Maybe the policy should be: Contribute whatever you want. Otherwise, the policy is: Pay if you feel bound by a rule that is merely illusory. It's just not fair to timid souls and to those with an especially low tolerance for disorder.I’ll never forget when the @nypost sent me to Penn Station to ask NYers their thoughts on fare evaders. Not one person cared. After I sent my notes to the rewrite desk, I got an angry call from an editor: “That’s not what we wanted.” The reporting didn’t fit their narrative. https://t.co/uUM2Q9Ge3k
— Blake Paterson (@BlakePater) October 5, 2022
October 6, 2022
Is it disorder if no one sees it as disorder?
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89 comments:
it's costing $40 million to have fare jumpers?
i have a Simple Plan, that will Save the city MONEY! and Reduce CO2
Stop running buses and trains. let The People walk!!!
The DC Metro's funding system is broken a dozen ways. It's supported by DC government and government-friendly people as a national showpiece for public transit. So, I don't think the goal was ever to make money or even break even. However, that urban planning vision collapsed with COVID and remote work.
Backstory: For several decades the Metro provided patronage jobs to way too many 'managers' who did nothing, and at the same time conducted minimal maintenance so the system fell into disrepair. This ended a few years back after fires, derailments, and deaths. Still, the system was heavily used pre-COVID.
With COVID a large percentage of the federal employee workforce worked from home and/or moved away. They had been the backbone of daily ridership, and many federal employees were reimbursed for riding too (so they paid nothing; indirect federal funding).
The video shows a green vest construction worker (among others) jumping the gates -- they are not federal employees -- they are the people who actually must work and use the system. Without federal employee benefits they may feel that free rides are owed to them as COVID hazard pay.
"I'll scratch your back if you scratch mine." Welcome to our dystopian mafia-like world government.
Litter, graffiti, vandalism, shoplifting, vagrancy, fare evasion...little by little the veneer of civilization peeled away.
Let's make everything free.
No more financial worries.
True equity.
Mental health benefits galore.
Steak (or bugs, your choice) with every meal.
[FWIW, NO, none, zip transit systems are fully paid at the fare box/turnstiles.]
Maybe they aren’t going to ride the subway. If all they are doing is pushing people off the platform then they aren’t care evaders.
It is a standard from another time to leave the payment to the honor of the person entering. There was a time when that was doable. That train has left the station. Heh...sorry. Though there are a few of us who still honor doing the right thing, most just say f*** it. It's all about me, and I'm so baaad. See me? I bad.
All it takes is a glance around where you live. Any day. Almost any place. You can see those days of 'self-checking' payment are done. Might be time to employ people to take money again and employ station cops to enforce it...again. Like back when we had a civilize society.
It's the small things. You shrug your shoulders at this and that and suddenly you're shrugging your shoulders at 45 shootings over the weekend, mass looting of small businesses via social media, and old women being clocked from behind and knocked down the stairs. Giuliani was right.
I just listened to Triggernometry podcast interview of Adam Carolla. In it, Adam discussed Lawndale Avenue in LA that runs next to the major city cemetery. He describes that on one side, you have immigrants selling flowers on the side of the road without permits to sell or be there and leaving their trash scattered on the ground. On the other side, you have a motorcycle cop with a radar gun giving tickets to "soccer moms" (Adam's description) driving 5 mph over the speed limit. This was part of a longer rift that California tends to punish the mostly law-abiding taxpayers and just ignore those not wanting to pay taxes or follow any laws. Seems like NY has the same issue.
Order is an illusion. Civilization is overrated.
"I’ll never forget when the @nypost sent me to Penn Station to ask NYers their thoughts on fare evaders. Not one person cared."
I'm sure they were more concerned about being pushed in front of a train by some whackjob murderer out on no bail.
New York is in the midst of a return to a 1970s dystopia and the NY Post is concerned about fare scofflaws?
Will the next 9-11 even be noticed? Or will it be considered urban renewal?
