Only Pricing Congestion Can Stop Congestion

[mpd618]

Ok, so I've read through this 5 times and I still don't understand what you're trying to get at...

Buses can move many more people than do cars in a given unit of road space. In other words, a person requires less of the scarce rush-hour roadway space when travelling by bus than they do when travelling by car. The latter case contributes much more to congestion, an order of magnitude more. Which is why it does not make sense to me to have congestion charges that are the same whether you're driving a car or riding in a bus.

It seems reasonable to me that a congestion charge could also apply to buses just as it would to cars, maybe even a slightly larger one to compensate for taking up more space. But divided out per passenger it likely wouldn't be all that high, and would not be a big addition to fares.

 

[gweed123]

Buses can move many more people than do cars in a given unit of road space. In other words, a person requires less of the scarce rush-hour roadway space when travelling by bus than they do when travelling by car. The latter case contributes much more to congestion, an order of magnitude more. Which is why it does not make sense to me to have congestion charges that are the same whether you're driving a car or riding in a bus.

It seems reasonable to me that a congestion charge could also apply to buses just as it would to cars, maybe even a slightly larger one to compensate for taking up more space. But divided out per passenger it likely wouldn't be all that high, and would not be a big addition to fares.

But the vast majority of the people who would otherwise be taking the highways won't be on buses. They'll be on other forms of rapid transit like GO, subway, or LRT, none of which consume any road space. In fact, aside from GO buses, I can only think of a handful of municipal bus routes that even use the highway system (and most of those are in dedicated lanes, like on the 403 in Mississauga), so your point about competing for highway road space, I'm not sure that's very relevant.

My rationale behind making the road toll the same as transit fare is to make it clear in people's mind that taking my car into work is going to cost me just as much as taking transit would, plus gas and parking. It's a 'stick' to get them to switch to using transit. And if they still want to drive, then let them help cover the cost of running the transit system. It's merely putting the automobile and transit on the same cost level, so that "it costs me more to take transit" isn't an excuse for staying in your car.

I would hope that it would eventually be a self-fulfilling system: people who are driving help fund transit expansion, which in turn makes transit more attractive, which causes more people to switch. Eventually, you would have relatively un-congested roads and a pretty kick-ass transit system.

 

[ssiguy2]

It is grossly unfair to have tolls entering the city.
Why should someone driving their small, fuel efficient, low polluting vehicle who drives just a couple of km from Miss to Sherway Gardens pay a toll but someone driving their Hummer from Miminco to Malvern do so free of charge?
Gas taxes are the only regional option and they cost almost nothing to collect and administer.
Gas taxes raised by Metrolinx for mass transportation infrastructure is the only sane option.
Even if there was the political will and OKed by Queen's Park they may still may not be effective in a Toronto context. Why? Because if people pay their gas taxes they want results and not promises of doing an enviornmental assesment and a line they may start to build in 10 years using grossly inflated prices that will take twice as long to build as any other city with Taj Mahal stations.
Atleast when Vancouver sys they are going to build something they damn well build it and start yesterday. Seriously.........$1.2 billion to put new track on a tiny 6km SRT line with the stations already built and somehow it's going to take 3 years?
People will tolerate gas taxes but only if they see real results and know their tax dollars are being well spent.

 

[sixrings]

but were nt tolling or taxing people because they are polluting. we are tolling and taxing primarly since they are causing congestion. what happens if every 905 resident buys a smart car or a volt to limit how much gas they use. ultimately this would cause less tax revenue which would hurt the transit funds. the only sollution would then be to raise the tax again. also what happens when in the future all cars are electric??????????

 

[W. K. Lis]

The world's estimated population went from 6 billion (6,000,000,000) in 1999 to 7 billion (7,000,000,000) in 2011. That's congestion by just the numbers. All of them demanding housing, food, and oil, increasing those prices. Since the supply of oil is not matching the increase in population, the price of oil has to go up, If everyone wanted their own car when they grow up, just imagine what the price of gasoline at the pump will be.

BTW. Estimates are that world population may hit 8 billion by 2027, just 16 years from now. It was only 4 billion people back in 1974.

