Luxembourg To Become First Country To Make All Public Transport Free (theguardian.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: Luxembourg is set to become the first country in the world to make all its public transport free. Fares on trains, trams and buses will be lifted next summer under the plans of the re-elected coalition government led by Xavier Bettel, who was sworn in for a second term as prime minister on Wednesday. Luxembourg City, the capital of the small Grand Duchy, suffers from some of the worst traffic congestion in the world. It is home to about 110,000 people, but a further 400,000 commute into the city to work. A study suggested that drivers in the capital spent an average of 33 hours in traffic jams in 2016. While the country as a whole has 600,000 inhabitants, nearly 200,000 people living in France, Belgium and Germany cross the border every day to work in Luxembourg.

Luxembourg has increasingly shown a progressive attitude to transport. This summer, the government brought in free transport for every child and young person under the age of 20. Secondary school students can use free shuttles between their institution and their home. Commuters need only pay about $2.27 for up to two hours of travel, which in a country of just 999 sq miles (2,590 sq km) covers almost all journeys. Now, from the start of 2020 all tickets will be abolished, saving on the collection of fares and the policing of ticket purchases. The policy is yet to be fully thought through, however. A decision has yet to be taken on what to do about first- and second-class compartments on trains.

Comments

Good question

[Kokuyo]

If you go for something like 5 bucks a day gets you 1st class, you'll once again need policing, clearly defeating some of the point.

If you do it on a first come, first serve basis, I guarantee it won't take one week for the first physical encounters to happen over a 1st class seat...

Re:Good question

[JaredOfEuropa]

You might want some form of policing anyway. Some people (especially older ones) have complained before about having far fewer conductors on trains and trams these days. They are useful for keeping unruly passengers in line, provide directions, etc.

Re:Good question

[Anonymous Coward]

I've grown up here in Luxembourg. For there to be any kind of physical alteration between adults is extremely rare. As for kids, they might get a bit rowdy from time to time but not much more than that. A lot of that has to do with the place being so small that if you do start a scrap, somebody will know who you are and the cops will come knocking.

The difference between between 1st and 2nd class is a matter of compartment and seat colour. The rest, including the comfort of the seats, is exactly the same. The only reason why you'd buy a 1st class ticket is so you're guaranteed a seat and it's only applicable on trains as all bus transport is one class.

Re:Good question

[nospam007]

"If you do it on a first come, first serve basis, I guarantee it won't take one week for the first physical encounters to happen over a 1st class seat..."

Indeed. Disclaimer: I'm from Luxembourg and I worked as a railway dispatcher for 40 years.

1. Class (+25€ per month) is used by people who want to get seated in overcrowded commuter trains where half the people are standing. The rest is occupied by railway workers from middle management upwards, because they can use that one for free, just like the rest uses 2. class for free.
Also, train ticket controllers and sellers earn between 60.000 and 80.000€ a year, (not to mention QA, Finance and other top jobs who earn much more) so if those jobs are not needed anymore, just as all the expensive electronic ticketing, the vending machines and their IT, the 'free' part doesn't cost much in the end.

Also bus drivers won't be attacked for the money if there isn't any anymore.

Re:Good question

[nospam007]

"You might want some form of policing anyway. "

There are security people who ride along most trains anyway, on top of the ticket vendors controllers in the trains.

Re: Good question

[Anonymous Coward]

Several 2-3 hour journey trains here in Sweden have what could be considered a first class section. It's just not marked in any way. It's first come first serve, has bigger seats, and I've never heard of any squabbling over them. I've commuted daily by such trains for two years now.
I actually prefer the smaller seats myself.

Re:Good question

[Oswald McWeany]

Welcome to Luxembourg, where the definition of 'free' is 'the government pays for it".

When something is "Free" there is ALWAYS someone else paying for it. (or someone else forgoing collection for service rendered)

Of course the people are still paying for it (via taxes), as does anyone else who pays VAT or sales tax inside the country. However, it may be a net-gain for the people. Places with subsidized transport typically see increase in property value (desirability goes up), along with that wages often increase too.

That's not always the case of course, but frequently is. So yes, the people may be paying for the service in their taxes- but their wealth might also be increasing because of the transportation (case by case basis if it does)- so there is probably a net gain for everyone because of this. Especially so for anyone who might be able to now do away with a car. Now they have lots more discretionary income. More than they're paying for taxes in transportation.

Re:Good question

[Anonymous Coward]

If someone benefits from it, he/she should pay. The more he/she benefits, the more he/she should pay. He/she who benefits most is the person using it. The person riding should pay the most.

Re:Good question

[Anonymous Coward]

When something is "Free" there is ALWAYS someone else paying for it. (or someone else forgoing collection for service rendered)

A good example is a hospital nurse. There are two ways I know of. 1) Either she's paid a hourly salary, and then no matter how many shots given or bodily function attended to, we don't give a crap. The job will get done and patients will be cared for. 2) Every ass wipe must be an itemized bill, everything will be nickel-and-dimed so that hospitals and private insurers have bullcrap to haggle about. The nurse won't be paid more, all she gets is "performance metrics". Cost of healthcare goes up to pay for all the needless accounting and parasites, employees get pressured and need to taylorize their wiping ass acts and flu shots.

Now, both 1) and 2) were not "Free" so you might wonder why do I reply with this to your quote about not paying vs paying. Well, to me 1) is more "Free" than 2).

It is ironic that Luxemburg transports are to fully move to 1) and abandon 2) (public transports always are a mix of both, often more than half is paid with taxes and the rest with fares). I think European Commission forced my country to switch from 1) to 2) in the context of hospital nurses, to satisfy some grand "liberal" capitalist ideology with a badly veiled longer term goal of dismantling national public healthcare.

Re:Good question

[Anonymous Coward]

So, do away with first class entirely. That would mean more seats per ex-first class carriage, and hey maybe add carriages to those overcrowded commuter trains.

For specific journeys one might introduce seat reservations at the cost difference. Most people really only want a reserved seat on long journeys or special occasions like taking the train to the airport.

Relatedly, I-forgot-which-city in Germany went full free PT, and found that while the extra cost was 12 mio euro per year, it yielded the city 20 mio euro per year in extra income from taxes and such, because more people went around in the city, bought stuff, and so on. Whether Luxembourgh will see a net positive result will remain to be seen, of course.

Re:Good question

[Luthair]

So what you're saying is, every road should be a toll road. The better the road, or if it goes somewhere good you should pay more to travel on it?

Re:Good question

[Anonymous Coward]

Never seen them here. Transport police do occasionally use the trains but they certainly aren't on every train, or even a tenth of them. Unless you're suggesting relying on off duty police.

Re:Good question

[thegarbz]

If someone benefits from it, he/she should pay.

What if everyone benefits from it? I catch public transport to work. That means one less car on the road in a given day. Everyone on the road should pay for that.

It's the fundamental reason why toll roads are a regressive and inefficient way to create infrastructure.

Re:Good question

[Anonymous Coward]

Places with subsidized transport typically see increase in property value (desirability goes up), along with that wages often increase too.

Or, in other words, your cost of buying a home goes up, and your cost of getting a haircut or buying bread go up because barbers' and farmers' wages have increased. Suggested google image search term: hyperinflation.

You can't create wealth just by making the numbers on bank notes bigger. One person's income is always someone else's expense.

Re:Good question

[Anonymous Coward]

Also, train ticket controllers and sellers earn between 60.000 and 80.000€ a year

I have just noticed how poor I really am. :-(

Re:Good question

[Anonymous Coward]

I work in Luxembourg, commute from Germany by train. Right now, as a matter of fact :)

Already, the trains within the country cost only 2€ and there is almost no policing, so really this is not much of a change. The trains are never full and the longest ride is only 30 minutes, so First Class is superfluous and usually empty already. It mostly exists because that is how manufacturers deliver them by default.

  However, the longer distance trains to France, Germany and Belgium are a different story. Just crossing the border means that CFL has to pay to use the tracks. Thus the 3km stretch from Wasserbillig to Igel costs 13€. These trains are meticulously policed because there is big financial impact. This will not change.

On these trains, first class is synonymous with "reserved seat", so the there you only see long distance travelers who bought a ticket through the country. But the trains that run at commuter time slots always have an empty first class.

Re:Good question

[Anonymous Coward]

Welcome to America, where the definition of 'adult' is a 2 year old crying "mine! mine! mineeee!!"

Re:Good question

[Anonymous Coward]

And the air is cleaner. So everybody who breathes benefits. And yes, in large cities this matters.

Re:Good question

[Anonymous Coward]

I think European Commission forced my country to switch from 1) to 2) in the context of hospital nurses, to satisfy some grand "liberal" capitalist ideology with a badly veiled longer term goal of dismantling national public healthcare.

(citation required)

Also, worst analogy for the issue...

The amount of money made off of the Luxemborg transit system is not very much compared to the overall budget of the government, who has the benefit of not only having a very wealthy tax base with a low number of citizens, they don't have to pay for much military either as a percentage of their GDP.

This will require 0.001% of some other budget to be rerouted to public transit to cover the missed revenue of tickets. And might even increase overall country GDP since this is an attractive thing to both business and citizens.

Re:Good question

[Anonymous Coward]

Welcome to Luxembourg, where the definition of 'free' is 'the government pays for it".

Yes, for the benefit of all of the citizens, like we expect a government to do.

Americans will howl and call this socialism, the rest of the world says this is one of the functions of government in a functioning society.

In the same way that I expect my government to maintain police, fire, roads, schools and hospitals ... doing public transit to benefit the entire public is one of the things I expect them to be doing.

I'd rather they do stuff which benefits me instead of stacking the deck to give the rich and the corporations a leg up on the rest of us. Government is for all of us, not just the wealthy.

Re:Good question

[Anonymous Coward]

FAKE NEWS - Enemy of the people! Witch hunt!

Re:Good question

[Hognoxious]

But why is the air free? Because of nanny-state communism, that's why.

Re:Good question

[Anonymous Coward]

Your problem is you are looking at this through American eyes. People in Europe tend to be a lot more civil and mature than Americans.

Re:Good question

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd imagine it's also in part because your entire economy is based on theft of money from other countries, so you've not really got much to argue with each other about because you're too busy swimming in other people's money like the fucking parasites you are.

Re:Good question

[Anonymous Coward]

It is in fact the point. The costs are shifted to those who more easily bear them, for the sake of providing a greater service judged more necessary than fractional wealth for the wealthiest.

