[net.politics] cars versus mass transit

warren (12/03/82)

I have seen endless emotional debates on the merits of mass transit
versus cars and highways.  My state (Illinois) fights this one
perpetually since it has 1 big city with mass transit and lots of
miles of deteriorating roads in the rest of the state.  I seem to
recall someone at one point doing an economic analysis of what is
truely the most economical form of transportation.  I think that
fuel economy was a minor to irrelevant factor.  The ingrediants of
the analysis included:

	Cost of vehicles
	Cost of fuel
	Cost of facilities (roads, rails, stations, etc.)
	maintenance for vehicles and facilities.
	cost of labor
	Cost of time of person being transported.

Has anybody else seen something like this?  As I recall, it was very
hard for mass transit to win because of the extra high-cost labor
needed to operate the system and the relatively high cost of mass
transit technology (due to much lower production volumes). If the
cost of the comuters time was included, that dominated everything
else.

swatt (12/03/82)

DISCLAIMER:
	The views reported here are not necessarily my own.


I remember hearing about a book that made such an anylsis, but I
never read it.  I think the author was Ivan Illych (sp?).  The gist
of the analysis is that cars require:

	gas, oil, maint.
	insurance companies
	expensive roads
	traffic laws
	police to write traffic tickets
	counts to process traffic tickets

and so on.  His point is that the TOTAL cost of operating a car is
quite a bit larger than what any individual owner sees.  He carried out
this calculation for other forms of transportation as well.

Now each form of transportation has a TRUE cost, and an effective
speed.  The greater the effective speed, the less time involved.  If
the $$ savings in less time are equal or greater than the true cost,
you're ahead; otherwise you're behind.

If I remember the reported conclusion right, he figured you were LOSING
as soon as your effective speed got over what you could achieve on a
bicycle.

	- Alan S. Watt