many places, for decades. Particularly in the U.S. where I live. This has created unsustainable and costly patterns of development, including sprawl, that almost everyone acknowledges but almost no one knows how to fix. And since it's kind of essential to understand what's going on, I'll point out that public sector unions have been heavily subsidized as well. This has grossly distorted transportation markets, resulting in entire countries such as the U.S., Canada, and probably many others, developing unsustainable levels of suburban sprawl that cannot be adequately served by transit as it is currently imagined.
I would propose a re-imagining of transit as we know it here today. States and the federal government already devote substantial resources to transportation in general. But most of it has been to benefit cars, not transit. This has created patterns of development that require cars, which require continuing investment in roads, etc., ad nauseam. I propose they shift a portion of these resources away from cars, particularly inside established cities, and toward transit. This represents a very small, baby step toward shifting back to what transportation looked like before all of this massive market distortion. Where transit dominated at least in and near cities, with most private car usage being found elsewhere.
And I also would either negotiate with transit unions for more sustainable wage structures, or - and, yes, most will consider this drastic, but remember I'm a libertarian so this is a concession for me as well: fire them all and replace them. There is nothing about operating a subway train that should cost $100k a year. Technology is going to replace most unskilled labor sooner than most folks realize. It's high time to serve notice to those who make very high wages for unskilled work that they need to retrain NOW, while they still have their current jobs, so that, when those jobs go away - which they will - they will be ready for other and better ones that are currently going unfilled for lack of properly trained workers.
And as I already touched on, automation can and should solve a lot of the cost issues. With proper signaling and safety technology, train operation can be largely if not completely automated. Driving huge buses on busy and chaotic city streets is a far greater challenge, but it is being worked on. Since buses are as big and as infrequent as they are now as a result of the need to minimize labor costs, automation over time should result in smaller, but more, buses, probably operating more frequently and in more places than they can now.
Last but not least, the one cost faced by both cars and transit, making both more expensive than they need to be, is energy. Technology is trying desperately to solve this problem. And politics is trying desperately to get in the way of that solution. We need to find genuinely better alternatives to fossil fuels, an we need to do that ASAP, preferably now while we still have them. We know how to produce energy cheaply in places with a lot of sun, or wind, or waterfalls. If we ever get nuclear fission right (thorium fuel cycle?) or even fusion, we can produce it even more cheaply. But how do we get it to where and when most of it is used, including either public or private transit vehicles? That's the biggest challenge right now. If we solve that problem, the cost of transportation, whether public or private, reverts to somewhere near the cost of infrastructure. No huge labor costs because automation; no huge fuel costs because of fusion + fuel cells or whatever. When these costs become low enough, we
Nonaggression works!
i wouldnt say "europe" but rather certain parts of europe ... the metro in paris for instance is so fast and dirt cheap and omnipresent it is idiotic to drive by car in most cases, and here in hellgium if you drive a car through a city you're probably even faster on foot than taking the bus (since they're never on time and the waits is longs) but i dont think that goes for everything. Living here in hickville (i dont have a car myself and i really dont want one, unless i can afford a driver) its really impractical to rely on public transport, due to savings (for whatever reason because they're 'always hiring') for instance there are no trains on weekends here. If you dont have a car you're basically stuck to the prancing pony , which is fine for most natives since over the hill thats where "the others" live ... just a generation ago people three streets away were the enemy still as i can hear when my parents reminisce ...
there have been proposals for similar projects but its like ubi ... because thats wellfare (which it is not) and no one knows where the money from fabriques nationales goes really, the governemnts dont keep open books.
And expensive, a bus to ratcity (about 5-7 km depending on what stop you drop off) costs (i think these days) close to €3 so its like not cost effective if you have a car so all the highways are congested, despite the fact that it looks like the country is made of 95% concrete by now in 2018
yea i LOVE my fatherland, im sure it shows in every word i say on anything, i just cant get enough of the hinterland
Free speech was meant to be free for all... how can anyone grow up in a nanny state ?
The original article is somewhat misleading and so is the summary, and by extension, also the discussion.
Yes, the Central Party wanted to push free overall *local* public transport, the kind that does not cross county borders. That did not come to pass. Instead, they instated a programme that encourages local transport operators to set up such free lines, only that it is not mandatory. Those operators that decide to enrol in the programme will get subsidies, those that don't, well, won't. But there will be some operators that won't, because there'll be various strings attached.
There never was a plan to extend the free local public transport initiative to country-wide public transport, so city to city bus lines were never meant to be free for all. Rail transport was never included in the plan.
This initiative is basically an opportunity for transport companies to get state subsidies in return for operating free local lines, if they choose to participate. This is no 24/7 free public transport zone, with unicorns. I love it how our PR people can spin stuff, but this is too much.
The country's population is most emphatically not overwhelmingly concentrated around the capital city Tallinn. The city's population is ~400,000, the surrounding county (size ~4300 sq km) adds about 200,000, which means that out of the 1.3 million inhabitants, most live elsewhere.