Re:Good question

[Anonymous Coward]

Moien ;-)

33 hours?

[MikeRT]

If you have a 9-5 in DC, Atlanta or LA you probably pull 33 hours in a single month.

Re:33 hours?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, if they're whining about 33 hours, I don't know what to say. I spend 10 minutes driving to and from work a day. At 5 days a week x ~47 weeks, I'm spending 39 hours a year driving to work. No one complains about a 5 minute drive to the office.

Re:33 hours?

[pjt33]

But if your 5 minute drive became 9 minutes because you spent 4 minutes not moving, you might start to get impatient. TFS says 33 hours in traffic jams, not 33 hours in the car.

Re:33 hours?

[magzteel]

But if your 5 minute drive became 9 minutes because you spent 4 minutes not moving, you might start to get impatient. TFS says 33 hours in traffic jams, not 33 hours in the car.

It's still a joke. It's 38 minutes in traffic per week, or 5 minutes/day. It's basically a few traffic lights.

Re:33 hours?

[4im]

In my case, it can be a normally less-than-10-minutes drive turning into half an hour. Which is what I'd need by foot. For commuters from abroad, a normal 30-45 min drive can easily turn into several hours of being stuck on the highway or country road, which happens all too often. Traffic really is at a breaking point - the least hiccup leads to monster jams. And it's literally 200k such commuters, so it really adds up.

Re:33 hours?

[magzteel]

In my case, it can be a normally less-than-10-minutes drive turning into half an hour. Which is what I'd need by foot. For commuters from abroad, a normal 30-45 min drive can easily turn into several hours of being stuck on the highway or country road, which happens all too often. Traffic really is at a breaking point - the least hiccup leads to monster jams. And it's literally 200k such commuters, so it really adds up.

I'm not suggesting that traffic isn't an issue for many people. I've had 3+ hour daily one way commutes with heavy traffic.
But 33 hours of traffic in the course of an entire year doesn't seem like much to fret over.

Re:33 hours?

[Anonymous Coward]

Exactly. If 33 hours is all the average person is spending, then their traffic system is just fine.

Re:33 hours?

[n2hightech]

Wow an average of 8 minutes per day for a 250 day work year. That must be brutal. Europeans are so spoiled.

Re:33 hours?

[Kidbro]

In DC the corresponding number is 63, in Atlanta it's 70 and in LA it's 102. LA tops the list world wide, btw.

This information is two clicks away from the summary: http://inrix.com/scorecard/

That wasn't so hard, was it?

Re:33 hours?

[angel'o'sphere]

He said 33 hours per week that is 6h per workday, 3 hours one way ... no idea what you are getting wrong.

Re:33 hours?

[magzteel]

He said 33 hours per week that is 6h per workday, 3 hours one way ... no idea what you are getting wrong.

From the summary: "A study suggested that drivers in the capital spent an average of 33 hours in traffic jams in 2016."

It's an annual number, not weekly. If you read the article it's pretty clear

"Compared with the major cities at the top of the list, the cliché of Luxembourg City as a congested capital clogged by its road traffic needs to be moderated. In comparison, for example, the inhabitants of the city of Los Angeles spent 104.1 hours in traffic jams, the inhabitants of Moscow 91.4 hours, and New Yorkers 89.4 hours."

I live in NY, we aren't spending almost 4 entire days a week just sitting in traffic.

Re:33 hours?

[angel'o'sphere]

The guy this threat is about, did not talk about the summary. He talked about the fact that he himself spends 33h per WEEK in traffic jams.

I live in NY, we aren't spending almost 4 entire days a week just sitting in traffic.
Good for you :D I live in a small village, just 300k people, there are only small jams during peak hours at some construction sites. But I use bicycle or train anyway ...

Re:33 hours?

[magzteel]

The guy this threat is about, did not talk about the summary. He talked about the fact that he himself spends 33h per WEEK in traffic jams.

I live in NY, we aren't spending almost 4 entire days a week just sitting in traffic.
Good for you :D I live in a small village, just 300k people, there are only small jams during peak hours at some construction sites. But I use bicycle or train anyway ...

Ah, I see, you were referring to just this thread, not the posted article about Luxembourg.
But even for this thread, the thread starter wrote "If you have a 9-5 in DC, Atlanta or LA you probably pull 33 hours in a single MONTH."

Nice you can bike to work. The distances here are too great, and right now it's too cold anyway.
I've used the commuter train line a lot, but some jobs have been in locations where a train was impractical.
The longest commute was 75 miles from home. It was not fun.

Define public transport

[Anonymous Coward]

Does that include shared helicopter flights?

Re: Define public transport

[Anonymous Coward]

Wait are you suggesting what I think you are suggesting? That would violate the laws of physics, right?

Re:Define public transport

[nospam007]

"Does that include shared helicopter flights?"

The only way to share a helicopter flight in Luxembourg is to ride with the doctor to the hospital if you're in an accident.

Saving on the cost of collecting money?

[sabbede]

Did collecting $2.27 cost them more than $2.27? What a strange situation.

Re:Saving on the cost of collecting money?

[Kokuyo]

Probably not but I didn't get that meaning from the article.

Collecting may have cost only 30 cents of that, however imagine how much time and effort is spent by everyone getting the ticket. Also calculate what it costs to make sure nobody cheated.

And then factor in a potential of more people using public transportation instead of private, thus relieving streets.

Not to mention tourism will like this, too...

Re:Saving on the cost of collecting money?

[CanadianMacFan]

They aren't saying that. There is a cost associated to sell passes and tickets, to collect them when people ride the transit system, to check that people aren't cheating the system, and to count cash. It's probably on the order of 5% to 10% of operating costs.

I found a PDF that shows for one city in Ontario the PRESTO card (Ontario's version of London's Oyster card to pay public transit in the Toronto and Ottawa regions) takes up to 6% off for processing the transactions and the transit authority is responsible for the hardware. Plus they still have to handle the cash and pay for people where people get passes and check for people who don't pay the fare. Plus they don't need to pay rent on where you buy passes. In Ottawa there are a couple of places in shopping malls which most cost a fair bit of money.

Eliminating fares could allow the transit authority to add more active buses or do other improvements.

Re:Saving on the cost of collecting money?

[scamper_22]

It's actually not that strange.

I'm in Canada, and I think like most of the world, public transit is subsidized. Whatever the number is. 30%-70% is covered by general taxation.

It's really not unthinkable to just make it free since you're already paying almost half the cost anyways. If a city is already subsidizing transit by $1 billion, and can make it free for $2 billion, it doesn't seem that crazy.

Then of course, there's the saving in terms of payment systems, inspectors, fares, security systems... whatever that works out to be. Probably like 5-15% of the fare cost.

It wouldn't surprise me at all if some routes do in fact cost more to collect in fares. Obviously not the major busy routes.

As far as government spending goes, this wouldn't be a crazy waste of money. I know in Canada, Calgary has a fare free zone, where you basically don't pay fares within the downtown core. Plus you can reduce traffic, drinking and driving, better for the environment...

Re:Saving on the cost of collecting money?

[nospam007]

"Did collecting $2.27 cost them more than $2.27?"

Exactly! That's why it isn't a big step.

Re:Saving on the cost of collecting money?

[bluefoxlucid]

I've proposed Maryland take this step. It would cost a tax increase such that someone making $100,000/year is paying around $80-$150 more in taxes per year.

That ignores all costs of administrating the ticketing system and all savings otherwise produced.

Re:Saving on the cost of collecting money?

[j-beda]

I think Vancouver decided to go the other way. I seem to recall that they recently installed improved ticket checking and gate infrastructure that cost some large number of million dollars (100?) and was expected to prevent a big but not as big amount of fare cheating (50 million?)

Ok, it looks more like 10 million to prevent a quarter million: http://www.railforthevalley.co...

Anyhow, I thought the fare gates made everything less friendly, but I do like the electronic payment smart card system.

Re:Saving on the cost of collecting money?

[sabbede]

Does that make sense? Wouldn't eliminating fares reduce the resources available to add more busses or make improvements? That's the only independent revenue stream for transportation, so there is an absolute loss of resources if it ceases.

Re:Saving on the cost of collecting money?

[sabbede]

Is that fair? Seems to me you're making people in west Maryland pay for people in Baltimore to have free public transportation, when really, that's something that should be paid for by the people who use it.

Re:Saving on the cost of collecting money?

[Anonymous Coward]

But how many extra people get stabbed at PG Plaza?

Re:Saving on the cost of collecting money?

[bluefoxlucid]

It depends on what you want to call "fair". Taxes are the analogy for the fallacy of fairness.

Each person is a whole person, and should pay a fair share. We should tax them flat, e.g., $1,000 per person. If you can't pay, we arrest you and force you into prison slave labor.

Each person works similar or the same relative hours, or is unable to work (often due to economic conditions of jobs not being available in their area). They receive dissimilar income, and should pay a fair share. We should tax them a flat rate, e.g., 30%, such that a person making $10,000 pays $3,000 and a person making $1,000,000 pays $300,000.

Persons with lower income are more-heavily impacted by higher tax rates due to the high marginal utility of every dollar, while the poorest represent relatively little taxable income. We work the same relative hours, yet some earn much less than the per-capita income and some earn much greater than it. They should pay a fair share. We should use a progressive tax rate, with little coming from the poor and much coming from the rich.

Each of these can be called fair or unfair.

The last one is equitable: it identifies disadvantages of some groups and adjusts accordingly.

There's another consideration: efficiency.

Economists have shown that direct cash transfers from rich to poor increase GDP and thus overall wealth, meaning that the rich end up overall richer in the end. This is, of course, subject to the normal caveats of economics: for any given economic conditions, a maximum benefit to the economy as a whole and its members individually occurs at some point X; below and above that, the economy suffers.

In other words: even the most basic form of transfer--giving people cash--can cause an increase in overall wealth, elevating even the wealthy (who profit off the economy as a whole); but jacking up taxes excessively will damage the economy and cause a slowdown, making even the poor more-poor.

In the extreme: people living under a properly-operating government experience greater wealth growth than people living in anarchy.

We can examine transit fees and do some logical reasoning to see how this impacts the economy.

In poverty-stricken areas, there isn't a lot of wealth flowing in--if there were, then there would be jobs, people would be working, people would be spending, and people would be wealthy. Access to jobs through public transit allows people in those areas to work in wealthier areas, earning an income, which then comes back to their area of residence. Convenience services--e.g. a corner grocery store--become a destination for some of that income, being spent into the local economy, creating jobs in the area.