 

[ibhattac]

It is grossly unfair to have tolls entering the city.
Why should someone driving their small, fuel efficient, low polluting vehicle who drives just a couple of km from Miss to Sherway Gardens pay a toll but someone driving their Hummer from Miminco to Malvern do so free of charge?
Gas taxes are the only regional option and they cost almost nothing to collect and administer.
Gas taxes raised by Metrolinx for mass transportation infrastructure is the only sane option.

Ssiguy2, as has been pointed out, I think the idea behind congestion fees is to control demand (car use) of a fixed product (roadway). So, in your example, the person driving just a couple of kilometres from from Mississauga into to Sherway Gardens would be tolled because the demand for that particular roadway exceeds its supply. The person driving from Mimico to Malvern would not because the route they take is not overwhelmed by demand. But you're right, in terms of environmental/roadway repair cost - the Hummer is no doubt causing more damage. Gas+fuel oil derivative/additive taxes, taxes on car parts, taxes on tires, a tax on the number of kilometres driven between plate renewals could all go towards moving some people into more reliable, fuel-efficient, lower-impact vehicles, encourage some people to look for work closer to home (or move closer to work), and encourage others still to opt onto transit where possible. To keep going with your rather apt example, that person driving 2 kilometres from Mississauga to Sherway Gardens really couldn't get on the bus or ride a bike/scooter in better weather?

Gas taxes, while administratively easy to collect, as a sole means to control congestion would not work. It might very well accomplish the very thing you point out: people could simply switch to smaller, more fuel-efficient, low-polluting vehicles. So, instead of 1000 cars per hour (on a roadway designed for 750 cars per hour) that pollute, we would now have 1000 cars per hour (on a roadway designed for 750 cars per hour) that don't pollute quite so much. The issue of congestion (vehicle demand in excess of supply of roadway) still hasn't been addressed - we've simply moved people into lower-polluting vehicles that use less energy.

I think the challenge here is that, much like most things, there is no silver bullet that will solve the problem overnight, and all options are going to be unfair to one party or another. It's going to have to be a balance between the many things that have already been discussed here, subject to the vagaries of the the public/electoral process.

Gas taxes, vehicle registration fees, mileage/consumption fees, congestion fees, road tolls, increased parking fees, more mixing of employment and residential uses in the traditional suburbs (as opposed to the current modernist industrial park approach), dedicated transit routes/lanes, peak-hour transit that connects suburbs to suburbs and not just suburbs to downtown, etc will all have to be part of the mix. And in order to get any of that done, people are going to have to speak to their elected officials. Metrolinx can only do so much. Toronto's Mayor, among others across Ontario, have shelved transit plans in favour of (a) subways to nowhere to be financed by someone else, or (b) nothing.

Meanwhile, people need to get to whatever job that they are lucky to get, and more often than not, that means having to rely on the use of a personal vehicle for lack of choice. Who in their right mind would spend an extra 30-45 minutes each way on transit for principle when they can hop in a $4000 used corolla and get an extra hour of their lives back to deal with all the other things and be with family and friends?

There's some significant transit-related events coming up in the City of Toronto. Among them: http://torontotalksmobilityforum.eventbrite.com/. Attend. Tell your co-workers to attend. Tell your friends to attend. Drag your family along. Otherwise, expect the status quo.

I live in downtown Toronto and bomb around in a v6. A resale vehicle that made sense at the time, but barely gets 350 km out of a full tank of gas. I am trying to use transit more often these days though it is a financial net zero and doesn't work for my job requirements. My rental insurance would be the same even if I dropped a vehicle from the policy, so by the time I've done gas tanks and oil changes maintenance upkeep parking fees etc etc I wind up having spent the same for a metropass as I have for the vehicle. But relying upon a metropass means adding an extra hour to three hours of travel to my day. I tried for a month - it wasn't worth it to me.I see limited ways for me to get out of not having a vehicle. The first is to find another job in my field that would allow me to get away without having a vehicle. I'm fortunate enough to be happy in my present position, so there's no real inducement to leave. Or there needs to be clear financial case for my to give up my vehicle the way things are priced, i.e. the cost to me really needs to get to a place where the loss in disposable income is far in excess of losing an extra hour to three hours out of my day depending upon my work demands.

