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SmartTrack (Proposed)

ssiguy2 said:
Transit users are VERY price sensitive. This is why every time fares go up on the TTC there is a corresponding drop in ridership even if the increased fares mean better service. This is also why GO has lousy ridership levels in the city of Toronto itself and adding more trains at the same price won't make any difference. Tory knows this while Metrolinx still thinks people will pay any price for better service aka UPX.
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Not disputing your point, but I'm questioning the wisdom of accepting it.

This whole debate about ST fare level is nice - so long as one assumes that whatever isn't covered from the farebox just falls from the skies.

This discussion ought to be about that actual facts of cost recovery. Yes, transit riders are sensitive about fare increases. Are we happy if ST had a lesser fare recovery statistic than other things TTCish? Should it recover as much at the farebox as GO? We can't just sweep the non-farebox funding under the carpet, it will come from the riders also - as taxes.

There are lots of things up in the air considering Fare Integration is in flux, and we don't really have a handle on what ST is or how many people will ride it yet. So I'm not taking a firm position. But we need to be less cavalier about thinking there is room for a super low fare.
- Paul
 
Well I'm sorry to hear that ST will be run by Metrolinx as a GO service.

Metrolinx {like GO} has never had the 416 at the top of it's priority list. Even if 100% fare integration comes along, for many ST will simply not be worth it. Even if the train comes every 2 minutes, for many it won't make a hoot of difference..........if you haven't got the money, you haven't got the money...........case closed.

For those who have the money, certainly there commute will be an easier and faster one but for those who don't have the money to spare {poor, lower/working class, disabled, students} their commutes will probably get decidedly worse. This is because those who can afford the service will take it as opposed to their regular TTC routes and this will result in lower ridership for those routes which will mean reduced service. Also the TTC will have to rejig their routes to converge more at RER stations..............fewer buses heading to the subway they can afford and more buses heading to the RER service they can't afford.

This is two-tiered transit service at it's best.................improved service for those who can afford to pay and worse service for those who can't.
 
ssiguy2 said:
For those who have the money, certainly there commute will be an easier and faster one but for those who don't have the money to spare {poor, lower/working class, disabled, students} their commutes will probably get decidedly worse.
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No disrespect meant to students or the poor, but this is a bit thick. If you consider transit fares as a fraction of what it costs to attend college or university, a fare increase is not that big a deal.

I would probably not comment except that it's spring break week, and a great many students are in Daytona Beach. Asking students to choose between a road trip and a yearly ST pass doesn't seem that harsh. Ye Olde Brunswick House closes this month. One less night on the town, and Toronto's students will recoup whatever an ST fare structure may bring.

- Paul
 
crs1026 said:
No disrespect meant to students or the poor, but this is a bit thick. If you consider transit fares as a fraction of what it costs to attend college or university, a fare increase is not that big a deal.
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I mentioned an hour ago that a $1 fare premium for SmartTrack works out to $500/year, assuming two trips per work day. That's a huge deal for a student. Many of these students who are working part time have annual incomes of less than $10,000 per year. That $1 increase would eat 5% of their income.

crs1026 said:
I would probably not comment except that it's spring break week, and a great many students are in Daytona Beach. Asking students to choose between a road trip and a yearly ST pass doesn't seem that harsh. Ye Olde Brunswick House closes this month. One less night on the town, and Toronto's students will recoup whatever an ST fare structure may bring.

- Paul
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I can assure you that road trips to Daytona Beach are not the norm. I've been in University for years and I still haven't known anybody who's taken extravagant vacations.
 
TheTigerMaster said:
That's a huge deal for a student. Many of these students who are working part time have annual incomes of less than $10,000 per year. That $1 increase would eat 5% of their income.
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Great. This would encourage those students to finish their degree sometime within the next 5 years. The current batch of intermediate-school students living in Scarborough and considering Ryserson will price both a potential time savings and the new costs into their future plans. As long as the details aren't held until the last minute, they'll probably be okay.

Wonderful thing about 5 year plans and university students, is almost nobody is impacted without knowledge being available before they put in their application.
 
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TheTigerMaster said:
I mentioned an hour ago that a $1 fare premium for SmartTrack works out to $500/year, assuming two trips per work day. That's a huge deal for a student. Many of these students who are working part time have annual incomes of less than $10,000 per year. That $1 increase would eat 5% of their income.
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I have no illusions about the cost of being a student. (I have two in the family). I would have pegged it closer to $20K than $10K per year, the issue being earnings are far less than cost and student loans end up covering the rest.

I may have sounded a bit chippy - but - if we are bending transit economics too far in the interest of social equity, then we have a problem. Are we going to give a fare discount to socially disadvantaged neighbourhoods? (We know where they are, with some precision)

I would prefer to see us structure transit fares around economic costs and values such as cost of service, distance, time (hence the premium for express services). These reflect the true value of transit.

It's fun for us to debate lines on the map, but sustainable transit has to be paid for somehow.

If some societal group is disadvantaged, then by all means we can offer tax credits, outright subsidies, reduced fares, etc. But let's not distort the underlying costs and benefits of transit. The support we provide to the disadvantaged should be visible. Refusing to recognise the true fare because it would harm the poor is not inclusive, nor is it objective decisionmaking - it's just hiding our head in the sand hoping we are "nice" people.

I suspect ST will cost a bundle to operate. That's fine. Now let's figure out who should pay, and how.

- Paul
 
mdrejhon said:
This may mean TTC is slightly higher than today, and short-distance GO becomes equalized to TTC price. $3.25 (TTC, cash) and $5.02 (GO Weston-Union, Presto) are close enough that a convergence can easily occur within 10 years by sheer inflation-excuse and presto-vs-cash discount adjustment shenanigans (e.g. Metrolinx simply begins holding prices back below inflation). Could be introduced over a multi-year period. And yes, free transfers within criteria (timed, zoned, or whatever).

Alas, it also possibly means TTC isn't a single fare anymore too -- e.g. extra fare to go to Vaughan via TTC subway.

Further reading: Fare Structure Concepts and Fare Integration at MetrolinxEnage.com
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$3.25 to $5.02 is 55% fare hike so its not quite so small. But an extra fare to go to Vaughan I like
 
WislaHD said:
Am I missing something? Why would TTC want to run it?

It is costly to operate and will have less daily ridership than the majority of our arterial bus routes.
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as you add more stations, fare is lowered how can you know for sure less ridership? I just do not like the idea of Metrolinx running things in Toronto and what the future will hold if that happens
 
Palma said:
as you add more stations, fare is lowered how can you know for sure less ridership? I just do not like the idea of Metrolinx running things in Toronto and what the future will hold if that happens
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Would you want the TTC to annex the GO lines then?

I don't see the error of Metrolinx operating a SmartTrack service (if such a service was different from GO, which it is not!). It would probably be more efficient since Metrolinx is already running the other services on the corridor.

But as things stand, even with fare zones and more stations, SmartTrack is still just merely GO-RER.
 
Palma said:
$3.25 to $5.02 is 55% fare hike so its not quite so small. But an extra fare to go to Vaughan I like
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Agreed. How long has it taken for the TTC fare to increase by $1.75? Or even 55%? Seems like an awful lot longer than 10 years. There's political hell to pay whenever you try to raise it by a dime!

I suspect the middle ground where ST is a premium fare, *but* there is a free/nearly-free transfer cost to transfer to TTC might be a viable way forward. If ST remains as GO fares and you still need to pay a full TTC fare to transfer, it's dead in the water.
 
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