The goods and services consumed in the lower-income area are of lower quality and price; therefor a particular amount of spending creates more jobs. If you're shopping for premium clothes and groceries, you buy the same quantity of goods and spend more; for discount goods, you spend less. With more goods moving, you need more people stocking shelves and running cash registers, thus more jobs.

More people working means more people being taxed--even operating a cash register is productive, as it allows selling, which is movement of goods, which is necessary and useful, thus a taxable productive activity because it represents wealth--which means more revenue at the same tax rates.

Ultimately, as these local economies become strong and stable, they become capable of providing better labor capital and good locations for business expansion. More-productive business can be carried out, and the economy as a whole grows.

With this growth, whichever people are positioned to profit from the overall economy will become richer: the output is bigger than the input. Those people also tend to already be rich, since they'd necessarily need to e.g. own franchise chains and have the capital to expand into the now-less-poor areas to get at some of that

Re:Saving on the cost of collecting money?

[sabbede]

Or Baltimore could increase municipal taxes to provide free transport within its borders and leave West Maryland out of it. Let those who experience the direct benefits bear the direct costs.

As for equitability, is it more fair to treat everyone equally or to try and make their outcomes equal?

Re:Saving on the cost of collecting money?

[CanadianMacFan]

At least here the city determines the budget of the public transport organization. Right now the city insists that fares must make up 55% of the income and the city* will provide the rest. There is a bit of income from the selling of advertisements on the side of buses and ads inside. There are a number of expenses including the collection of fares. If the city decides to completely fund public transit at the current rate and remove fares then the cost of fare collection goes away and that money can go to extra service.

* While the city is the entity that signs the cheques for public transit it gets funding from the provincial and the federal levels of government to run the system. Of course it's all from the one taxpayer. It's just how far out the costs are spread.

Re:Saving on the cost of collecting money?

[bluefoxlucid]

Baltimore could increase municipal taxes to provide free transport within its borders and leave West Maryland out of it.

If Baltimore becomes wealthier, some of that wealth will tax-transfer to West Maryland due to the impact on the State's general GDP. We can't leave West Maryland out of it.

By the same token, if we make West Maryland pay for it, the impact on Maryland's GDP will return dividends to West Maryland, which means West Maryland comes out wealthier than they started. You're basically saying West Maryland should be left behind and not be made wealthier.

is it more fair to treat everyone equally or to try and make their outcomes equal?

Equitability is trying to make their opportunity equal. If you run around a circular track, the outer circle is longer than the inner circle; so instead of starting everyone at 0 degrees, we start some people ahead of others. On an oval track, you're started several meters forward on a straight area, so it looks like you start "ahead" because the road is longer. If you want to win, you still have to be actually faster than the next runner.

As stated above, the question of treating people equally is complex.

There's $60,000 of income per person in the US (it's like $85,000 per worker) and a 40-hour job is $30/hr (plus two weeks vacation). Some people make $12/hr; some make $120/hr; some make $500/hr. All jobs are necessary, even if some produce more than others: replacing a burger-flipper with a burger-flipping machine requires more total labor investment (currently) than just having a grill and an employee, and we keep buying hamburgers.

So even if everyone had the same education and investment, many need to stock Walmart shelves and flip hamburgers. Should they pay an equal tax (e.g. $5,000/year), an equal-rate tax (e.g. 30% of income), or a progressive tax adjusted to their income such that people benefitting less than average from our society (and struggling more to survive) keep more of their income while the rich are still rich but pay a larger portion of their own income?

If you have $1,000,000/year of income and pay 40% in taxes, that's 40% of your hours, or 16 hours per week. For the average $60,000/year income, that $400,000 represents 13,333 hours of work. For less than half a week's work, you get paid for almost 7 weeks of the average person's work. What's left after your taxes for the year? 500 weeks of the average person's work.

You're taking home 500 people's gross pay. The average person, paying 28% in taxes, is taking home 0.72 people's gross pay while investing equal time.

Seems fine to me.

DC

[Anonymous Coward]

Interestingly Washington DC has free public transport for all residents under 21 and has for years. They don't have a school bus system.

It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[bobbied]

You may not be paying for it when you use it, but it's being paid for though taxation. It's not free, far from it.

But let's be real. "Public transportation" is ALWAYS taxpayer funded in some way. Why? Because there is no way it would be possible for the private sector to do this kind of thing at a "reasonable" cost for the average user. The business model is unworkable. The only option is to throw taxpayer funds into it.

Re: It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[Anonymous Coward]

I LIKE YOUR LOGIC...nothing in life is FREE. We should all know that by now.

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[Anonymous Coward]

This! ^

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[AmiMoJo]

Even if you don't use public transport it benefits you by reducing traffic.

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[fluffernutter]

They could do it for a reasonable cost, they just refuse to do anything that they lose money on.

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[Anonymous Coward]

"reasonable cost" That's the catch here. If a private company ran busses, a trip to downtown might cost $8 while the government-ran busses would cost $4. But then the government bureaucracy and bloat increases the cost of that trip to $15 - they just charge what they don't collect from the passenger to the taxpayer.

They got the $4 from the person riding - wasn't that nice of them?

(Government fails in every nearly single instance when there is a private option)

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[Anonymous Coward]

Have a look at how the subway in NY was started...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_New_York_City_Subway

Sure they had some subsidies and help from the local government to secure the needed permissions to build it all, but it could still be done. The subsidies did also impose a max-price for the tickets, but the 2 companies did run for quite a few years making profit before given a deal of a buyout from the government since the post-war inflation made the old price-limit impossible to keep..

If you want some type of price-fixing of different types of required services it should be made in terms of "Max price x% of the average income and maximum profit y% of invested money for the last 10 years" or similar.

Throwing tax-money at something is usually never a good deal... If for example they would take a few percent of collected taxes to start a company that everyone would receive shares of, in relation to their contribution, that would be something different.

If my tax-money is used to build a new or save a existing businesses then i should own a part of it... Like the huge bailouts that where made to banks in the latest crash.

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[Registered Coward v2]

You may not be paying for it when you use it, but it's being paid for though taxation. It's not free, far from it.

But let's be real. "Public transportation" is ALWAYS taxpayer funded in some way. Why? Because there is no way it would be possible for the private sector to do this kind of thing at a "reasonable" cost for the average user. The business model is unworkable. The only option is to throw taxpayer funds into it.

Very true. It comes down to, once you provide the service, how to best fund it. Doing all of it via taxation means some people will pay for it but never use it; however there are many government services that do the same thing so it balances out. People also benefit from externalities even if they never use a service they help fund via taxes. The challenge is, once it has no fare costs, is how to deal with a sudden increase in demand if it occurred? Such a change, in some cases, could overwhelm the existing supply of space at some times of the day; driving up the costs as demand is met. In addition, what happnes to underserved areas who all of a sudden aren't getting a "free service?" I would guess first class will go away as rolling stock is replaced or refurbished as it no longer makes sense to use space that isn't generating incremental revenue.

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[pjt33]

Firstly, I think you might be using an overly narrow definition of "public transportation". The private sector runs air and long-distance bus transport in much of the world without subsidies.

Secondly, an urban bus system must surely be profitable at peak usage when it's standing room only. Urban bus subsidies are about ensuring that busses still run at off-peak times of day.

And thirdly, even restricting to urban rail, Hong Kong's metro is an interesting exception which makes money through a rail plus property model.

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[Anonymous Coward]

But then the government bureaucracy and bloat increases the cost of that trip to $15

And you think large transport companies don't have bureaucracy and bloat? And marketing. And dividends. And CEO salaries.

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[Anonymous Coward]

You say that it is far from free, but are you sure?
- Less pollution -> less sick people -> less medical costs
- Less cars on road -> less roads needed -> savings from road building and maintenance
- People will visit each other more (as it is free) and also on other places -> better mental health -> healthcare savings (at least in theory)
- More attractive to tourists -> more income
- Less cars -> People will save time when travelling due to less traffic -> time is money, so...
- A lot of waste-work around tickets is removed -> money is saved

I have no idea about what is the total amount of savings when everything is added together, but I would say that it is at least possible that they will actually save more, even if they have to pay for it in the taxes.

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[nospam007]

"You may not be paying for it when you use it, but it's being paid for though taxation. It's not free, far from it. "

Yes, it's like roads, highways, schools and university, all 'free' here as well.

Re: It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[nospam007]

"I LIKE YOUR LOGIC...nothing in life is FREE. We should all know that by now."

Since you like uppercase...
TANSTAAFL

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[Anonymous Coward]

Let's be real. "Public transportation" is ALWAYS taxpayer funded in some way. Why? Because there is no way it would be possible for the private sector to do this kind of thing at a "reasonable" cost for the average user. The business model is unworkable. The only option is to throw taxpayer funds into it.

Thank you for making your statement nicely absolute, by saying it never workds and always requires taxpayer support. Because now a single counter-example suffices to refute your statement :)

Hong Kong Metro (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MTR) makes a very juicy profiy on its operations, with a farebox recovery of well over 100%. In fact, a number of metro systems have >100% recovery ratio, including the London underground (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Farebox_recovery_ratio).

Now, this does not include investment on rail, etc - but please tell me who payed for those beautiful interstate and other highways. Yes, the taxpayer did. And no, fuel taxes are not nearly enough to cover maintenance, let alone future investment.

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[Anonymous Coward]

you say this like it's a bad thing

must be an american

The civilised world has left your country in the boonies.

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[stud9920]

But then the government bureaucracy and bloat increases the cost of that trip to $15

And you think large transport companies don't have bureaucracy and bloat? And marketing. And dividends. And CEO salaries.

In Belgium we combine both: transport companies are public but split in geographical fiefdoms managed by boards of directors coming directly from political parties, generally those apparatchiks so bad they could not get elected to public office. As with any proportional elections, there's always more than one party in these boards, but instead of controlling each other they typically cover each other. A huge part of the budget is then spent for "study trips" like "studying public transportation in Miami, Florida"

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[ledow]

And means you don't have to buy a car yourself.

And reduces pollution.

And means people can get to your businesses without having to pay for fuel and parking.

And means that when your car breaks down you can still get to work without having to worry about it.

The point of things like mass transit is that you SPEND MONEY on them as a basic service that everyone is able to use, in order that you save lots of money elsewhere.

