The logic of Metro

[elfs]

I can understand that Metro, wanting to save money on gas, sends out the lighter, shorter diesels rather than the longer half-electrics to my neighborhood. What I can't understand is why they send out the lighter, shorter diesels during the commute when ridership is up almost 10% and the buses were already uncomfortably crammed for the 35-minute drive before you took away the articulateds?

Ridership is up so they give us smaller, more crowded buses. It's never really been about covenience and comfort, I know, but could they at least pretend?

Comments

[lucky-otter.livejournal.com]

It's not even necessarily that they *want* to save money on gas - it may be that their budget requires them to. Of course, someone is still setting that budget.. and setting it poorly.

Ahh, the joys of money-losing transit

[danlyke.livejournal.com]

Isn't that just the primary failure of hidden revenue streams? They probably don't actually make an appreciable fraction of their operating costs from ridership revenues, it mostly comes from government grants, so they win if they can show politicians that, yeah, the buses are really full, there's high demand!

But if they actually meet the demand, they'll lose even more money, so it's better to have taxpayers complaining that there aren't enough seats while they're running within budget.

[mrf-arch.livejournal.com]

The nice thing about the high price of gas these days is that you can provide whatever crappy level of service you want as a mass transit system and people will still ride. Ah, the joys of a captive audience...