Free Public Transit: Moronic US culture dumps on Blagojevich while EU seeks progress

Thursday, April 8, 2010

Moronic US culture dumps on Blagojevich while EU seeks progress

Over 66s free travel pass should be extended Europe-Wide

Posted by Andy White on April 07, 2010 at 01:46 PM

The EU should provide free public transport to all senior citizens, by extending the successful Irish model to all 27 EU member states, Nessa Childers MEP has told the EU Transport Commissioner today.

"I proposed today to the new Transport Commissioner Siim Kallas the extension of free public transport for older people across the EU. Regardless of what country they come from, are living in or are even visiting, older people across Europe should have those same basic set of transport entitlements as their Irish counterparts. What better place to start than an EU-wide bus & train pass? Nessa Childers

Free is Cheaper

How is free transit cheaper? Don't you have to make up for lost fare revenue? The answer is that your city will save so much money in other areas, and quality of life will improve so much that you will get back much more than the lost fares. Some examples are listed below. If you want to see specific numbers, see our spreadsheet here.

Increased return on investment. Public transit involves large fixed costs. When fares are gone, there are more riders per vehicle, getting more value from the investment.
Reduced parking costs. With free transit, fewer people will park downtown. City parking authorities can cost $180 million a year, paid by fines, which are just a tax on customers and delivery services.

Reduced traffic congestion. Studies have shown that the time lost in traffic costs urban economies hundreds of millions of dollars.
Less money exported for gasoline. A medium sized city can export 1 million dollars a day in gasoline money for cars. Free buses will reduce this considerably.
Better quality of life, priceless. In Hasselt, Belgium, when fares were removed, people in hospital started receiving more visitors.