Forty million a year will cover the expenses of quite a few police officers. One might think about placing 1 or 2 at each of the worst stations to begin arresting offenders. Of course, they will be released for a simple misdemeanor offense and the cycle will repeat. Doesn't seem to be any way to break the cycle until the justice system actually imposes penalties. Think of the backlash to that!
I expect that the gov has insulated itself from lawsuits from the plebs, but, I'd love to see a lawsuit arguing that the lack of enforcement of the fare places an undue financial burden on the disabled and elderly who cannot jump the turnstile and is therefore illegal under the ADA (or some other law - there's gotta be one law that would work here).
Either enforce the fare or do away with it.
That's the Washington DC subway. I used to ride it frequently. Unlike New York, a calculates where you get on and where you get off and what time to assess rush hour fees. Meaning if you jump the turnstile to get on, you also have to jump the turnstile when you get off.
Richlb - so now the disabled have to jump two turnstiles? Tell me how that is not discriminatory!
Three words:
Broken windows policing
Law and order isn't a pleonasm.
Do they have turnstiles that allow handicapped people to evade the fare? If not, why not?
It's not unfair to give people what they voted for. It's democracy in operation. If you don't like it, you don't have to live in New York; you can live someplace where people have different values more in accord with yours.
Just to be clear, I do live in New York, but I understand that my fellow citizens mostly do not share my values, and I don't go complaining about how unfair it is.
Broken window theory - - Gee, whoda thunk?
Denver - A friend was caught not paying for RTD lite-rail. Consequence? He was fined and banned for a while.
How about consequences in NY? Is that lost in Leftist Fascist D-land/ Trump-obsession-only-land now?
It's all just funny money to the financially illiterate left. Inflation-is-good-for-u. Crime is fine! Right, leftists?
participation trophy.
Every turnstile-jumper sends a message to everyone else. Part of the message is “F the system, I’m special.” But another part of it is “F you, only a chump would pay the fare.”
So part of the damage done to society is the lost revenue on which the shared physical infrastructure depends. But the biggest loss is the de-moralization of the invisible commons; the infrastructure of society itself.
Long story short: broken windows do matter. I lived in NYC during the late 70’s and it was a war zone, largely because of crap like this.
I don't believe the reporter. I can't imagine people not caring that they themselves spend $1000 a year on the subway and others pay 0.
This was part of a longer rift that California tends to punish the mostly law-abiding taxpayers and just ignore those not wanting to pay taxes or follow any laws. Seems like NY has the same issue.
The phrase most often used is "anarcho-tyranny."
The rule is: the rules don't apply to me.
I think it started with miniskirts in schools.
But what's a country to do when the public at large does not want, or is not brave enough to demand, either informal or formal social control?
Why on earth do we think an election as stolen? Its in their M.O.
Anyone can break Man's laws. Not even the Virgin Mary herself can break the laws of physics.
There's transportation.
Now, do health care.
"Who is John Galt?"
The light was ebbing, and Eddie Willers could not distinguish the bum's face. The bum had said it simply,without expression. But from the sunset far at the end of the street, yellow glints caught his eyes, and the eyes looked straight at Eddie Willers, mocking and still—as if the question had been addressed to the
causeless uneasiness within him.
"Why did you say that?" asked Eddie Willers, his voice tense.
The bum leaned against the side of the doorway; a wedge of broken glass behind him reflected the metal yellow of the sky.
"Why does it bother you?" he asked.
"It doesn't," snapped Eddie Willers.
He reached hastily into his pocket. The bum had stopped him and asked for a dime, then had gone on talking, as if to kill that moment and postpone the problem of the next. Pleas for dimes were so frequent in the streets these days that it was not necessary to listen to explanations, and he had no desire to hear the details of this bum's particular despair.
"Go get your cup of coffee," he said, handing the dime to the shadow that had no face.
