Times Online Poll: Should local gov'ts support Freedom Trans

[Venter]

Here is the current Gettysburg Times Online Poll:
As of today, 8/20, here is where the poll stands...

Online poll -
Should local governments support Freedom Transit?

Yes 58.5%
No 41.5%

So I decided to use this opportunity to run our own BoroVENT Poll on the same subject.
I even made it just as simple.

[Venter]

I was tempted to lock the Poll with 100% responding "NO", but even I didn't think a Poll of One was quite fair, even if it WAS my opinion

I'll add a secondary, Unofficial Poll to this one:

Should Local Governments support a poorly planned venture that was set up to make somebody money, while sucking taxes from citizens to do so?

Hell, if that's the purpose of Government, maybe they can throw a few bucks MY way!
Most small businesses face a daily struggle to make things work, and there is no lifeline to keep us afloat.

I'm not the one who continued to construct a building downtown as a "Hub" in a town of 5,000, hoping that the people would want to take a glorified bus to points unknown.
These fancy "Trolleys" that parade through our streets, spewing out more greenhouse gases per person than a few cabs would - and CABS would actually take you where you wanted to go!
I have yet to see a trolley pass with more than three persons in it (and I'm counting the driver).

Hey, FREE is NICE, don't get me wrong.
I offer free advice... maybe I can get the Local Governments to pay for that!?

Actually.....................
I could probably do better if I asked them to pay me to keep my opinions to myself! 

[davew]

No government level should support freedom transit. There is not enough demand for it there. If we can't swing it here in western PA (without huge subsidies from people who aren't riding public trans), it's just going to be a huge money soak there, too.

And, Yes, I ride public trans every day. Thanks for paying for my transportation

[lifesaver]

I was under the impression that the free rides were only temporary until more interest was generated to use the trolley.

[Alex Oreilly]

The Gettysburg Foundation is paying for the trolleys, are they now trying to get out of it now that the 150th is over?

I still think the Transit system is a good idea, Im in the hospitality business in town and tell people about it all of of time especially over the 150th. If the other hotels and busniessses would tell their guests about it, people would use it even more.

And I was at Giant today and there was people on the local run, some already on it and soem waiting for it.

[orrtannaexpat]

I have always been skeptical about this venture due to the low population density as mentioned in Venter's 2nd post. Perhaps in the height of the tourist season it might make sense but from Labor Day to Easter the ridership is probably miniscule. It looks like just another hole in the ground to pour money into for minimal and dubious rewards. I would love to take a hard look at their user statistics. Assuming that they haven't cooked the books.

[philliesfan]

I do not feel that the local government nor taxpayers should be keeping this venture afloat. I have wintessed these buses going thru town and frequenting the bus terminal and I can honestly say that I have never witnessed more than 2 or 3 riders at a time.

Where is all the funding coming from for wages of the drivers, fuel, maintenance, insurance, etc? If the powers to be feel that the service is needed, why not condense the routes down and reduce the number of buses needed and maybe even charge a minimal fee to ride, say .25 cents to help off set the cost? Maybe during peak toursit season the buses are a good idea, but certainly not during the "non tourist" season!

[davew]

Public transit will never be self supporting, especially in small areas where there isn't a sigificant portion of the population relying on it, and even then, it won't be self supporting. The nature of society is never to allow them to run on their own dime, because the folks screaming the loudest will always be the ones who want something without paying for all of it.

[diogenes]

PM is correct--on the average 20% of the costs of public transportation is met by the user fees (tickets, tokens, passes, whatever) and the remaining 80% is borne by the taxpayer via a number of ways...I was at the ACTPO sessions and other locations where this fact was spelled out by Far and others but methinks no one was listening.

[davew]

Our local transit authority, which is very well run, and very well utilized at this point (routes have been cut and the well used routes are what's left), generates about 1/4th to 1/3rd of their revenues via fares, as far as I know. The average cost of a two-way ride is somewhere in the neighborhood of $6. If you made it $18 or $20, nobody would ride, and it is literally recognized out in the open as partially a social welfare cause (which negates the ability to ever raise the price to costs in the first place).

It is an impossible equation to make it something that funds itself, and the idea locally that it just needs to get bigger to do better is completely misguided. Adding more routes that lose money is a way to lose more money, not to gain it. The population there just isn't dense enough.

People will gladly pay $6 for a round trip here, though, because that is literally the cheapest price for parking anywhere close to the downtown area, traffic is worse than you could ever dream of in adams county and the cost to park close to the office is more like $10-$20 per day depending on what "close" means to you.