 

[kkgg7]

In order to discourage people from driving, a city needs to make it both convenient and affordable for people to travel, thereby eliminating the need to drive, which Toronto failed to do miserably. If owning a car is both cheaper and faster, why would I take subway and bus, which takes 2 or 3 times long? For example, if you live by Sheppard and Victoria Park, driving to Pearson is a matter of 20 minutes, yet to take TTC, you need to take a bus to Don Mills station, take two subways to Yonge/Bloor and another subway to Kipling, and then catch the 192 Rocket, which takes almost 2 hours. Why would I take TTC? There are too few subway lines, the convenience of which, or the lack of it, is not enough to incentivized people to take it.

In terms of price, a three person family would need $363 a month. Do the math.

Why people don't drive in NYC and London, because there is really very little need for it. In Toronto, many still need it, even if you live just by a subway station, because if the place you need to go is not within 10 minutes walking distance from a station, you are reluctant to use the subway. The government must eradicate the need to drive, simply making driving more expensive is not gonna solve it, as most people still prefer paying the price for a lot more convenience, comfort and flexibility.

Yes, there are plenty of street cars and buses, but if they show up every 4 minutes too, they might mean something.

 

[spider]

We have all been treated to the urban myth that road congestion is the fault of those selfish motorists who are sitting all alone in their car occupying the same road space as the bus beside them.

A photo of a bus labelled “50” and a car labelled “1” stopped side by side at a traffic light is triumphantly presented to illustrate this point. Nice picture but it is a close-up, we all know that if the photographer had included the street behind these 2 vehicles for a couple of blocks we would see maybe 50 or 100 cars for each bus.

These cars contain 50 to 150 people, where is their bus, do they have a choice? Since the bus in the photo is full all the motorists behind it only have a choice of driving or walking.

Putting two or three times as many busses on the road is not the answer for a peak period problem. The current model is inefficient in that a bus is on the road with a driver for 4 hours in the morning peak period that is best described as only about 2 hours in duration.

The solution to congestion is not better use of the existing roadways with bigger and more street cars and busses.

The solution to congestion is providing motorists and others an alternative that works. I think a DRL is the solution, not to be confused with a bus or a street car on a ROW within a road allowance. A DRL need not follow an existing roadway or street because it is not a replacement for local transit, it is an enhancement for people who are headed downtown. The volume of riders switching from the traditional “bus to subway” route to work could possibly save us from expanding the current inefficient transit model without sacrificing service to those who use the TTC for local short haul trips.

Let’s get our heads out of that box.

 

[mpd618]

Why people don't drive in NYC and London, because there is really very little need for it.

Both cities have the same kinds of transit capacity and connectivity issues that Toronto has. In NYC (at least Manhattan), parking is absurdly expensive (because it is scarce) and a big reason why people don't drive. Similarly for expensive parking in central London, but with a congestion charge added to that. It's not just that there's no need to drive -- it's also that there is little ability to do it on a regular basis in downtown.

These cars contain 50 to 150 people, where is their bus, do they have a choice? Since the bus in the photo is full all the motorists behind it only have a choice of driving or walking.

Putting two or three times as many busses on the road is not the answer for a peak period problem. The current model is inefficient in that a bus is on the road with a driver for 4 hours in the morning peak period that is best described as only about 2 hours in duration.

On the one hand you are saying that the buses are full and there's no more space for new riders. On the other hand you are saying that running two or three times as many buses doesn't solve any problem. Which is it? Certainly peak-only commuter trips are not the most efficient kind of transit, but they're loads more efficient than private automobiles doing the same thing.

 

[freshcutgrass]

Face it folks....the thread title is the only answer to reducing congestion. Everything else is just denial.

Congestion has nothing to do with transit pricing. It isn't a case of "fair" or "unfair". The 99% of vehicles that comprise congestion, are the least efficient users of the road. And the least efficient users of the road are the ones that have to pay.

There will always be more supply of vehicles in Toronto than any increased capacity of roads or transit could ever hold, so the only way to create traffic flow to a desirable level, is to price it accordingly. Even with a fairly high fees, I bet it would still be congested.

But at least it would generate some serious revenue that could have subway/LRT construction funded on a regular basis. We should be building subways/LRT non-stop.

 

[valkoholic]

Toronto will never 'stop' congestion on its highways. Even reducing it would be heroic.

