DC decriminalizes Metro fare evasion. Says prosecution is RACIST

[canceled.2021.1]

People not paying for BART and Muni buses is a big issue in the Bay Area. It goes back to the broken glass theory used in New York. How long do you allow this type of thing to go on when it brings so many other problems with it?



How bad is BART fare evasion? We saw 90 people in 92 minutes slip through the gates


Why don't station agents intervene? It's not their job, BART spokesperson Alicia Trost told SFGATE.

"In the past, we've had incidents where station agents do intervene and they're assaulted by fare evaders," Trost said.

Station agents' job is essentially to provide customer service: help with ticket issues, monitor any escalator or elevator issues and evacuate the station in case of emergency. They're not meant to go after gate jumpers — for their safety and for the safety of riders.

"Station agents are not police officers. They are not tasked with enforcing ordinances and penal codes. That's the job of BART police officers," Trost said.

Keep in mind the fact we were watching the fare gates at just one of BART's 48 stations, for only a small portion of one afternoon. An estimated 22,000 people ride BART without paying every day.

It's easy to see how station agents may feel helpless to fight fare cheats, a problem that's thought to cost BART up to $25 million every year.

Past attempts to crack down fare evaders haven't gone so well. In 2016 the transit agency bolted shut many of the swinging doors at San Francisco stations often use to skip fares, but it was deemed a fire code violation and they were ordered to reopen.

Earlier this year the agency hired six community service officers to act as fare inspectors — to the tune of $740,000 — to issue tickets to cheating riders. They cited 1,300 offenders in two months, but only about 100 of them paid up, so the effort ended up costing more than it recouped.

The latest plan to stop the bleeding of funds is to replace 600 fare gates with ones that are harder to jump over or slip through — though the upgrade won't come cheap, either. The agency is projecting a cost of $150 to $200 million and there's no timeline for the overhaul yet. Trost says BART is conducting a study and will deliver the results to the board next spring. It'll be up to them how to proceed.

In the meantime, BART is taking a station-by-station approach to combating fare evasion in other ways. Trost says it is adding alarms to some emergency exit gates and relocating others to more visible areas so they can't be used with the same impunity. As budget allows, the transit agency is also trying to add features that make it harder to use elevators to dodge payment, like fencing that forces riders to enter the paid area to use an elevator.

But of course, even these smaller projects come at a cost.

"Every single thing we're talking about costs money. So it can't be done overnight."


https://www.sfgate.com/local/article...n-13186006.php

Pay up whitey

It isn’t a problem. San Fran is rich. Surely you can afford for people to ride for free. You shouldn’t charge them at all you racist

[domer76]

That's funny, a racist calling another racist a racist...

Your inability to follow a series of posts is astounding.

[Text Drivers are Killers]

Paying for public transportation is racist

Don’t people know that we had slavery hundreds of years ago?

Yes - we had slavery and it was the best thing that ever happened to blacks. Better to be a slave in america than starving but free in africa.

[Text Drivers are Killers]

Pay up whitey

It isn’t a problem. San Fran is rich. Surely you can afford for people to ride for free. You shouldn’t charge them at all you racist

Well hell - let's legalize bank robbery too while we're at it. You libs are certifiable. HAHAHA

[USFREEDOM911]

I suppose it can be done that way, too. But if you have them ticketing in the stations, rather than on the train, it's going to create some limitations about zones, etc. For example, if the system has a zone-based pricing set-up, it may not be possible to show that people's tickets aren't good for the actual ride they are taking, unless you actually ticket them when they move from one zone to another. That's easy to do aboard the train -- if you're in zone 1 and the doors close with the next stop being zone 2, then anyone without a ticket that covers moving between zones could be ticketed, whereas if you stop them in either zone 1 or zone 2, there may be no way to show they did anything wrong. Of course, that assumes a certain kind of pricing set-up, and a simpler system wouldn't have that problem.

And in your estimation, this would involve how many officers and at what cost??

[Oneuli]

And in your estimation, this would involve how many officers and at what cost??

I'm not sure. It depends on how often you want to catch people. It should take fewer people than a traditional system, though, since you're effectively only spot-checking. If you only manage to catch someone one out of every 30 illegal rides, and fine him 50 times the cost of a ticket, that's still enough to be a disincentive.

