Transit Can Only Improve If TransLink Is Dissolved
The following PostScript to a letter sent by Eric Chris, a professional engineer, is worthy of a post because he addresses the hidden issues of the U-Pass.
For those who live outside of TransLink’s realm, the U-Pass is a universal transit pass giving unlimited travel, forcibly sold to over 110,000 post secondary students in Metro Vancouver. There is very little accounting done with the U-Pass and no one at TransLink or at Metro Vancouver know what the actual usage rate is, nor do we know how much the U-Pass needs to be subsidized.
An interesting coincidence is that at a time when TransLink is pleading poverty, over 110,000 deep discounted U-Passes have been issued.
What we do know is that there is a large black market in U-passes, where students sell their U-passes (as a reminder, the post secondary student is forced to purchase a U-Pass, whether he/she does not want one), which again increases the subsidy rate for the deep discounted fare. An uncorroboratedAi?? source has put the number of U-Passes in use at over 60% or over 66,000 of the deep discounted U-Passes are used every day!
The taxpayer must ask; “Is TransLink’s current financial woes exacerbated by the U-Pass, where TransLink operates highly subsidized late night express and regular bus services to accommodate mainly student customers using the deep discounted U-Pass?“
Zwei echoes Mr. Chris’s observation; “Can transit can only be improved if TransLink is dissolved.”
Todd Stone et al,
When was the last time that TransLink cut service hours during off-peak times in Vancouver (weekends, holidays and weekdays) to match demand?Ai?? TransLink in Metro Vancouver can learn plenty from TransLink in Brisbane, Australia:
For next to no cost to students, TransLink offers about 100,000 students an unlimited number of trips daily to go anywhere in Metro Vancouver.Ai?? In essence, TransLink is buying its clients or riders and charging non-users paying for the express and late transit during off-peak hours, in particular.Ai?? If students had to ai???pay per tripai???, there wouldnai??i??t be so many wasteful trips by students ai??i?? trips wearing out the transit equipment and increasing the cost of transit (buses, for example, like light bulbs only operate for so many hours before they have to be replaced).
Anywhere in the world, find me one other transit organization offering ai???express and frequentai??? transit service until 2:30 am on Sundays, holidays and weekdays followed by late night transit until 3:30 am on Sundays, holidays and weekdays ai??i?? in addition to regular transit service.Ai?? Is there one?
Everyone at TransLink is over paid and spends his or her days reading and sending emails as well as addressing ai???internal TransLink stuffai???.Ai?? Really, no one at TransLink is even necessary.
TransLink employees merely get each other to do ai???stuffai??? and none of the ai???stuffai??? by the employees at TransLink matters ai??i?? studies and reports distorting the truth and promoting more sky train.Ai?? No one at TransLink makes any difference to the day to day operation of transit.Ai?? No one at TransLink designs, maintains or operates the transit system.
Who at TransLink is going to be fired for spending about $200 million to potentially increase fare evasion losses by millions of dollars annually?Ai?? Ian Jarvis, who heads TransLink, seems to be the logical choice to me.Ai?? Transit can only improve if TransLink is dissolved.
