The benefits of a ‘free’ transit system

In letters to the Star and in the musings of at least one mayoral hopeful, free transit seems to be garnering fresh attention.

Ignoring for now the misleading use of “free,” two things are often missing from the discussion.

First is the substantial cost of fare collection — equipment, maintenance, administration and enforcement. Regrettably, the system is already installed and daily demonstrates its unreliability and cost.

Second, and perhaps more important, is the inherent fairness of tax-supported transit where all beneficiaries pay, not just passengers.

Every private vehicle removed from the commute, every business made more accessible, every parking space freed for better use, and every inebriated partier not behind the wheel is a benefit to the city and to everyone who lives or works in it.

It’s time to rethink transit. Paul Collier, Toronto

Free transit is a misnomer. Like health care, it would be publicly funded by our tax dollars. Like any publicly funded service, the benefits go to the transit riders because both transit riders and car drivers pay for it with their tax dollars.

In this case it makes perfect sense for two reasons.

Firstly, the entire expense related to fare collection (Presto) disappears, resulting in a much cheaper and efficient transit system.

Secondly, when something is free it attracts more users, which is the desired behaviour. Getting people out of their cars is critical as the city is choked with traffic.

The only issue is that Toronto is woefully short of capacity to consider publicly funded transit anytime soon. The initial implementation could be during non-peak hours followed by peak hours when capacity is finally built. Michael Yaffe, Toronto

Re Uploading subway likely to leave city worse off, Oct. 2 This Royson James column is so good in summing up the perils of any subway change by the province, it must be put to all of the candidates for office by voters to demand how a prospect would respond.

One has to wonder if the election meddling in Toronto was to simplify the taking of transit, and to enable the waste of billions into sprawl. Hamish Wilson, Toronto