"Thank you, sir," said the voice, without interest, and the face leaned forward for a moment. The face was wind-browned, cut by lines of weariness and cynical resignation; the eyes were intelligent. Eddie Willers walked on, wondering why he always felt it at this time of day, this sense of dread without reason.
No, he thought, not dread, there's nothing to fear: just an immense, diffused apprehension, with no source or object. He had become accustomed to the feeling, but he could find no explanation for it; yet the bum had spoken as if he knew that Eddie felt it, as if he thought that one should feel it, and more: as if he knew the reason.
Eddie Willers pulled his shoulders straight, in conscientious self-discipline. He had to stop this, he thought; he was beginning to imagine things. Had he always felt it? He was thirty-two years old. He tried to think back. No, he hadn't; but he could not remember when it had started. The feeling came to him
Suddenly, at random intervals, and now it was coming more often than ever. It's the twilight, he thought; I hate the twilight.
The clouds and the shafts of skyscrapers against them were turning brown, like an old painting in oil, the color of a fading masterpiece. Long streaks of grime ran from under the pinnacles down the slender, soot-eaten walls. High on the side of a tower there was a crack in the shape of a motionless lightning, the
length of ten stories. A jagged object cut the sky above the roofs; it was half a spire, still holding the glow of the sunset; the gold leaf had long since peeled off the other half. The glow was red and still, like the reflection of a fire: not an active fire, but a dying one which it is too late to stop.
I work a couple of days a week in Manhattan, and this does not track with what I see. I think a lot of people are very frustrated and angry with fare evaders and other examples of lawlessness in NYC, but I also think a lot of people don't want to speak to reporters about low-level crime, especially on camera. They're afraid of being taken out of context and losing their jobs. There's also a sense of generalized helplessness that I haven't seen in the city since the pre-Giuliani years. The city elected a mayor who supposedly was the "law-and-order" candidate, but once in office, he has barely moved the needle, if at all, against crime. Imagine if it were 1995, and Giuliani hadn't made a move against crime. That's sort of how it feels in Manhattan today.
Anecdote: I work in a gleaming new medical research building that happens to be very close to Bellevue Men’s Shelter. Most of my co-workers would safely be characterized as very liberal, and they are very hesitant to complain out loud about the related safety issues. However, they will share notes on the "most convenient" ways to get into our building. When scrutinized, the "most convenient" ways to the building are not the most convenient at all, but they are the most likely to minimize the chances of being harassed or attacked by the Bellevue residents. Personally, I've witnessed men punching windshields and trying to enter cars waiting at red lights (while nearby police stand by), men defecating on 1st Avenue in front of the shelter, men yelling and screaming at passersby, and so on. It is not a happy place, and this was before the recent NY Post story about the impact of "migrants" on the shelter.
It’s a bit like broken windows policing, isn’t it? Inflation is squeezing people at the bottom of the economic pyramid. People being squeezed see lots of other folks getting away with jumping turnstiles, and they realize that every turnstile they jump is more food and clothing they can afford for their families. So why not? Why should they and their families do without when hardly anybody else is paying?
And, as others have pointed out upthread, Washington’s Metro has always been known for featherbedding and corruption. BTW, I lived in the Washington metropolitan area for most of the time the Metro had been in operation, and it might interest readers to know that fares are calculated not so much based on miles traveled as on whether one gets off or on in a mostly white suburb or in the inner city.
The fare jumpers are a symbol of the loss of civilization in Democrat cities. When I first arrived in Los Angeles, to go to college, I was astonished at the difference between the LAPD and Chicago police. The LAPD was honest and enforced the law. That was long ago.
“F you, only a chump would pay the fare.”
Are you keeping up with the news ... like at all???
You can walk into any New York City CVS and walk out with whatever you want without paying. Nobody is going to stop you. The police aren't going to arrest you, and even if they did, you'd be out before the ink on their paperwork dries and the corrupt New York prosecutors - all bribed by George Soros - aren't going to prosecute you.
And even if they did, they have no more jail space to put you in prison.
