By
the end of the 2010’s, city officials in several American cities were
rethinking bus service in a fundamental way; the passenger-fare revenue model
was being questioned, and in some cases replaced with a model that fit better
with serving poor people and changed local business environments. Yet the
downside effects on the bus companies of trends, especially regarding
ridership, may have been the result of internal organizational factors immune
to a change in the revenue model. I contend that city officials and the
managers of bus companies should resist the temptation to view a new model as a
cure precisely because some problems, internal to the companies, could go on
and silently undermine analysis of the new model such that it could erroneously
be discontinued. To be sure, being willing to question a longstanding model is
a mark of managerial strength. Indeed, it is precisely the managers of bus
companies and regional authorities who are mired in longstanding assumptions
who would tend to have the most difficulty in dealing with troublesome internal
problems.
Providers
of goods or services must adjust to changing local environments, which in turn
are impacted by broader trends. Bus companies and regional authorities in the
U.S. faced increasing traffic congestion as well as decreasing ridership from
5.6 billion in 2008 to 4.67 billion in 2018.[1] Also, competition ranging from electric scooters to
ride-hailing services like Uber and Lyft were literally driving people away
from buses nationwide, according to transit officials. Light rail and subways,
which do not have to fight street congestion, also saw ridership decline, but
not as much as buses. There was also the argument that the very poor, including
the homeless, who generally rely on bus service, are least equipped to pay for
it. Many universities were already using the student-fee model for university
bus service, spreading the cost wide enough that the students could afford the
service. Alternatively, only students who used the service could have paid for
it, which would have been particularly hard on poor students.
In
the altered environment in which bus companies found themselves by 2020, the
concept of free fares on some or all bus routes was drawing increasing support in
several cities. “Advocates in Massachusetts claimed that free buses would speed
up boarding times, draw more passengers, aid poor residents and help reduce
greenhouse-gas emissions.”[2] Michelle Wu, a member of the Boston City Council who
supports free transit, remarked, “If we’re truly treating it as a public good
that has benefits to everyone when everyone uses it, then we should remove
barriers.”[3] To the extent that poor people are especially in need
of a public good, charging a user free can essentially privatize the good for
the poor.
The
poor may go without transportation needed for their very sustenance, or resort
to fraud. In Phoenix, Arizona, for example, people needed only go to a
convenience store to buy reduced-fare cards otherwise reserved for the elderly
and disabled. As of 2020, enforcement on the buses was rare; few if any drivers
asked to seek the accompanying ID of discount fare-riders. Even on the light
rail, security employees intent on staring at passengers as if they were all
conducive to violence would not bother to even ask to see the ID. In fact,
passengers who had not paid were let out at the next platform, from which they
could easily board the next train. Lest the shady passengers get all the blame
(though surely they deserve a lot for their sordid attitude alone), the revenue
model itself was culpable because it did not adequately take into account the
extremely limited financial resources and vital transportation needs of the
very poor. Such a regional transit authority and its bus operating companies
would not likely be willing or able to address internal problems, such as rude
drivers and horrendous (and risky) driving. Phoenix buses were widely known
locally for these two things. Also, it was not uncommon to see three or four
transit security employees in half of a light-rail train car staring at
passengers as if the latter were prisoners.
Put
another way, city and transit officials in the Phoenix metro would not be
likely to analyze, let alone perceive the free-rides option because they were
so preoccupied with, and yet unsuccessful at, stopping the ticket fraud in order
to boost revenue from riders. Getting serious with bus drivers who were rude
and/or bad drivers was something beyond the reach (and will) of the bus
operating management and regional transit authority. Moreover, the political
environment in Arizona was such that a majority of the voters would have balked
at the prospect of paying for poor people to ride free. Minimizing tax
increases fared much better in that political climate.
A
world away, in Lawrence, Massachusetts, the region’s transit authority
in September, 2019 stopped collecting money on three routes that go through the
poorest parts of the city. Lawrence used $225,000 in reserves to waive fares
for two years. Lawrence Mayor Dan Rivera explained the rationale for free
rides. “We could support those citizens to mobilize
themselves out of poverty.”[4]
The regional transit agency said ridership on
the three free lines climbed quickly—up about 24% in the first few months from
a year earlier.
In Olympia, Washington’s
capital, a ballot measure in 2019 that boosted transportation funding helped
the Intercity Transit agency start offering free service on all buses in
January, 2020, according to Ann Freeman-Manzanares, the system’s general
manager. Fares there amounted to $2.7 million annually, a small portion of the
agency’s budget, and some of that is spent maintaining fare boxes and
collecting cash. “It actually was surprising to us when we started digging deep
how much it costs to collect fares,” Ms. Freeman-Manzanares said.[5]
In
Kansas City, the local transit authority was overhauling its bus service and
already offered free rides to veterans and students. The authority aimed to
completely cancel fares by May, 2020, Chief Executive Robbie Makinen said. The
city council voted unanimously in December, 2019 to find about $8 million a year
to cover free buses, which were already heavily supported by taxpayers.
Meanwhile
in Phoenix, bus drivers regularly held up their buses waiting for passengers to
dig for more coin—not having bothered to do so before boarding. Also, the fare machines
on the buses were old, and thus particularly susceptible to breaking down, in
spite of the priority on revenue from passengers. The bus operating companies
and the regional authority erroneously accepted these intangible and tangible
costs as necessary in part because the managers assumed the passenger-revenue
model being used to be fixed rather than possibly replaced.
Generally
speaking, a mind wetted to one way of thinking as if a blind card set in a
highly rutted dirt road is likely to accept as
necessary too many costs because another way of thinking, a broader one,
would be necessary to take into account other models even though their costs
would be lower. A mind willing and able to perceive and think beyond its groves
is necessary. Though such a mind is likely to be more motivated and able to
take on seemingly intractable internal problems, such as rude drivers and bad
driving (e.g., accelerating too fast, and braking too hard), even being willing
to think wider may not be sufficient. Hence it is possible that the continuing
internal factors (i.e., problems within a bus company) could sabotage a new
model’s perceived efficacy.
[1]
Jon Kamp, “Cities
Offer Free Buses in Bid to Boost Flagging Ridership,” The Wall Street Journal, January 14, 2020.
[2]
Ibid.
[3]
Ibid.
[4]
Ibid.
[5]
Ibid.