It's in a country's best interests to ensure that workers can get to work, reliably, on-time, and by an efficient means of transport. Because that means more productive (and therefore taxable) work and less congestion and pollution (and all major cities/countries can get fined for having bad pollution).

I have never understood why the London Underground isn't free. Or more reliable. I'd happily have it free in its current state, or more reliable and I have to pay what I do to use it. (P.S. it beats Luxembourg on most of those "amazing advances" already).

But public transport being "free" is no different to things like health services being "free"... for many basic services that keep your workforce happy, productive, and moving, they actually save more than you could spend on them.

This is why America's arguments against healthcare are always absolute bunk by the way. Failing to provide basic healthcare, no matter how much you tax private healthcare, will never make up for the 50+ years of lost productivity of a worker dying early, or the years of lost productivity of a worker who is ill, injured, scared to seek treatment, etc.

It doesn't work for everything, but healthcare and public transport it definitely works for. At worst you should heavily subsidise them.

Same way that my council collects my rubbish "for free" because if you charged me specifically to take my rubbish away, all those people who can't afford things will sacrifice rubbish collection and turn all the poor areas of the city into unofficial municipal rubbish tips in seconds.

And, of course, "for free" means "via your tax that you ahve to pay". Because everyone paying en-masse means that people who don't have much rubbish, or healthcare problems or use public transport much are subsidising those who do because they need to.

Socialism isn't about "things being free". It's about "why should people have to pay to go to work or receive basic healthcare" - when lack of those EXACT things are exactly the cause of why they can't afford to pay for them in the first place. It's about breaking the cycle, not offering freebies to millionaires. And some countries get that very wrong.

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[Anonymous Coward]

Only the very poor will be using public transportation more creating more traffic not less. Look at the current state of public transportation now in any major city in the world. I would rather walk than take public transportation. Actually I would prefer to ride a bicycle than take public transportation.

My own younger brother was accosted and robbed taking public transportation. He will never take public transportation again, neither will I.

But make no mistake, yet another way that the middle class working population is being forced to pay for the uneducated and poor thanks to the government.

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[Anonymous Coward]

You say that it is far from free, but are you sure?
- Less pollution -> less sick people -> less medical costs
- Less cars on road -> less roads needed -> savings from road building and maintenance
- People will visit each other more (as it is free) and also on other places -> better mental health -> healthcare savings (at least in theory)
- More attractive to tourists -> more income
- Less cars -> People will save time when travelling due to less traffic -> time is money, so...

Unfortunately, these are all false.

Every major city already has a substantial transportation system. Every bus and train is already full. It hasn't reduced the number of cars on the road. Every road is packed full of cars, all day every day. It hasn't made anything better, faster, cheaper or more convenient.

I live just outside a major city and if I need to go to the downtown area, I take the train. This involves:
Driving to the train station, where the parking lot is completely full and I have to park a long distance away and walk to the loading platform. Then I have to wait a long time for a train. There are trains arriving every few minutes, but every car is completely full.

Or I can take a bus, and it's the same thing. Every bus is packed full and makes for an extremely uncomfortable ride.

It's faster and easier to just drive my car wherever I want to go.

Re: It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[Anonymous Coward]

Private enterprise maximizes greed. Public enterprise maximizes sloth. If we want people to really put an effort in towards excellence, we need a system that maximizes pride.

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[Anonymous Coward]

Says the one from the 9.9%.

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[Anonymous Coward]

What shithole do you live in that this is the case? Where I live, everyone of all social classes takes the train.
And public transportation creating more traffic not less? Are you fucking high?

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[bluefoxlucid]

Some things are cheaper than free. To a certain extent, direct cash transfers cause an increase in GDP/C, decrease in unemployment, reduction of welfare claims, lower crime, and so forth, meaning that something like a Universal Dividend can actually reduce the operating cost of government and lead to lower taxes, while also increasing economic activity and making the rich richer.

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[fph il quozientatore]

Yes, it is funded through taxes. This means that it is a net gain for people that use public transportation, and a net loss for those who don't. It works as an incentive to use public transportation. Economically, it makes sense, as long as they retain the same efficiency. The total amount of money spent on transportation, by the entire population, can only go down. Actually, it would make sense to do the same things for museums, for instance: entry to a museum is always free; museums are funded through taxes (for citizens). This policy encourages you to visit museums as often as possible, because why not? You're already paying for it. Boosts culture and education.

Re: It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[orlanz]

It's not just that. I think a city needs a whole range of salary levels to stay well oiled. Eventually, it is constrained by becoming unaffordable to low salary, low value positions. You can fix this by automation to increase value and raise salaries. But for a given area of land, it will only take you to a certain growth level before all that becomes a non-optimal situation that drags on the growth of the city.

I think free transit will increase a metropolitan's area for growth. The faster and more reliable the trains, the larger the area. Eventually, you will still have lower income levels driving to the nearest outskirts' train station but they will be working in a true super metropolitan that could be a 100 miles across!

And for people, they can work across the entire city without having to move their family. Far less will find their living suddenly unaffordable because the city became too expensive. They will have access to far more retail and recreation establishments.

Then there is the logistics benefits of shipping supplies to and from a high concentration of the population. Or even courier services within the city. Cargo transit may not be free, but it could use and help pay for the same infrastructure.

I think crime will actually reduce as you have fewer corridors of transit where law enforcement and security cameras can be placed to catch thieves.

Of course there is the reduction of pollution from less cars. Less power wasted due to central ACs, island effects, and shared walls. More business/green real estate from less parking spaces.

I really look forward to Lux's results!!

Re: It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[orlanz]

Have you worked in large companies? Companies larger than 5k employees are larger than many local governments and about as inefficient. At 20k, it seems they are about as inefficient as any large government. At 50k+... they are too big to fail and will be bailed out by taxpayers.

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[bobbied]

"You may not be paying for it when you use it, but it's being paid for though taxation. It's not free, far from it. "

Yes, it's like roads, highways, schools and university, all 'free' here as well.

Ah yes, nobody is saying government isn't an answer to problems. I certainly understand that there ARE things that government is best suited to do. I'm just pointing out that "free" at point of use is not exactly "free" of cost for the citizens of the city.

I'm paying for that road I drive to work on though the taxes I pay. I don't directly benefit from the public school system (I homeschooled my kids) but I pay for it too. I use the local universities, though they are NOT free for me or my kids and I've been forking out taxes to build them for decades now. None of these things are "free" even if I'm not paying at point of use, I'm still paying for them.

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[ArsenneLupin]

Same way that my council collects my rubbish "for free" because if you charged me specifically to take my rubbish away, all those people who can't afford things will sacrifice rubbish collection and

Somebody, please tell this the Luxembourgish communal authorities... Have you ever seen garbage cans with locks on them? Surprise: in Esch-sur-Alzette you have them! No, it's not to prevent people from stealing your garbage, but rather to prevent them from adding to it.

turn all the poor areas of the city into unofficial municipal rubbish tips in seconds.

... or of the neighboring cities. Wonder why there are no public garbage cans left at the rest areas in Dippach?

Right: it's to prevent people driving through from Esch-sur-Alzette to Luxembourg-City on their way to work to dump their household garbage into a trashcan solely intended for picnicers.

Fortunately Luxembourgers are still well educated enough not to simply dump their trash into the forest, or along the roads...

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[bobbied]

Even if you don't use public transport it benefits you by reducing traffic.

Citation? Something with real numbers and studies of a "before" and "after" public transportation please? How much traffic did it reduce and how much did it cost per car?

Where this might seem obvious, is that a benefit to everybody? My commute is pretty short, doesn't touch even one "highway" as it's all on surface streets. Reducing traffic is not part of my needs or wants.

Actually, I live in a large metro area (Dallas-Fort Worth) and we DO NOT have public transportation in my town at all. DART participation requires that the city sign over a large portion of their sales taxes, and commit to do so for something like 5 years before DART provides any service. The city I live in declined this offer. We don't need or want DART service. And it wouldn't reduce the traffic for me one bit, though it might make crime and such worse. Nope, don't want it.

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[squiggleslash]

Kinda hard to do that when the trend has been to hobble public transportation over the last few decades, and in any case most of the time transit is introduced - when it is - while a city is growing.

However, the fact it reduces traffic is actually completely self evident. Here's a great animated GIF that shows why. As long as they get enough riders, a bus will always take up less room and as a result reduce traffic compared to the equivalent number of cars. And for "A normal city bus", that's probably three or four riders (think how many cars traveling at 30mph could safely fit the same space as a bus end to end and with a buffer zone)

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[dryeo]

Transit used to be profitable. Shit, the transit company built the dams down the road that light my house, originally to power their street cars. It was one of the cost savings, electric traction.
Unluckily, between unrealistic franchise agreements, things like the transit company being responsible for snow clearing, government subsidized road building allowing a much more spread out urban area along with the franchise forcing the transit company to serve that spread out area, subsidies for fuel and parking making cars cheap to operate and of course the GM conspiracy to replace electric traction on rails with diesel buses all made it unprofitable for transit.
Note that it was largely subsidies, both government and private, that resulted in the current state where transit is almost always unprofitable.

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[Anonymous Coward]

Public transportation doesn't benefit; it simply costs less. The cost probably can never get to zero, and it's impossible for it to go below zero. It only seems like a benefit when you measure it relative to something worse.

Years from now, we can have the same argument about telecommuting, and someone will say the cost of network infrastructure is a "benefit" because it costs less than everyone taking the maglev or teleporter or whatever.

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[Anonymous Coward]

We are talking about the civilized world, not America, dummy.

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[Anonymous Coward]

Literally everyone knows this.

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[DNS-and-BIND]

When you give people something for free, they perceive it has no value. Thus they treat it poorly, crap on it, throw it away, etc. And then in the middle of your rant you suddenly veer off-topic and start riding a hobby horse about how evil America is And finish off with cheerleading for socialism? Dang how'd this word salad get modded up?

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[Anonymous Coward]

But let's be real. "Roads" are ALWAYS taxpayer funded in some way. Why? Because there is no way it would be possible for the private sector to do this kind of thing at a "reasonable" cost for the average user. The business model is unworkable. The only option is to throw taxpayer funds into it.

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[Anonymous Coward]

>The private sector runs air and long-distance bus transport in much of the world without subsidies.

Are the airport and the road not massively subsided?

Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded...

[Kjella]

Same way that my council collects my rubbish "for free" because if you charged me specifically to take my rubbish away, all those people who can't afford things will sacrifice rubbish collection and turn all the poor areas of the city into unofficial municipal rubbish tips in seconds.