ONLY A CHUMP WOULD PAY.
“F you, only a chump would pay the fare.”
Are you keeping up with the news ... like at all???
You can walk into any New York City CVS and walk out with whatever you want without paying. Nobody is going to stop you. The police aren't going to arrest you, and even if they did, you'd be out before the ink on their paperwork dries and the corrupt New York prosecutors - all bribed by George Soros - aren't going to prosecute you.
And even if they did, they have no more jail space to put you in prison.
ONLY A CHUMP WOULD PAY.
The fastest way to destroy a civilization/society is to impose capitol controls. The second fastest way is to stop enforcing minimum basic standards.
Now everyone who uses that rail system and pays feels like a chump because they see the freeloaders jumping the styles.
The people running the society are promoting freeloaders who do not support the system. Just look at the comments on the twitter thread.
If you want the good infrastructure and high living standards you support people who contribute and build.
If you want Afghanistan you allow people to jump the turn styles. Kandahar Afghanistan is a modern city that has large glass buildings and had full electricity and a modern airport in the 1970's.
Barbarians have been living in it for 50 years. Now they don't have roads or electricity or glass.
You have to suppress the barbarians and shitheads who jump turn styles. Because the next step for them is tearing the copper pipes out of the house they are renting for 5$ at the recycle shop or throwing rocks through windows or looting stores in mobs in broad daylight.
I read an interview with a NYPD officer tasked with ticketing fare evaders. He described a situation where supporters of the evader start recording the event and the evader must resist or lose face on Instagram and the supporters crowd and interfere with the police to the extent that it becomes dangerous for the officer and clearly not a practical solution to the problem.
Blogger Mr Wibble said...
"This was part of a longer rift that California tends to punish the mostly law-abiding taxpayers and just ignore those not wanting to pay taxes or follow any laws. Seems like NY"
This must be done to defend against claims of disparate outcome regarding police interactions. It would be racist to address the actual problems.
We visited NYC 10 years ago and used the subway quite a bit. Never saw anyone jumping the turnstyles. This is a new behavior since the safe days of 2010-2012. Amazing how quickly things can go to shit.
If the reporter had in his report the number of non-responses he had to his inquiries, and the number of rude "Eff off" responses he received from the famously friendly New York commuters he tried to interrogate, I didn't see it. So I suspect the survey results aren't very accurate. Objective data is data, anything subjective is collated emotion, and partial results are always suspect.
I live on the Metro's Green Line in DC, and that spectacle of mass turnstile-jumping is something I see every single time I take the Metro. On buses the jumpers just breeze past the driver without paying when they get on--that's their form of fare evasion. It's a massive phenomenon: more jumpers at some stations than paying fares. The station-masters and bus conductors do nothing about this, and I don't blame them. Why should they risk their lives confronting crazies and feral teen-agers? They will get no support from any government authority, as it is considered racist to try to make people pay their fares, and indeed the DC government has forbade arresting people for jumping on grounds of "systemic racism" or whatever they call it. Despite the supposed existence of Metro transit police, I haven't seen a Metro cop either in a station or on a train for years. On the platforms it's open-season for crazies, so every few months someone gets pushed onto the tracks. I feel like a chump actually paying my fare, and there are stations where I don't feel safe. But, hey! DC is better than New York City, where there's a ghastly subway crime every single day of the week.
Yeah..... but this is Washington DC, which by any cultural definition, is not the US. The money rains down from heaven here, in copious quantities, disrupting all probity. Just as the Jan 6 protestors as they gaze upon their jurors: Is this the US? Or is this a separate, Kafkaesque parallel universe with shared attributes but crazy people?
Last time I was on the NYC subway the metro card readers were defective a couple of times and stole about 3 or 4 fares from me. The turnstile reader was say error and not let me in but still managed to take the rides from my car. I'm not saying all the turnstyle jumpers are doing because they've been ripped off but some sure have.
