From: Lee Daniel Crocker (lee@piclab.com)
Date: Tue Feb 11 2003 - 16:09:42 MST
ML> Successfully used public mass transit is a
ML> paramount sign of a mature and ingrained socialist society.
DB> I dunno about that, but it sure makes life in Melbourne considerably
DB> more comfortable and pleasant than it would be otherwise. New York,
DB> too, for that matter.
Yep, I think Mike's case is a bit overstated. There can be, and has
been, successful private profit-making mass transit. One I remember,
for example, is the private bus system that Las Vegas had until it was
taken over by force and replaced with a government system. It was sold
to the public as a way to make the system cheaper and ensure that it
would cover outlying areas that the successful private system didn't.
It does in fact now cover more areas than the private system did, but
it is now more expensive and far less reliable.
BART in the San Francisco area is nominally a private enterprize, but
it does benefit from some subsidies. It certainly could be successful
as a private system, since it is extremely useful to residents and does
in fact make about as much money in fares as it takes to maintain. One
major reason it isn't, though, is that the bus and taxicab lobbies are
fighting hard against allowing it to extend to the airport, which would
likely double its revenues with little extra expense.
-- Lee Daniel Crocker <lee@piclab.com> <http://www.piclab.com/lee/> "All inventions or works of authorship original to me, herein and past, are placed irrevocably in the public domain, and may be used or modified for any purpose, without permission, attribution, or notification."--LDC
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