I don't know about you but I get an itemized bill of all county services, including hot and cold water, sewage, garbage collection etc. but I don't know if it's actually optional. I assume that if you did try they'd require documentation that you actually have an alternate waste disposal system in compliance with everything. The rest is quite obvious, if you have well water you don't pay for water and if you have a septic tank you don't pay for public sewage. You usually pay more to maintain your own system though.

Do the math

[Anonymous Coward]

33 hours a year in traffic jams on average? If you make 10 trips a week for 50 weeks that's 500 trips per year. 33 hours / 500 trips is abou 4 minutes per trip stuck in traffic. That's "some of the worst traffic in the world"?

Re:Do the math

[rickb928]

My commute is 40 miles each way. 4 days a week, though on an annual basis about 180 days.

Morning, 45 minutes, no delays.

Evening, 50-75 minutes, delays 5-30 minutes, average about 15 minutes. Yearly, about 1350 minutes. 22 hours, close enough.

And this is nowhere near the worst commute in the US.

Yes, yes, they pay me more than enough to justify the ride. And no, telecommuting or working from home would diminish my productivity. Late next year I'll move to a location about 15 minutes closer. Woot.

Re:Do the math

[Anonymous Coward]

It's in Europe, so more likely to be 42-44 weeks so it's closer to 5 minutes!

Re:Do the math

[slash.jit]

maybe they want people not to spend any time in traffic jams.. whats wrong with that ?

Re: Do the math

[Anonymous Coward]

Thanks for this. Because we were all concerned what your personal commute was like.

Re:Do the math

[pz]

Thus spake Anonymous Coward:

33 hours a year in traffic jams on average? If you make 10 trips a week for 50 weeks that's 500 trips per year. 33 hours / 500 trips is abou 4 minutes per trip stuck in traffic. That's "some of the worst traffic in the world"?

From the linked article, which rather paints a very different picture than the one suggested by the summary and questioned by our AC (emphasis in bold added):

How much time a year do Luxembourgers spend stuck in traffic jams?

With 33 hours, Luxembourg City ranks 134th in the world out of more than 1,000 cities analysed.

22-02-2017

According to a study published recently by the American company Inrix, drivers in Luxembourg City spent an average of 33 hours in traffic jams in 2016. This result puts Luxembourg City in 134th place. Esch-sur-Alzette, another town in the Grand Duchy included in the study, fares better, with just 21 hours spent stuck in traffic jams. It ranks 350th on the list.

To draw up its ranking, Inrix analysed the road traffic situation in 1,064 towns in 38 different countries. Inrix accumulated 500 terabytes of data from 300 million different sources, covering 8 million kilometres of roads.
International competition

Compared with the major cities at the top of the list, the cliché of Luxembourg City as a congested capital clogged by its road traffic needs to be moderated. In comparison, for example, the inhabitants of the city of Los Angeles spent 104.1 hours in traffic jams, the inhabitants of Moscow 91.4 hours, and New Yorkers 89.4 hours.

In Europe, the ranking is led by the major cities in Russia. That does not mean that the big cities of western Europe are unencumbered. Londoners spend an average of 73.4 hours in traffic jams, while Parisians manage to waste 65.3 hours.

Overall, cities close to the Grand Duchy fared rather better than Luxembourg City. Metz is in 944th place, with 6.6 hours of traffic jams. Thionville is in 724th place, with 10.3 hours of traffic jams a year, and Saarlouis in 669th place, with 11.4 hours of traffic jams.

Two main factors may explain the difference between Luxembourg City and these examples. Firstly, Luxembourg City has a high ratio of cars per household, and secondly, more than half the people who work in the Grand Duchy are cross-border workers, and they need a means of transport. Given the particular circumstances of the Grand Duchy, the Government is investing in improving and extending public transport (examples include the tram project and a car-sharing app).

Re:Do the math

[Anonymous Coward]

Or... maybe only 20% of people currently commute daily by car (some are at school, some retired, some walk, cycle, or already take the bus), plus a few retirees pootling about. In which case it's 20 minutes per trip stuck in traffic. A typical commute might be 5 miles at what could have been 30 miles an hour, or 10 minutes, if traffic flowed quickly. Obviously the devil is in the detail, but it could represent the typical commute time being doubled.

Re:Do the math

[nospam007]

"33 hours a year in traffic jams on average? If you make 10 trips a week for 50 weeks ..."

I'll stop you right there, everybody has at least 5-7 weeks of vacation (depending on the job) and they take every single day, all of them.

Second, the country is 40*60 miles, normally people would only need between 5 and 20 minutes if there was no traffic jam.

Re:Do the math

[rudy_wayne]

maybe they want people not to spend any time in traffic jams.. whats wrong with that ?

So you spend ever more time: getting to the bus/train station, more time waiting for a bus/train and even more time riding on a bus/train as it travels around making all the stops on its route.

Been there, done that.

From the time I walk out the front door of my house to the time I walk into the front door at work:
Driving -- 45 minutes.

Bus -- 75 minutes

Train -- 85 minutes

Re:Do the math

[Anonymous Coward]

Okay... so after subtracting 5-7 weeks... do the math again. Did that change result really lead you to a different conclusion?

Re:Do the math

[Anonymous Coward]

Trust me. You must avoid driving through Luxembourg City between the hours of 8:00->11AM, 12->1:30PM, and 4PM->7:30PM.

And on holidays. And on weekends. And on days with a festival. And on any other day with a nice bright sun.

Use Waze and it will route you around the city in a crazy way 99% of the time, and its almost always faster.

Re:Do the math

[slash.jit]

If I drive to my office at peak hours it takes me more time than taking shuttle to train station and then train to office.
Been there, done that.

Free

[rickb928]

I do not think that word means what you may think it means.

Re:Free

[Anonymous Coward]

It means zero cost to all residents 21 and under. It is cheaper than running a school bus system as well.

Re: Free

[Anonymous Coward]

No, it means subsidized by mandatory taxation of those who don't really any benefit.

Re: Free

[The Original CDR]

Welcome to civilization.

Re: Free

[Anonymous Coward]

Everyone benefits. The whiners are just myopic.

Re: Free

[orlanz]

No, we know what it means. It's "free" just like roads, the clean air we breath, 2 day shipping for Prime, the National Parks, sidewalks, over the air TV channels, libraries, the plastic straws at a restaurant, restrooms in a store, parking spaces at a mall, and the bloody door being held open for those after you....

We should be clear now.

Re: Free

[Anonymous Coward]

No, you must be thinking of roads built to your suburban subdivision. Oh, let me guess: you think the builder of your crappy suburban house built those? Nope. Or perhaps you are thinking of sports stadiums or the military.

Re: Free

[rickb928]

Surprisingly I live in a house that was built as part is a subdivision. And the roads into that subdivision were indeed built by the subdivider and home builder.

It's not the norm, but it is done. And it's not exceptionally unusual for subdividers to actually pay for the community to build those roads, and to maintain them.

It does happen.

Re:Free

[Geoffrey.landis]

Interestingly Washington DC has free public transport for all residents under 21 and has for years. They don't have a school bus system.

I do not think that word means what you may think it means.

Then you think wrong. The phrase "free public transport for all residents under 21" means people under 21 do not pay for transportation.
If you think it means something else, you're wrong.

The statements the libertarian ideologues have been repeating over and over, "it's not free, somebody pays for it!!" is really a statement with no content. When a restaurant gives out free samples to people passing by, that doesn't mean they don't pay for it. If the bar I go to says "free beer when the Browns win a game"-- yes, of course the bar pays for the beer. "Free" means you don't pay for it. Even "free comic book day" doesn't mean that comic books appear by a magic spell, somebody still prints them, and the printers and distributors and even the employees of the comic shop all get paid for "selling" the book for free.

Yes, the word "free" has multiple meanings. Anybody posting on /. ought to already know that. If you don't, try: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki...

Re: Free

[dryeo]

While around here, the developers are responsible for building the roads into and in the new subdivisions, the city still ends up upgrading the main roads. Where all the development has been happening has led to the main road being 4 laned with sidewalks and shoulders, multiple traffic lights and a new by-pass, all paid by the tax payers and making a trip to town for me, quite a bit slower, mostly due to the traffic lights.
More expensive coming home due to having to stop multiple times on the uphill too.

Re:Free

[rickb928]

"people under 21 do not pay for transportation."

I wonder how this applies to people under 21 in DC who work and earn pay that is taxed.

Or rent apartments and pay that rent.

Or even own property and pay taxes on that property.

Then again, knowing the special case DC is, perhaps they don't pay. And we do. It's possible that I am mistaken, that it is the word 'pay' that is misunderstood, for public transportation in American is by no definition free, and while it's pedantic, someone pays. Losing sight of that is leading to misunderstandings and questionable choices

Re: Free

[The Original CDR]

I made no promises about Reddit.

Re: Free

[rickb928]

0) Bear in mind that some of those taxes are paid by the owners of those shiny new homes. Seems fair, though perhaps not equitable.

1) Growth, for whatever reason, does bring impacts. Some years ago a town near my old home in Maine levied a $30,000 or so charge on all new homes build within town boundaries, as an offset of costs for utilities construction and other costs. I don;t recall that it actually deterred new home building as much as expected, but it did minimize the burden, and the town was actually trying to limit growth without being denied the ability to actually refuse new home permits, s a legal challenge made that more expensive than charging builders up front. Growth management ('Planning' for the conventional) is a big deal, and communities that don't do it well suffer the consequences. Modern planning of course looks different, consider the differences between Boston MA and Gilbert AZ.

2) My commute is slower over the past year, in the morning due to the construction workers all hustling to their jobs, something much less prevalent in 2016 and early 2017, and in the evening due to all the new office workers, since I live within reach of 5 of the top job markets in America. The price of success.

3) One benefit to you is all those new businesses opening up to serve the new residents. Traffic a sign of success also.

Re: Free

[sjames]

Many would consider less cars on the road to be a benefit, especially less cars driven by teen drivers (even if you walk to work that could be a plus at every crosswalk).. Not having to pay for schools to have buses is a benefit (unless you want the people taking care of you when you're old to not even be able to read up on how to give you your medication).

Re: Free

[sjames]

And I'm sure those roads would be perfectly useless if they ended in the woods at the entrance to your subdivision.

