NYC Subway Fare over last 120 years adjusted for inflationChrisFromLongIsland t1_jcluz09 wrote
The true cost of running the system has skyrocketed. The fare used to cover the total cost of the system. Now the fare covers about 1/3 the cost of a ride(pre covid). Probably less now that the ridership is down.
Die-Nacht t1_jcmoike wrote
The fares should NOT cover the total cost of the system. No transit system works like that.
The simple fact is that transportation has to be subsidized, it can't ever be "profitable". And that's all transportation, even private car usage is heavily subsidized.
One of the big reasons public transit sucks in this country is that we keep demanding that it be profitable, all while not demanding the same from other forms of transport (aka, the car industry).
andruuNewgen t1_jcn89y4 wrote
And fares is an oversimplified way to look at the value of transit. The subway increases economic activity where ever it runs, which increases tax revenues and land values in general and its only fair some of that funnels back into the transit system.
iamnotimportant t1_jcnjxif wrote
That's how a lot of other cities run it, the transit system owns the land near their stations, that land is obviously more valuable cause there's transit there, they directly benefit as a result.
EmoRedneck t1_jd65sc3 wrote
What cities?
iamnotimportant t1_jd67x2h wrote
Tokyo, hong kong ther'es probably others. I forget one of them also has a metro card that doubles as a pay card for everything.
greenlambda t1_jcnxk2j wrote
This is not true. Both the London Underground and the Tokyo metro system have >100% Farebox recovery ratio https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Farebox_recovery_ratio There are reasonable discussions to be had about what the “ideal” ratio should be, but self funded is sometimes possible.
gammison t1_jco5zff wrote
For London that's mainly because of the way fares work and the reduced number of stations and hours even though there's slightly more track. The system is divided up into zones encircling central London and depending on between which zones you are traveling and whether you are traveling at a peak hour, the fare goes up.
It would be like if within the bottom half of Manhattan, and within each borough the fare was 2.75 but then if you crossed between them you'd get charged an extra two dollars. There are also daily and weekly caps that depend on zones and peak times. It's a pretty complicated fare system.
The weekly cap for the largest zone travel is like 90 dollars, way more than the 33 dollar cap the MTA has.
The buses in London also work differently and some are much cheaper than the London Underground (and MTA) and have daily caps of like 5 dollars while others are more expensive.
Buses in London are also subsidized, unlike the trains. Makes sense considering there are over 700 lines and like 20 thousand bus stops in London, double that of the MTA.
The Tokyo metro also has ticket price tiers that depend on distance traveled (they still use paper tickets where you get a source and destination station iirc). These actually cap out at like $2.50 USD. Again though, beyond the cost of operation being cheaper in Japan, there are reduced hours and fewer stations and daily ridership is actually higher than the NYC subway.
All this is to say, these self funded systems depend on pretty different conditions from the MTA. The MTA to self fund like this would have to do a combination of hour reductions and tiered distance and congestion pricing.
It would be very expensive just to to make the logistical changes to how swipes work for that, but imo is also just not socially worth it. I'd rather have a progressive percentage tax on all city residents and businesses (to hit the commuters out of city) and make the whole system free than do some chicanery of "well we'll target 50 percent self funded so raise fares x amount, spend this much to do cross-borough pricing, and reduce hours by y".
We should also transition the MTA to being fully state owned, not the current public benefit corporation model.
chetlin t1_jco80bz wrote
They charge £6.70 minimum too if you pay with cash, which I did the first time I took a train there in 2019 :( from King's Cross to Old Street, just a couple stops, equivalent to $8.16.
gammison t1_jcob4tg wrote
Yeah they do that on purpose to force people to use cards and phones.
woodcider t1_jco42b5 wrote
I’m guessing the fact that they both have zoned fares helps. A flat rate at the same ridership level will bring in less revenue.
WikiSummarizerBot t1_jcnxlkf wrote
>The farebox recovery ratio (also called fare recovery ratio, fare recovery rate or other terms) of a passenger transportation system is the fraction of operating expenses which are met by the fares paid by passengers. It is computed by dividing the system's total fare revenue by its total operating expenses.
^([ )^(F.A.Q)^( | )^(Opt Out)^( | )^(Opt Out Of Subreddit)^( | )^(GitHub)^( ] Downvote to remove | v1.5)
damnatio_memoriae t1_jcnsya4 wrote
1000%. the subway is a service that makes the city a desirable place to live, work, and do business. it enables people to move freely and cheaply throughout the city throughout the day and night, visitors and citizens alike. the goal is not to make a direct profit off of these people for the city. the goal is to use public funds to benefit the public -- to spend tax dollars to improve the lives and livelihood of the citizenry and visitors to the city.
YutaniCasper t1_jco633h wrote
Japanese trains are a mix of a public/private and they’re stellar
RyzinEnagy t1_jcpxznk wrote
True on a macro level.
NYC had a specific set of circumstances. The nickel fare was kept way too long, and the city's money went to Moses' highways instead of system maintenance. The city went broke in the 70s and was forced to cede control of the subways to the state. Today we're playing catch-up for maintenance that should have been done 50-100 years ago, and the subway is still under state control.
Powerful-Attorney-26 t1_jcruhdq wrote
The subways were taken over by the state in the 1960s.
dlerach t1_jctg8ge wrote
Unification of the subway system happened in 1940.