I'm pretty convinced there's three easy steps to developing a sustainable transportation system in Toronto.

1. End bad land use planning in the suburbs. Employment sprawl, in particular, is creating transportation problems that basically can't be solved.
2. Toll roads.
3. Expand higher-order transit.

All three are possible and, done together, would actually work because they compliment each other. If we keep doing the third one only on a sporadic, unplanned basis the transportation network will get more bogged down.

 

[Palma]

I

In terms of price, a three person family would need $363 a month. Do the math.
.

I have done the math and it is no where near that. A metropass I believe is
119 (not sure). For 2 adults = 238.00. For children under 12 its .75 per ride. Even if i child were to use transit 2x per day and 7 days a week it will total 45.00 for a total of 283.00 for the 3 people. And since people easily fill up with 60.00 - 80.00 in gas per week, the car is not cheaper plus the congestion on top of it.

 

[kkgg7]

I have done the math and it is no where near that. A metropass I believe is
119 (not sure). For 2 adults = 238.00. For children under 12 its .75 per ride. Even if i child were to use transit 2x per day and 7 days a week it will total 45.00 for a total of 283.00 for the 3 people. And since people easily fill up with 60.00 - 80.00 in gas per week, the car is not cheaper plus the congestion on top of it.

You are right. yet math is not everything. Driving is still a lot more comfortable and fast and flexible than taking the infrequent ttc bus and unrelaible ttc subways. So if driving costs 100 more a month, families still prefer driving, especially considering the family needs to go somewhere together.

I don't think pricing congestion, although reasonable, is not going to solve the problem, unless the government implement really draconian measures (like $20 each time you enter downtown, or congestion really becomes unbearable, which is not the case, yet. addding 10% 20% of the cost is not going to do the trick.

Another way I can think of is to get rid of all those surface parking in downtown. But i doubt that can ever happen.

The problem Torontonian face is public transit is not that great. (buses don't really count). People want fast transit to be able to go pretty much everywhere, not just along Yonge and Bloor st, just like NYC, London and Paris, in order to consider giving up driving. With our two subway lines, it is not gonna motivate them not to drive. The thought of waiting for a bus in winter is scary enough.

 

[mpd618]

The problem Torontonian face is public transit is not that great. (buses don't really count). People want fast transit to be able to go pretty much everywhere, not just along Yonge and Bloor st, just like NYC, London and Paris, in order to consider giving up driving. With our two subway lines, it is not gonna motivate them not to drive. The thought of waiting for a bus in winter is scary enough.

This is just silly. Why exactly don't buses count? Because they don't come frequently? That can be fixed. In London, more people take buses than take the tube. If you give the buses their own lanes without congestion, and have them come frequently, they become a viable mode of transportation.

Toronto is not that special, and its problems are not that different from those in other cities.

 

[gweed123]

You are right. yet math is not everything. Driving is still a lot more comfortable and fast and flexible than taking the infrequent ttc bus and unrelaible ttc subways. So if driving costs 100 more a month, families still prefer driving, especially considering the family needs to go somewhere together.

I don't think pricing congestion, although reasonable, is not going to solve the problem, unless the government implement really draconian measures (like $20 each time you enter downtown, or congestion really becomes unbearable, which is not the case, yet. addding 10% 20% of the cost is not going to do the trick.

Another way I can think of is to get rid of all those surface parking in downtown. But i doubt that can ever happen.

The problem Torontonian face is public transit is not that great. (buses don't really count). People want fast transit to be able to go pretty much everywhere, not just along Yonge and Bloor st, just like NYC, London and Paris, in order to consider giving up driving. With our two subway lines, it is not gonna motivate them not to drive. The thought of waiting for a bus in winter is scary enough.

The biggest source of congestion by far is the home-work commute. It's unrealistic to expect that families use transit for all types of trips. Home-work trips are the easiest kind to switch over to transit, because a lot of the destinations are in similar locations (i.e. downtown).

The idea with peak hour road tolling is to get people to change THAT behaviour is particular, because that is when our system is most stressed. Taking kids to hockey at 7am on a Saturday morning doesn't really stress the system that much, nor does going to visit Grandma on Tuesday evening.

Rush hour is when the most people are on the road. It's also the time when there's the greatest opportunity to take people OFF the road. Price it accordingly.