Re: Free

[dryeo]

0) The question is, do those new taxes bring in more then the cost of increased policing, increased fire department coverage, increased snow clearing and other road maintainence etc? I don't know the answer but the city council never mentions the increased costs when talking about the increased revenue.
1) The planning hasn't actually been too bad here, and I'm not really complaining, just stating things aren't clear cut.
2) My commute isn't bad due to not going into the big city. For those going in to the big city, one of the largest in Canada, the commute has become hell.
3) The new businesses are generally nice, but hard on the old businesses.

Re: Free

[Anonymous Coward]

Welcome to adulthood. You will find a sexual partner, have some kids, buy a house, uhhh... oops.

Re: Free

[The Original CDR]

That comment belongs to Crash Dummy Redux. Before you accuse someone of being a liar, make sure you have the right person.

Re: Free

[Anonymous Coward]

Christopher Dale Reimer, well-known serial digital pest and wannabe cool guy? User of dozens of accounts on Slashdot in a pathetic bid to gain recognition? The online cockroach that no one likes?

Re:Free

[Dragonslicer]

If the bar I go to says "free beer when the Browns win a game"-- yes, of course the bar pays for the beer.

Of course the bar doesn't pay for the beer. The Browns would have to win a game first.

Sorry, I couldn't resist.

Re: Free

[Anonymous Coward]

Some Indonesian woman who wanted a green card marriage was willing to marry the dude, so obviously he is popular with all the ladies. The day he decided to join a campus Bible study and become a virgin for the next 20 years is still mourned by women around the globe.

Re: Free

[Anonymous Coward]

Friar Reimer made the difficult decision to give up sex to dedicate himself to a life of the spirit. He decided to focus on his art, you see.

Of course, it's *not* free

[Chris Mattern]

It's just that the riders aren't the ones paying for it.

Re:Of course, it's *not* free

[Anonymous Coward]

They aren't the only ones paying for it.

No it doesn't! Political promises aren't actions!

[Anonymous Coward]

How in the hell are there still people, who see a politician claiming something ... before an election, at that ... and believe this to have any relation at all to his actual actions?

If that was true, then Obama would not just have continued the policies of Bush as if they had been a tag team.

Oh, and, on that matter: It's not like Bettel, or Obama, or Bush, were absolute autocrats! They don't literally "do" those things! They at best, can ask the government under them, who actually hold the power, to implement something. And they can completely ignore him, like the Republicans did with Obama no matter if in their interest or not, and the Democrats would have done with Bush if they had any spines.
OK, even they don't actually hold the power. As they serve their masters too. Either citizens (who am I kidding), or corporations. Especially in "literally actually exists only because it is a tax haven" Luxemburg, with its meaningless government. (I'm luxemburgish. Why do you think Luxemburg started the EU? So people like Juncker would actually have some power!)

Nothing will come of this, except the gullible dumbfucks with goldfish memories having picked a liar and asshole yet again, for all of us to suffer under. (OK, all of us 600,000, until he follows Juncker. ;)

P.S.: A correction: Those $2,27 are for the whole day! Not just for two hours. At least the last time I checked. It's not like anyone checks anyway. In the time where I had no car, half the time, I rode for free, on invitation by the bus driver.

subjective

[gDLL]

Everyone thinks *his* traffic is the worst in the world...

Re:subjective

[Anonymous Coward]

Everyone thinks [gender identity] traffic is the worst in the world...

Fucked that for you.

Re:subjective

[gDLL]

perhaps woosh but i don't understand the joke.

Grand Dookie

[Anonymous Coward]

A city is not a country. This isn't the middle ages.

Re: Grand Dookie

[Anonymous Coward]

That would explain an awful lot of things. But city states are real, why not country cities?

Re: Grand Dookie

[Impy the Impiuos Imp]

The country city mouse sat down for a hot cup of tea, but because he was psychotic, he jammed the sugar spoon in his eye and died the end.

Re:Grand Dookie

[nospam007]

"A city is not a country. This isn't the middle ages."

They are not talking about Luxembourg-City, the are talking about the Grand-Duchy of Luxembourg.
Only crazy people use the car in the city.

mKaart

[johnjones]

mKaart (a smartcard) works on the train, tram, bus and self-service bicycles

young people (20 to 25) can get free travel now apart from travel to the international terminals

honestly I don't know why more places don't do this, sure charge visitors and if you want 1st class charge for it but ordinary TAXPAYERS who dont need to have an entire car then are not clogging up the roads... makes everyone happier

Re: mKaart

[Luckyo]

Because TAXPAYERS in Luxembourg overwhelmingly people of the rest of EU, rather than its own citizens. Their primary means of income is providing safe haven for tax evasion for large companies that want an office within EU and all the perks that come with it.

There's a reason why the current head of EU Commission and former PM of Luxembourg has earned himself a nickname "tax evader in chief". It's easy to pay for large array of benefits to a microstate worth of people when you can fund it via providing safe haven for large multinationals.

If you're an actually productive rather than parasitic economy, the picture looks very different and perks like these don't scale well.

Re: mKaart

[nospam007]

"young people (20 to 25) can get free travel "

People under 20 are completely free since last year, 20-25 ride for free to their respective schools.

Re: mKaart

[Anonymous Coward]

About time teenage slavery was abolished!

Re: mKaart

[LynnwoodRooster]

How many transit systems actually operate at a profit? In most of the US, transit systems operate at significant losses, with something like 70-80% of the costs covered by general taxes, not the ticket. And the transit is often-times under-utilized. Moving to a free model may just fill up the transit systems, for not a whole lot more tax dollars.

Re: mKaart

[Anonymous Coward]

As a company few, but as part of the whole, I imagine it saves us money. Every person in a bus is a person not driving and wasting resources, letting the roads be open and fast, saving everyone time.

Re: mKaart

[Anonymous Coward]

If you're an actually productive rather than parasitic economy, the picture looks very different and perks like these don't scale well.

If you're a productive economy then those workers are commuting to a place of work which then produces goods/services which contributes to GDP. You then tax those companies and their sales/trade. Those tax receipts should be sufficient to pay for the employee's transport costs, given that it's affordable out of their salary which is paid from a small part of their revenue. It should result in people using public transport more. Companies should benefit from more employees in their talent pool and the government benefits from reduced use of the road infrastructure which saves on costs.

They only fail to scale well over very large distances in countries with a sparse population, like America. Even then they would scale well in and around large cities.

Re: mKaart

[Luckyo]

In my home city of Tampere, we have one of the cheapest tickets in Finland for a city of its size. Additionally city's population density is so low, that when we joined the EU, it was classified as a "village of ~200.000 people" by EU standards. Additionally our central street that most bus lines use is a historic street made of stone pavement, which causes excessive vibration on the bus structures over time requiring additional maintenance and making buses that operate on gaseous fuel impossible as valves cannot handle vibration for long. That kind of population spread coupled with unique problem of pavement on the central street makes public transit a significant challenge, so being one of the cheapest in terms of ticket prices in the country has been one of the point of pride to the folks doing the planning in the organisation. I listened to a couple of lectures on the topic in my old university some years ago.

To my understanding, the public company that handles the public transit lines is profitable and highly competitive with private bus companies. Latest city budget proposal for 2019 reports that it was profitable to the tune of 3,6 million Euro on the revenue of slightly under 28 million revenue in the latest numbers they have which is for year 2017. Revenue includes 2,1 million "support and assistance from the region".

Here's the document I took the numbers from:
https://www.tampere.fi/tiedost...

Page 115 has the numbers First column is the final numbers for 2017, to which plans for 2018-2022 are contrasted. You can find what individual lines mean by running the document through google translate.

Re: mKaart

[Luckyo]

These grandiose utopian plans tend to crash and burn when you go into details, specifically because they're utopian. You still want people to pay for the ride, if for no other reason than to make them value having it.

General goal in European major cities is that you get costs low enough that its a good and popular alternative, but high enough so people don't treat it like they treat all free things. With zero considerations.

And if you do it like that, it can work even in fairly low population density areas. How do I know? I live in a low density city myself, that EU classified as a "village of ~200.000 people" when we joined the EU. We have great public transit, to the point that as long as you only need to go to the city itself or the more densely populated areas of the surrounding smaller towns, you don't really need to have a car at all for daily transit. And if you do the economy part right, it will pay for itself and even turn small profit. See my other reply to this thread for more details.

Re: mKaart

[desdinova 216]

I know the local public transit where I am is required to be self sufficient. meaning that they can't run a deficit with their income being from a local sales tax, fares, advertising, and whatever federal or state money they get. this has led to a semi perpetual downward spiral where ridership declines, so the cut routes, which erodes public confidence they can get where they need to go and back in a reasonable time, which causes ridership to decline...

Re: mKaart

[Anonymous Coward]

How much do you have to pay for gas and your car? How much do you have to pay in taxes for road and bridge building and repairs, policing of traffic, the bureaucracy of the DMV? How much of your insurance money is going to cover sicknesses caused by the air pollution from all the cars on the road, injuries from accidents, complications arising from the obesity of people who won't even walk to the end of the block to get something, drive through fast food, etc. More people are killed by cars every year than by guns.

When you factor in all the cost savings from public transportation, turning a profit on fares seems irrelevant. You just have a small and petty perspective, that is to say, you can't see the forest from the trees.

Re: mKaart

[LynnwoodRooster]

I never said we shouldn't pay or subsidize transit; in fact, I was pointing out that it pretty much is, effectively, fully subsidized - everywhere. Charging a small, nominal fare that covers a very small part of the cost is more a nuisance tax than anything. Transit is already effectively paid for by tax dollars, it doesn't seem to be much of a stretch to go full-subsidy.

One interesting thing to note is that Luxembourg is the country with the highest external debt (by percent of GDP and per capita) in the world; I guess it's time to toss more debt dollars on that pile!

Re: mKaart

[LynnwoodRooster]

Precisely. I never understood a "nuisance tax" called a fare, when the fare covers a small portion of costs and also serves to restrict use. Make transit free, eat the remaining 10-20% of costs, and see if ridership increases.

Re: mKaart

[Hognoxious]

I don't know if it's still there, but there used to be a bus that ran on a cobbled street in Brussels - near the royal palace & the park.

Damage to the valves I was the least of my worries.

Re: mKaart

[Anonymous Coward]

That's interesting. In poor countries they have trouble collecting payment for some of the things (e.g. rat's nest of illegal wire connections for electricity). But some article I quickly skimmed over or something talked of making Africans in some area/region/country pay a tiny amount when fetching water. This makes people value it and/or perhaps you simply have someone looking after it ; if so there's basic maintenance/upkeep and people won't trash the resource.