It's been used successfully in various places:

https://europeforvisitors.com/munich...ahn-s-bahn.htm

In Germany, they work on commission.

Such a system emphasizes efficiency of transport over profitability. It accepts that you'll collect less money overall, and thus that public transit will have to be subsidized more from general revenues, but that the gain will be huge savings in time among riders. For example, the NYC system has 1.72 billion rides per year. If you save an average of fifteen seconds per ride by way of eliminating ticket-buying, turnstile holdups, etc., you'd eliminate about 7.2 million person-hours of wasted time. The average hourly wage in the US, according to the BLS is about $25 (probably higher in NY, but we'll go with that). So, the distributed value of eliminating all that wasted time would be about $180 million. Even if you had 300 three-man teams working full-time doing spot checks, at $50,000 per person, and overhead doubling that cost, that's around $90 million in cost, so you're still coming out way ahead, even before counting savings on turnstiles, security to check for turnstile-jumpers, etc.

[Fentoine Lum]

90% of those caught are black and that's not fair!!!!! So now we get affirmative action justice.

So much outrage, so little time.

[USFREEDOM911]

I'm not sure. It depends on how often you want to catch people. It should take fewer people than a traditional system, though, since you're effectively only spot-checking. If you only manage to catch someone one out of every 30 illegal rides, and fine him 50 times the cost of a ticket, that's still enough to be a disincentive.

It's been used successfully in various places:

https://europeforvisitors.com/munich...ahn-s-bahn.htm

In Germany, they work on commission.

Such a system emphasizes efficiency of transport over profitability. It accepts that you'll collect less money overall, and thus that public transit will have to be subsidized more from general revenues, but that the gain will be huge savings in time among riders. For example, the NYC system has 1.72 billion rides per year. If you save an average of fifteen seconds per ride by way of eliminating ticket-buying, turnstile holdups, etc., you'd eliminate about 7.2 million person-hours of wasted time. The average hourly wage in the US, according to the BLS is about $25 (probably higher in NY, but we'll go with that). So, the distributed value of eliminating all that wasted time would be about $180 million. Even if you had 300 three-man teams working full-time doing spot checks, at $50,000 per person, and overhead doubling that cost, that's around $90 million in cost, so you're still coming out way ahead, even before counting savings on turnstiles, security to check for turnstile-jumpers, etc.

Since you're not sure, then how can you know it should take fewer people than a traditional system??

[Text Drivers are Killers]

Since you're not sure, then how can you know it should take fewer people than a traditional system??

You're arguing with a brainless dingbat.

[Fentoine Lum]

Yes - we had slavery and it was the best thing that ever happened to blacks. Better to be a slave in america than starving but free in africa.

We should do that for whites, the middle aged male suicide rate and opioid addiction needs addressing. Could also help with their victim complex.

[Text Drivers are Killers]

We should do that for whites, the middle aged male suicide rate and opioid addiction needs addressing. Could also help with their victim complex.

I say hell with both issues. If people want to kill themselves, let them. And if they get hooked on drugs, it's their fault.

[Troll]

You've never driven in DC, have you? Try finding a parking place...

Not any different then any large city.

[Fentoine Lum]

Well hell - let's legalize bank robbery too while we're at it. You libs are certifiable. HAHAHA

Why not, we’ve got a Liar In Chief who laundered money for the Russian mob, a binge drinker gang date rapist on the US Supreme Kangaroo Court and a corrupt political system. Yeah, we have parted with legitimacy ages ago; only the frenetically pushed illusion remains.

[Oneuli]

Since you're not sure, then how can you know it should take fewer people than a traditional system??

For the reason I already indicated in my post: it involves spot-checking. By its nature, spot-checking is less labor-intensive than gate-keeping. Picture, for instance, how many police would be needed if we had one at every highway on-ramp to make sure people have their inspection and registration stickers, before they're allowed to get on the highway, rather than handling that with a few police spot-checking.

[Text Drivers are Killers]

Why not, we’ve got a Liar In Chief who laundered money for the Russian mob, a binge drinker gang date rapist on the US Supreme Kangaroo Court and a corrupt political system. Yeah, we have parted with legitimacy ages ago; only the frenetically pushed illusion remains.

Liar in chief?? You mean like obama when he lied us into obamacare? "If you like your doctor..."

Binge drinker on the supreme court? That would be your hero Ginsberg.