[deleted] t1_jcmsm4z wrote
[deleted]
k1lk1 t1_jcomur5 wrote
As pointed out below, you're simply wrong on the point that farebox recovery can't ever fund the system.
Upleftright_syndrome t1_jd3zyy0 wrote
It can't ever fund the system, though. We'd have to completely change the system to a new system. It'd be a completely different system.
User-no-relation t1_jclvbx5 wrote
Why?
vanshnookenraggen t1_jcm10kc wrote
The cost of everything has gone up, and now there are a third fewer daily riders.
One of the biggest factors is debt. The MTA pays for all their capital improvements with debt, which has to be repaid. And right now, when interests rates are high, that debt costs a lot more.
I__LOVE__LSD t1_jcnak4q wrote
Interest rates are high in the context of the past decade, but not so much in the context of the last century.
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/FEDFUNDS
The St Louis Fed has this chart of the fed funds rate going back 70 years, and where we're currently at is still fairly low.
ArcticBeavers t1_jcnjw5j wrote
MTA had it's highest day of ridership in 3 years yesterday. Obviously still much less than pre COVID but 1/3 might be a bit much
oreosfly t1_jctzbtg wrote
Not really. Average daily ridership pre COVID was about 5.5 million. 3.94 mil / 5.5 million = 71.6%, which is not that far off from 66.7%.
ChrisFromLongIsland t1_jcmgtt5 wrote
The costs have gone up vs inflation because other things goods and services have experienced efficiencies and there has been very little efficiencies in the MTA even 100 years later.
The second part. Ridership has declined during covid so there are less fares but the MTA is incapable of cutting service or moving around the schedule to meet changes in demand due to the union.
SnooSongs2714 t1_jcomzxe wrote
Seems like they can’t cut service because of the public outcry too. Seems like there are always people at board meetings complaining about every modification of service. As a general rules, seems to me the public only want more service, not less.
User-no-relation t1_jcmnukl wrote
I mean it went from $1.75 100 years ago to $2.75. That's not a huge increase
edman007 t1_jcn4ste wrote
No, they are saying it was $1.75 for everything, now it's $8.25 and you pay a third ($2.75).
User-no-relation t1_jcn5qgt wrote
The graph is inflation adjusted
edman007 t1_jcn7paq wrote
Yes, it's inflation adjusted. But it's the cost to ride, not the per customer cost to operate. It's missing the second graph, the subsides provided by the government.
They were 0 when it started. It's absolutely not anymore. The MTA says fares only make up 23% of their budget. So MTA wide, the cost per ride is $11.96.
That $1.75 at the start was more than the cost per ride (since they were private companies with some amount of profit). The $2.75 for today is a tiny fraction of the cost.
lilBob1989 t1_jcnzgid wrote
Huh interestingly that is a lot closer to true average price on london tube
woodcider t1_jco3tbk wrote
We complain but a flat fare is such a good thing for commuters.
Powerful-Attorney-26 t1_jcruo9l wrote
It isn't the unions. It is that the city needs the level of service to function.
IIAOPSW t1_jcniv1s wrote
Well, the first part of the graph from 1904 to 1954 is a historical accident. Basically the subway was built by contracting it out to private companies, namely the BMT and IRT. But the city couldn't afford the full price up front, so part of the payment was that these companies got to also run the service and collect fares. Part of the contracts made certain stipulations to prevent these companies from screwing the public, among them being fares were capped at 5 cents. Flash forward 50 years, inflation happens but fares are still capped. Populist view both companies as "greedy corporations" and have been trying to murder them since the 20s, and so they finally get their wish. Neither company could stay solvent at that price cap, and no elected official wanted to amend the contract and let them raise it. The city buys up the bankrupt private operators which is how we get to where we are today. Then for the first time fares get to rise to match (and apparently surpass) inflation.
damnatio_memoriae t1_jcnsdt1 wrote
stipulations to prevent companies from screwing the public?
imagine such a world...
tonka737 t1_jcqtsu1 wrote
Everything also going bankrupt or investors choose not to take on that burden and the city is left trying to dig itself out of financial holes via taxes and such. Sounds shitty to me.
AnacharsisIV t1_jcnuat7 wrote
Maintenance has to be a huge part of it. There are parts of the system still using parts designed (if not manufactured) a century ago. In many cases there are no companies manufacturing replacement parts, so they have to be machined in-house by the MTA. I'm pretty sure there are literal blacksmiths employed by the MTA because that was still state of the art technology when the subways were constructed.
Years of deferred maintenance are catching up.
ArmArtArnie t1_jcn5pgw wrote
The fact that a huge number of riders don't pay contributes to this
mistrsteve t1_jcwhkpe wrote
What proportion of riders do you think don't pay, and how much do you think that contributes to the farebox recovery ratio?
ArmArtArnie t1_jcwiiw4 wrote
From watching people getting on and off the bus I ride every day, I would say 40% of the people getting on aren't paying and that's being conservative
damnatio_memoriae t1_jcnsk6c wrote
do you have a source that the fare used to cover the cost? because that seems incredibly unrealistic beyond maybe the first few years. the fare literally didn't change until after WWII.
Powerful-Attorney-26 t1_jcrurx1 wrote
I think that the fsres stopped covering the cost about 1915.
damnatio_memoriae t1_jcsg7ya wrote
no idea if that's true but thats about what i would've assumed, give or take -- so doesn't that kind of make the previous comment somewhat meaningless?
Viewing a single comment thread. View all comments