Another example in developed countries is the fee for using toilets in a train station. Well, in major ones you do need to dissuade using it and if nobody was watching it would turn to unsung horror under half an hour. Let's not even think about it.
When boarding a bus though, there's the bus driver overseeing it at all times, then other passengers (if there aren't any you're not hurting anyone by using the bus). So, you're not left alone to do your mischief and the place is taken care of. You won't do anything different whether you're paying or not (unless you're using the bus as your sleeping mat, loitering for hours in there, then someone may ask wtf are you doing there. Yet, you can do the same if you paid two bucks or used a magnetic card.)

So, compared to other things that could be free and unlimited, I think free bus fare can be not-a-disaster or neutral.

Re: mKaart

[Luckyo]

You may have a point on "watchful eye is present" in terms of damage, but you may have missed the larger message. My point wasn't just that people don't do damage to the relevant hardware. My point was that people learn to value the fact that they have affordable public transit that goes places where they need to go, to the point where they may skip driving there themselves, or even skip having a car at all.

If something appears to be free to us, we don't value it, even if we pay for it otherwise. This is easily seen in socialist and communist states, where people do not bother maintaining even their homes. Think about it - concept of "my hearth" is ingrained in us by evolution itself. It's central to our existence. And when it's considered to be property of the state that you have for free, people stop maintaining it, because they no longer value it.

It's a horrible fact that is linked to our psyche, and that needs to be taken into account when public services are generated. They must be both cheap enough that even the poorest among the society to whom this service is relevant can afford it, but expensive enough that it doesn't seem to be "free" to that unconscious part of our mind that assigns value to things.

Re: mKaart

[Luckyo]

We're installing a tramway over next few years in that street, and there was a big news story on the fact that there's only one specialist in the entire country who knows how to remake that stone cobbled road back after it's removed so rails can be installed.

It's a part of history of the city. As such, it's valuable. Apparently it will take something like 4-5 years for that one guy to rebuild the road with his team, stone by stone. And he'll be doing it.

Re: mKaart

[MrMr]

The average citizen in Luxemburg receives a net contribution of 2600 Euro from the EU. That is all paid by ordinary taxpayers outside Luxemburg. I do know why more places don't do this - they are to busy funding your happy duchy where everything is free.

Re: mKaart

[Anonymous Coward]

fuck off you god damn russian paid troll

Re: mKaart

[angel'o'sphere]

Additionally our central street that most bus lines use is a historic street made of stone pavement, which causes excessive vibration on the bus structures over time requiring additional maintenance and making buses that operate on gaseous fuel impossible as valves cannot handle vibration for long.
Sorry, that is complete nonsense.

Basically all long distance public transport in Thailand runs on gas (LPG). The valves are just fine, rofl. Vibrations causing extra maintenance ... rofl.

Re: mKaart

[Luckyo]

That line is taken from a lecture by TKL's chief technology planner referencing their environmental efforts where they tried various technologies to see what would be relevant. He specifically referenced buses running on gaseous fuels, and the fact that their valves simply could not handle the vibration causing breakdowns very quickly.

I suggest you go back to talking about your field of expertise - fiction about wind wizardry in Germany and its relationship to power generation there.

Re: mKaart

[angel'o'sphere]

Sorry, no idea what you want to talk about.
If a developing country like Thailand with bad roads has valves that can stand the puny pressure you use in a bus, then Finnland can too.
Perhaps you did not mean fuel but buses that run on high compressed gas? Then you probably misunderstood that TV talk ... anyway, I would be surprised if your bus experiences any unusual vibrations at all.

Regarding your wind wizardry, that joke gets old. No idea what you misunderstood that time and why you try to haunt me with it :D And for your interest: WoW has no wind wizards, so I'm not experienced with wind spells ...

Re: mKaart

[Luckyo]

I'm sure that you're just as much of an expert in this field as you are in the wind.

As in "magic works here, and I know how".

In real life, expert who actually worked on the system in real life has cited practical application and points of failure to an auditorium full of engineering students. I'm sure that you can think of many magical reasons why expert is wrong and you are right. But you're in the wrong forum to argue that. You should google "magic and mysticism" and go there with your points.

Re: mKaart

[angel'o'sphere]

I'm sure that you can think of many magical reasons why expert is wrong and you are right.
That is not the point.

The point is that YOU are wrong. Because you misunderstood something the experts say and you cite now.
Gas powered cars and trucks are all over the world. And yes I'm an expert in that: as I sit in them and look out of the window. So: no valve exploded in the last 4 ears since I regularly use them.

And then again: in modern bus, there are no vibrations, regardless how bad the road is. The bus may sway a bit and thats it. Up to you to figure what you understood wrong. You seem to have not the simplest piece of common sense.

"Our street is so bad, the vibrations are so huge that a _modern bus_ can not run on LPG/nat gas because the vibrations are bad for the valves", you said that. Not me. If you don't grasp how idiotic that statement is, your problem. I hope you are not an engineer with that attitude. I wonder how Space X manages to use valves that work ... or any airplane.

Re: mKaart

[Anonymous Coward]

Are you really this dumb?

Re: mKaart

[Anonymous Coward]

Make transit free, eat the remaining 10-20% of costs, and see if ridership increases.

It will. The homeless will flock to them, especially in cold weather.

Why even have First Class?

[Roger W Moore]

Given that the country is 87km long and 57 km wide why on earth would you even need first class? You will not be sitting in it for longer than about 30 minutes unless you are crossing a border in which case the travel is no longer free anyway.

Re:Why even have First Class?

[ArsenneLupin]

You will not be sitting in it for longer than about 30 minutes unless you are crossing a border

You'd wish. From Troisvierges to Belval (no borders involved) the train takes 1 hour 45 minutes. If it is on time, which rarely happens.

Yes, some people actually object to fare-free travel saying that the money would be better used improving the service, rather than making it cheaper.

Re:Why even have First Class?

[dryeo]

As mentioned above, 1st class includes reserving a seat and not much else. (different coloured seats basically)

From a Lux. Native

[4im]

First off - the state already pays for something like 80% of the cost of public transport. Going 100% won't make much of a difference on the budget.

Traffic is indeed quite horrible, with all the commuting and street works. Luxembourg (which isn't only one city btw) is by far the most active economic center of the region, and so pulls in a lot of workers who live up to 2h (in normal conditions) driving away. It's also gotten a lot worse these past decades.

Public transport isn't very effective now on many lines, because it will suffer from works too (trains as well as buses), buses will be stuck in traffic just as much as cars. And "people incidents", let's not forget those. Lots of economic areas are badly covered, as the public transport lines are mostly aligned for Luxembourg City only - if you want to go somewhere else, good luck, count in a lot more time. To get people to switch from private cars to public transport would take a massively better quality, different lines... which isn't really on the to-do list as far as "we the people" can see.

Making things free won't automatically improve the quality of public transport, thus... things will probably remain as they are.

There's also the impression that something free isn't worth anything, some people will think they're entitled, will show poor respect to personnel etc., so we're really not that happy about this upcoming change, fearing that quality will actually go down.

Not much impact for me anyway - I live close enough to work for walking, which I do when weather won't permit the use of the motorbike (much easier to find parking space that using a car!).

Re:From a Lux. Native

[Anonymous Coward]

You live close to work... In Luxembourg??? Gawd, you must be rich.

Re:From a Lux. Native

[Anonymous Coward]

The whole population of Luxembourg is like one village in a large country.

Re:From a Lux. Native

[Anonymous Coward]

Or he could be like some retirees on a French island, they're living a simple and rough life in a house that happens to be valued over a million euros/dollars/pounds.
Or so was the story a decade or two ago. They came up in the media because they were poors asked to pay a wealth tax (so, look at how unjust a wealth tax is! they said). The island is famous, touristic, a bridge was built some time ago. (Ile de Ré)

I imagined these old retirees (natives) never even thought of selling and moving

Radio Luxembourg 1600

[Anonymous Coward]

anyone? on your am dial. anyone? hello? is your radio tuned to 1600 khz?

rod blagojevich did this for seniors & now he

[Joe_Dragon]

rod blagojevich did this for seniors & now he in prison after that the next governor cut the free rides down.

So are roads

[Roger W Moore]

"Public transportation" is ALWAYS taxpayer funded in some way.

So is private transportation. Who do you think pays for all those roads? Encouraging more people to use public transportation by making it free will reduce the need to build more roads and save on repair on the ones that are already there.

Whether the benefit is worth the cost requires detailed analysis but in a densely populated country like Luxembourg I suspect the maths is much more in favour of this than in less densely populated countries like Canada where our city council is both considering either making local transit free or increasing the price by ~30%!

Re:So are roads

[bobbied]

"Public transportation" is ALWAYS taxpayer funded in some way.

So is private transportation. Who do you think pays for all those roads? Encouraging more people to use public transportation by making it free will reduce the need to build more roads and save on repair on the ones that are already there. Whether the benefit is worth the cost requires detailed analysis but in a densely populated country like Luxembourg I suspect the maths is much more in favour of this than in less densely populated countries like Canada where our city council is both considering either making local transit free or increasing the price by ~30%!

LOL.. IF you are thinking they will save money by doing this, I dare say it's unlikely to happen. Are there possible offsets to the increased costs? Sure. But I seriously doubt this is a financial winner for the city.

Government is the least efficient and least effective way to do just about anything you can imagine. Sometimes Government is the only possible solution, such as when providing national defense and law enforcement, or as you point out maintaining infrastructure like roads, bridges, water, sewer treatment and the like. But never be fooled, it's going to cost more than it should, take longer than it should and be less effective than it should when government is tasked to do something. "Public Transportation" is not an exception to this rule.

Re:So are roads

[j-beda]

Government is the least efficient and least effective way to do just about anything you can imagine. Sometimes Government is the only possible solution, such as when providing national defense and law enforcement, or as you point out maintaining infrastructure like roads, bridges, water, sewer treatment and the like. But never be fooled, it's going to cost more than it should, take longer than it should and be less effective than it should when government is tasked to do something. "Public Transportation" is not an exception to this rule.

Knee-jerk reactions of "government-bad!" always strike me as lacking in nuance.

