Or so the Ex/Chron says. The argument for this is based on a comparison with
other
big city systems. This is a bad argument, tho. Big city systems tend to
have
higher fares on average than suburban/exurban systems, reflecting lower
levels of
subsidization per ride for central city riders. I recently discussed the
issue of
fare rates and subsidization with Brian Taylor of the Institute for
Transportation
Studies at UCLA. (Brian did a study of Bay Area transit systems in the
'80s.)
According to Brian, research shows the following about rider response to
changes in fares:
* Riders with higher incomes will tend to be the first to desert transit in
response to fare
increases. This is because they typically own cars, can better afford
parking charges, etc. I.e.,
they have more options.
* Low income riders are more sensitive to *drops* in fare but not to
*increases* in fares. What
this means is that, as the fare increases, people with lower incomes (and
this may also apply
to people without cars in cities where larger numbers of middleincome
people don't own cars,
like S.F. and NYC) wil still tend to ride because of the lack of options.
And as the fare *decreases*,
lower income people will start using transit to a much greater degree
whereas higher income
people won't.
The result of this is that systems with a higher income rider profile --
typically suburban or exurban
systems -- tend to be more resistant to raising fares, and tend to have
lower fares. For example,
in L.A. the MTA can get away with a $1.35 fare because such a huge
proportion of its ridership
are quite poor (two thirds with incomes under $15,000 annually). The various
L.A. area satellite
systems by comparison tend to have very low fares, typically 50 or 75 cents.
This is because the
suburban systems would be subject to significant drops in ridership if they
were to raise fares.
(And suburban rail systems like BART, Caltrain, and Metrolink tend to have
very high subsidization
per ride.)
Because S.F. is not really comparable to most other American transit systems
in its rider
profile, it therefore makes no sense to make policy for S.F. transit based
on averages from other
American cities.
A related aspect of this is that the systems serving a more outlying or
suburban clientele tend to
have a much higher subsidy per ride than central city systems do. We've
already discussed before
how Muni has the lowest subsidy per ride of any Bay Area transit system. To
the extent that the
average income of the ridership of BART or Caltrain is higher than that of
Muni, this means that
higher income transit users are receiving more per capita subsidy than lower
income riders.
This is in fact a structural characteristic of big metropolitan area transit
in general in the U.S.
The way to address this inequity is to reduce the Muni fare, not increase
it.
There is also another class inequity in fare policy that Professor Taylor
mentioned to me. He points out
that higher income riders tend to use transit only for commuting, because
they are likely to own cars.
This is especiallly likely in S.F. given that there is one car for every 2.4
residents.
Lower income riders are more likely to use transit during offpeak periods
than are higher income riders.
But the peak service is the most expensive to provide. The reason for this
is two-fold:
a. There is a certain overhead associated with just putting a run on the
street, such as deadheading to
the end of the line. This is spread over fewer trips in the case of a
peak pullout that only makes one or
two trips.
b. To expand peak service will typically require actually buying a new bus
or streetcar. Expanding offpeak
service will not, because one of the peak service vehicles can be used.
For these reasons, Professor Taylor argues that there should be a peak hour
fare differential, on both
grounds of social efficiency and class equity. This could be best
accomplished by lowering the offpeak
fare, to, say, 75 or 50 cents. This is more equitable because at present
higher income riders are getting a
higher subsidy than lower income riders because they are consuming the most
expensive service. It would
increase efficiency because the greater revenue of the peak hour surcharge
could be used
to expand service. It would also have a bigger impact on increasing Muni
ridership because higher income
people are not likely to use transit more because of a lower fare but lower
income people are, and
the latter are the main users of the offpeak service.
Another comment that relates to our previous discussion about
gentrification: To the extent that the
income profile of the city continues to move upward, and it becomes
increasingly a bedroom suburb
for Sillicon Valley and other suburban employment sites, the ridership of
Muni will inevitably fall.
Given the sensitivity of higher income riders to fare increases, mentioned
above, this would be
exacerbated by a fare increase.
I strongly suspect that the city's gentrification has already contributed to
the big drop in ridership in the
'80s. The reason that this will inevitably lead to lower ridership is that
it will (a) lead to a further drop
in the rate of households not owning cars, and (b) people who commute to out
of city locations are less
likely to use transit (in part because higher income people tend to only use
transit for commuting, as I
mentioned above). I've been studying census tract data lately, with a
particular eye towards the
relationship between income, urban characteristics of an area, and the
proportion of families not
owning cars. What I've found is that at each income level there is a certain
range of carlessness,
which seems to be affected by the urban character, so that an area that is
more "urban", like S.F.,
will tend to have a higher proportion of families not owning cars at each
income leve. But what is
relevant here is that the ranges are very different for each income level.
The highest rate of
carlessness for more affluent areas tends to be very much lower than for
middle or low income
areas. Thus as the gentrification process continues to intensify in S.F.,
you can kiss Muni's
ridership good-bye, and you'll see a lot more of the pro-car sentiments of
the likes of Ken Garcia
and Debra Saunders.
Tom Wetzel