Mr. Anderson is correct that no (feasible) amount of expenditure on public transportation systems will alleviate congestion under present conditions.
The only way to bring about any long-term satisfactory melioration of our transportation system is to bring automobile driving closer to a market pricing framework. The Victoria (B.C.) Transport Policy Institute maintains what is probably the most comprehensive digest of studies conducted to determine the costs of driving, encompassing a broad range of internalized and social costs from the internal costs of vehicle ownership, operation and insurance; to time costs experienced by the driver sitting in traffic; to the social costs of land devoted to parking, air pollution, and barrier effects on communities. While these costs include a number that are very difficult to quantify, they also are quite conservative in excluding costs that would dramatically increase the overall social cost of driving (e.g., a large part of the cost of the U.S. aggression in Iraq and its aftermath -- in dollars and global destabilization -- quite properly could be tallied as the cost of maintaining our single-occupancy way of life). Some of this material can be accessed at www.vtpi.org. In reviewing and aggregating the results of the many studies, the Institute locates ranges and midpoints of costs. For example, in one aggregation, each mile of driving during peak hours costs about $1.18 (1996 dollars, and before the fleet began to show a dramatic shift to quite more costly SUV's, so that costs would be perhaps substantially higher today). Of this, only $0.41/mile is the variable cost that the driver bears, and that has an impact on his/her choise to drive. The rest ($0.23/mile fixed cost and $0.53 external/social cost) either has no impact on a person's choice to drive or in fact (in the case of fixed costs) tends to increase the tendency. It is fundamental that the "socially optimal" amount of an activity occurs when the activity bears its actual price. Requiring a driver to face the actual cost of his/her driving -- e.g., by a gas tax equivalent to the combined internal-fixed and external costs of $0.76/mile, or some $10 to $14/gallon -- is the only real way to put a curb on this American pathology. Building more highway lanes -- when driving remains profoundly "subsidized" -- only prompts more activity that already is well beyond the "socially optimal" level (particularly in that travel time costs are the most important internal, variable cost, meaning that adding new capacity will be the most effective way to prompt more driving). Pricing driving at its actual cost, and making clear as a matter of public policy that this market framework will be maintained, is the only thing that will have a real, long-term impact on development patterns and mindsets. And it is only within that framework that transit -- in myriad innovative forms -- will truly show the results that Mr. Anderson wants to see, because it then will be competing on a level playing field with the single-occupancy vehicle, and because a population unwilling -- and rightly so -- to pay the true costs of driving will clamor for it. We can't demand that transit solve the problems created by massive subsidization of the single-occupancy vehicle until we, as a society, are willing to end that subsidy and stand up for the free market. Chuck Holtman Prospect Park From: "Anderson & Turpin" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: Re: [Mpls] Minneapolis; becoming a cold Atlanta? Date: Sun, 19 Oct 2003 14:25:30 -0500 Dave Peihl wrote: > Great article in the Star Tribune regarding the > potential future of Twin Cities transit - keep in mind > that a recent study said we'd need 70% more freeways > over the next 15 years or so to keep congestion > reasonable. Is this a time when local politicians > should be offering alternative solutions to freeways? > Clearly, there would be no end in sight in terms of > enlarging freeways. Mark Anderson replies: It's funny how the only arguments being made for mass transit are to complain how expensive and impossible highway construction is. Those arguments would be a lot more credible if they'd include the cost and possibility of reducing congestion by building mass transit. Berg had an article in today's Strib that said it would cost $20 billion to build enough lanes to make congestion "reasonable." His only reference to the cost of mass transit was to say that $20 billion would build 20 Hiawatha lines. But I seriously question whether 20 Hiawatha lines would make congestion "reasonable." What I'm concerned about is we will spend something in that range for mass transit over the next 10-20 years, and it'll still take hours to get from one side of the metro to another, by any means. I think mass transit advocates are afraid to come up with a comprehensive study, because then we'd all see the enormous costs of lowering congestion with all the trains and buses needed to do so. It's much easier to take potshots at highway costs. Mark V Anderson Bancroft REMINDERS: 1. Think a member has violated the rules? Email the list manager at [EMAIL PROTECTED] before continuing it on the list. 2. Don't feed the troll! Ignore obvious flame-bait. ________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe, Un-subscribe, etc. at: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