"Government is the least efficient and least effective way to do just about anything you can imagine." is not a rule. There are many examples to the contrary - US Medicare delivers better outcomes at lower overhead than US private insurance for one example, and virtually every publicly funder national health service is cheaper and more effective than the private provisions of healthcare in the US.

Yes, it is true that Governmental services can have different incentives than systems funded in other ways, and those may have undesired outcomes. However there are lots of people all over the place that have similar levels of justified distrust of more "market oriented" systems. The multinational corporations are not the saviors of us all.

Neither are they the root of all evil either. Well designed and run private and public systems are possible, and exist. So do poorly run ones unfortunately.

Re:So are roads

[angel'o'sphere]

Government is the least efficient and least effective way to do just about anything you can imagine.
In your country perhaps.

In Europe it worked the last 70 years quite fine to have government run businesses. No idea why you americans always claim that a government run business is less effective than a private one. There is absolutely no inherent reason for that.

Re:So are roads

[bobbied]

No reason? You must not live in Greece then, or Venezuela... Government runs pretty much everything in Venezuela and it's a total mess. I dare say any EU country isn't much better.

Re:So are roads

[angel'o'sphere]

I dare say any EU country isn't much better.
And there you are obviously wrong.

Government runs pretty much everything in Venezuela and it's a total mess.
Last time I checked: they have/had no functional government but are a kind of totalitarian state ... so: what is your point? You have on single example of a tyranny and another example as Greece (which has no things government run anyway) and jump to wild conclusions about he EU?

Re:So are roads

[bobbied]

I dare say any EU country isn't much better. And there you are obviously wrong.

Government runs pretty much everything in Venezuela and it's a total mess. Last time I checked: they have/had no functional government but are a kind of totalitarian state ... so: what is your point? You have on single example of a tyranny and another example as Greece (which has no things government run anyway) and jump to wild conclusions about he EU?

Oh, I've picked extreme examples, to be sure, but they are examples of what happens when you depend on government, the logical destination of where your thinking goes. Venezuela started down this path when it's government made similar promises as you would in support of the EU about 20 years ago. I remember what Venezuela once was and the vibrant economy it had, rich with promise and natural resources.

The EU is far from a perfect place, and Greece is an example of why it simply cannot survive. If Greece and Spain can drag the EU though such turmoil financially, there are fundamental problems with the idea. Unless the EU changes form pretty soon, Venezuela like conditions will spread from Spain and Greece north. Eventually the EU will either break up or become one desperately poor third world region, with just vague memories of it's past glory. My guess is that break up is in the cards, but a breakup coupled with violence and unrest as the blight of socialism and the cost of its programs drive economic conditions into the gutter for most of the member states.

But hey, I might be wrong, history might not repeat itself this time, but I seriously doubt it. Look at France right now. Can a "let the eat cake" analog be far from coming? Hopefully we can avoid the guillotines but revolution seems to be in the wings, waiting to take the stage in Paris right now. All this driven by what exactly? EU regulations? No?

Re:So are roads

[Roger W Moore]

Governments are worse than private industry at things whose primary benefit to society is that they pay for themselves. They are better than private companies when the benefit is not so monetary. Public transit has more benefit than just monetary and so government much better. The same is true for health care.

Land area of Luxembourg Rhode Island

[IHTFISP]

Note that the total land area of Luxembourg (998 mi) is approximately that of Rhode Island in the U.S. (1,212 mi), according to Google.

Just sayin'. ;-)

Re:Land area of Luxembourg Rhode Island

[Anonymous Coward]

That's a big iland, or is it a very long rhoad? I am from San Marino. A moutain top sited in another country.

Bullshit

[dnaumov]

So who is supplying buses, trains and the like at no cost? Who is driving them out of the goodness of their hearts and takes no salary for the job? Oh wait, so it's not free after all, but taxpayer-funded? Why don't you use the correct words?

Re:Bullshit

[jpaine619]

Bravo!

Nothing in life is free.....

Public transportation is usually subsidized

[Anonymous Coward]

by the state. The issue is is collecting the fare worth it? I would say no. There is the man power cost, then the lost time cost, then the frustration cost, then the excess traffic cost, then the pollution cost.

Re:Public transportation is usually subsidized

[jpaine619]

So, it's worth it to collect the fare via taxes, but not from the actual assholes using it? Okay...............

Re:Land area of Luxembourg Rhode Island

[drewlake2000]

Thanks, now I have a rough idea of the size of Rhode Island. Not sure why I would want that, but thanks anyway.

No free public transit

[Anonymous Coward]

There is no such thing as free public transportation. You pay higher taxes to pay for it. This idea of the government fairy is for low information voters but the fact is the Government doesn't do anything for you, when it takes your money, to give you something for "free", its actually taking away your freedom to control how your money will be used, which you could otherwise have if you kept it, you could choose where to spend it and how to spend it. Its fascinating how this "free this, free that" mentality dresses up taking away peoples freedoms as being a santa clause.

Re:It's not Free... It is EU funded

[Anonymous Coward]

Luxembourg (as Irland) is stealing the money from France and others EU countries

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

It scales fine when it's a transport system

[rsilvergun]

instead of a 'perk'. You do need to build your cities around it though, which most European cities did. The problem with America is that our car companies got to decide how our cities would be laid out in the 30s, 40s and 50s.

Re:It scales fine when it's a transport system

[Hognoxious]

You do need to build your cities around it though, which most European cities did.

With a few exceptions, European cities were already old when horses were invented, let alone buses, trams & underground railways.

Some of them did get an extensive makeover in the early 1950s, though.

A few facts for perspective

[Bromancer]

The population of the country of Luxembourg is 590,00. This is about equivalent to the population of Wyoming, which is the least populated state in the United states. As another post in this thread noted, Luxembourg is slightly smaller than Rhode Island. However, Rhode Island has a population of 1.05 million, or about twice that of Luxembourg.

Luxembourg City has a population of 110,000, which is actually less than the number of people who would attend a University of Michigan Football game on a Saturday in the fall. In fact, the university does supply free bus service to all those people for many years, yet it doesn't seem to warrant a celebratory article on slashdot.

The city of Columbus, Ohio in the United States also offers free mass transit. Columbus has a population of 870,000, or more than1.3 times that of the entire country of Luxembourg, or about 8 times that of Luxembourg City. This is a bigger achievement by far, yet has not warranted a celebratory article in slashdot. Btw, Columbus is not a complete anomaly, Salt Lake City, Pittsburgh, and Miami also do this, to name a few.

Also, many other cities around the world do this.

The point of this not to downplay the helpfulness of free mass transit. For reasons mentioned elsewhere, like traffic, it can be a very good thing. Why all this needs to be mentioned is the tone of the article. It is making a big deal about how a COUNTRY has free mass transit, with some implied shame about why other countries are not following this lead. In a forum made of people who pride themselves as "nerds" logic and nuance must be a factor. In truth, many other entities that are bigger than Luxembourg have done this already. Saying in a breathless voice, 'but, it's a country." really does not have great meaning. In reality what is important is size and area covered. So, this is by far not a world first.

The real story should be, why not earlier Luxembourg?

Re:A few facts for perspective

[jpaine619]

The population of the country of Luxembourg is 590,00.

What the fuck is that number? Is that 59,000? Is that 590,000? Is it 590? I know people in Europe use a comma instead of a period sometimes (is it universal?), but I thought y'all still grouped your shit in threes like the rest of us...

The US uses gas taxes as a good proxy

[raymorris]

Gas taxes are a pretty good proxy for that, and more efficient. Heavier vehicles cause more wear and tear on the roads and use more fuel, so it works. The US has been doing this since 1932.

I'm curious what country you live in.

Re:The US uses gas taxes as a good proxy

[darkwing_bmf]

For roads, okay. But what about the the lost value due to parking lots? That land could certainly be put to better uses, including making everything denser so trips would be shorter and you'd need motorized transport less often.

good for you

[Anonymous Coward]

when you can walk the circumference of your country in an hour, less on a bike, the overhead costs of free transit are so minimal that this isn't a big deal.

#slownewsdayuntilccntalksmuellersreport

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

There were

[SuperKendall]

there are security people who ride along most trains anyway

Will there still be as many in a system no longer generating revenue? I'm suspicious of how the end game looks here.

I was always fine with the system where people with money paid for public transit, and people without skipped paying fares. That seems to work pretty well most places, and it brought in a lot of revenue for public transit specifically.

Re:There were

[ShanghaiBill]

A big problem with "free" services, is that the user is no longer a paying customer, the provider loses nothing from a decline in ridership, and has little incentive to care about quality.

Nevertheless, this will likely work fine in Luxembourg. It is small, affluent, socially-cohesive, and a high-trust society. But their success will not translate to Detroit.

Let's redefine Free [Re:Free]

[Geoffrey.landis]

You're working hard to redefine words so that they don't mean anything in order to make a point that is banal. In this case, you're working hard to redefine the word "free" so that it has no meaning at all.

Yes, you're correct, if something is free, that means somebody else paid, so if you want to be "pedantic" you can say that the word free is meaningless, if you just redefine the word with the purpose of saying nothing is free.

But that redefinition is useless, and more to the point, it's not what the word means.

If you actually want to be pedantic, you may say that the word "free" always requires a prepositions: when you say something is free, that means it is free to a particular person.

Re:Land area of Luxembourg Rhode Island

[Anonymous Coward]

Hmm, to give you another data point, Vancouver island is about a dozen times larger than Luxembourg and has double the population.

It's not free

[McFortner]

It's not free like they said it will be. It's just that they won't pay for it when you get on. It will be paid for from the taxes collected by the state, which will be going higher to cover the costs. TANSTAAFL.

free as in Free to Use, Captain Obvious

[Uberbah]

You may not be paying for it when you use it, but it's being paid for though taxation. It's not free, far from it.

Good thing that's a straw man then. The "free" in free health care, free higher education, free public transportation is free to use . Same as it's free for you to use any of the public roads or highways without paying a toll to use them. Which none of the people who complain about the cost of mass transit had a problem with when it was time to spend trillions to construct them.

How much is saved?

[Anonymous Coward]

Once they dismantle all the money-collection, security, and auditing apparatus, and dispense with selling and verifying tickets, and fare inspectors, and so on...one wonders how much more, if any, they will be losing. (Another example: I have been told, anecdotally, that the major thing you're paying for in a phone bill is the infrastructure to enable you to pay.)

Yeah well

[jpaine619]

When your entire country is the size of a postage stamp...........

Free as in lunch?

[Anonymous Coward]

No such thing as a free lunch.