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T riders now know how much their fares will go up every two years
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Comments
I thought the voters of MA
I thought the voters of MA were absolutely against raising taxes by a set amount over a set time. I remember some kind of referendum too.
Our elected officials are really pissing me off.
I feel like more and more of them are adopting a "I know best what's best for you" attitude. How the hell do these people keep getting elected? ARGH!
This legislation doesn't
This legislation doesn't REQUIRE fares and passes to go up. It just limits how much they can.
You're referring to the gas tax indexing referendum, which would have AUTOMATICALLY raised the gas tax at the rate of inflation.
It doesn't REQUIRE the maximum increse....
.... but the Control Board has extracted MORE than the maximum increases since our GOP gov put it in place (by reading the prior law in a way not intended by the legislature).
Are the Masspike fares are going up at the same rate/frequency?
If so, great!
If not, then why are drivers not subject to the same burden?
They outumber us transit riders....
... but this is, at least, an improvement over the dreadful current law (which allowed 10 per cent "on average" increases).
There are plenty
of burdens. -Someone who uses both forms of transportation regularly.
The us vs. them whining gets real old, real fast.
Its not whining. Its
Its not whining. Its expecting fair treatment. As it is the T riders get screwed with a hike every other year while drivers continue to pay less and less gas taxes. This has been true for decades now.
Kinopio, if you feel like you
Kinopio, if you feel like you are getting screwed as a T rider and you seem to think that car owners are getting an almost free ride, then you are FREE to incur the wildly expensive option of owning a car OR you can do the SENSIBLE thing and get a bike. No one is forcing you to take the T. OR and here's a crazy option: you can WALK. Sincerely, city dweller of 20 years who (gasp!) walks.
wow...
Walking! Oh yes, of course! Oh, wait....I work an hour away from where I live. WELP! So much for this idiots brilliant suggestion.
Cool, so
Go ahead and buy a train, pay for registration, insurance, inspection, maintenance, fuel, and repairs, find a place to store it, etc., and then you can use the tracks for less. Deal?
This law LIMITS fare
This law LIMITS fare increases.
There's no law limiting Pike toll increases.
How about this for an initiative petition
All statehouse based pols - including the Governor - pay market rates for parking.
won't work....
They will just add the cost to their per diems.
Increases
I'm waiting for the "it's just the cost of a cup of coffee each day" comment from the Governor.....of course that coffee is a $3.95 Starbucks frappachinno
Time for a similar law for
Time for a similar law for gas tax and tolls to go up at the same time T fares go up. Only increasing public transit costs is not only unfair (in this climate where both parties agree income inequality is a huge issue), but will just lead more and more people to abandon the T in favor of driving. This may be part of Bakers plan, to ease the problems of the T by reducing the # of riders, but it wont be great for drivers to be fighting with even more people than projected on the roads.
Driving through Maine and NH recently and paying tolls on 95, its time MA added tolls to 95 and 93 from NH. I dont see why we need to subsidize NH workers commute if they want us to pay to drive on their highways. With new toll technology fares would be collected at full speed with no toll workers like in NH and on the Tobin.
That's how and why Charlie Baker was elected Bay State Guv.
That's how and why Charlie Baker was elected Bay State Governor in the first place. He was one who'd always advocated cutting public transportation, including the T, in the first place. As it is, if the constant problems that have been cropping up on various parts of the MBTA system are any indication, the T, which has a long history of having constant problems, is having even more frequent, and worse ones, to date. It's disgusting that the fare on the T is being raised without the problems (which are many) on the T being fixed in the first place.
Free rides!
Fare hikes???? Nope. Just come to the Field's Corner T stop, where almost everyone just evades fares and illegally walks through the gates. Sure, buzzers go off all the time. But the staff doesn't care, so just go for it.
Free fares
How bad is the free ride problem? Is it in the millions or billions? What are the worst stations?
Prop 3.5
So for property owners, it's Prop 2.5. For MBTA riders, it's Prop 3.5?
Bah. Seems like the MBTA should have been held to 2.5% fare raises.
Apologies, I left something out of the original post
The limit was originally, at least according to the governor's interpretation, 10% every two years. I've added that to the post.
Fare increases
And in theory it's not an automatic raise of that amount every two years, it's that the MBTA can raise the fares up to that amount within that time frame. Yeah, yeah that means they will definitely do it, but it's not exactly the same as pegging the gas tax to a regular % increase to match inflation or something like that.
Pedantically yours.
Same for Prop 2.5
Prop 2. 5 is the ceiling of the increase, not a required increase.
Dyslexic pedants untie!
Maybe we should also
take a look at salary decreases every 2 years (with a cap, of course–we're not monsters!) for the people at the top if T service doesn't improve despite increased fares.
ChrisInEastie: best comment ever!
Love this! lol
Salary decreases?
We can have that now. I volunteer to do the work of a current T exec at 10% less than their current salary.