In the present times, the default choice by many people seems to be, if you believe you can get away with it, do it. If you don't suffer an adverse consequence, do it again.
Religions and social mores used to attempt to instill a sense of "conscience" in folks that led them to avoid actions deemed "wrong." ...beginning in their youth, that sense of conscience often if not most of the time, carried on into adulthood. Alas, these days one rather is tempted to exclaim à la Cicero, "O tempora. O mores!"
You could post additional city or transit police in the stations, to accost transgressors, but could they efficiently cope with a high number of miscreants all at a time? And the potential for aggressive human-to-human interaction would be high.
Really, it's a no-brainer.
The turnstiles pictured are obviously quite simple to evade: $40 million/year would pay for turnstiles that would provide greater security, for example: https://www.a1securitycameras.com/full-height-single-gate-turnstile-standard-series.html
I was going to suggest putting up something like a chain-link barrier to make turnstyle jumping impossible, but I'm getting the idea that such a thing is not wanted anyway: the whole thing was a scam in the first place.
Which I basically knew, I guess. Any mass/public transit project is not for transportation, it's for political graft and corruption.
I wonder if it every occurred to anybody to make better fare turnstyles. You know, the kind you can't pass unless you pay.
Don't be grumpy. Otherwise, they win
Been in NYC long enough to see blatant rampant turnstile hopping, then about 15 years in which it became rare and was common to see people apprehended by plain clothes officers. Now it’s rampant and blatant again, even in those rare stations that still have live station house attendants. Nobody gives a shit. School kids who probably have city issued metro cards in their pockets do it to impress their friends. The turnstiles are harder to hop in some stations so often folks wait by the emergency doors which people use when the exits are jammed or they have something large in tow, and then the fare beaters just hold it open and let in anyone who wants. Subways are dirtier, more dangerous and people do complain about that, but I’ve not seen anyone connect it it to the new laxity towards fare beating.
What Aggie said at 10:15.
"Any mass/public transit project is not for transportation, it's for political graft and corruption."
No, in NYC, it's for transportation. That doesn't mean graft and corruption don't enter into it. Years ago it was found the MTA kept two sets of books...and no one was prosecuted or even fired, if I recall correctly.
Anthony points out, that..
Any mass/public transit project is not for transportation, it's for political graft and corruption.
Exactly! mass transit is no more for moving people, than mass education is for learning
Not only aren't either for the users, they aren't even for the employees..
They are for the administrators and contractors.. That is graft and corruption.
Don't believe me? Ask Igna? She'll tell you How Wonderful both are; which is All you need to know
If you read the Twitter comments ...they're overwhelming sympathetic or indifferent to the fare jumping. Their opinion is it should be free.
Maybe they should cement broken coke bottles on top of the turnstyles like they do on walls in Mexico.
Is it really possible that honest users don't recognize they're paying for the cheaters? Or is the whole thing so heavily subsidized that the connection to the lost revenue is just too attenuated?
Also: I imagine almost any turnstile is jumpable, but these seem ludicrously easy.
"timid souls and those with an especially low tolerance for disorder."
Ann, do you even contemplate the existence of people who pay the fare because they are using transportation otherwise unavailable and want to pay for it? That maybe some of the people who pay to ride the Metro aren't either timid or averse to "disorder," but understand that there is a transaction going on -- money for transport -- that should not be egregiously flouted by other people?
I would never jump a turnstile (weird how many people now write "turnstyle"). Not because I am "timid," or because I hate disorder, but because I think it would be wrong. Is it still OK to say that? Or is it nixed because all the violators in the video appear to be Black?
I tend to agree with ColoComment, who suggests turnstiles that can't be jumped. I mean, bummer for those used to getting around DC for free, but a relief for everyone else. Even the scolds who pounce on this reporter for spending one morning (!!!!!) photographing these folks at their "work." Are the scolds themselves paying fares? I think so, yes; they are the "timid," if you like. But they still can't bring themselves to say that they are doing the moral and normal thing.
Of course it is disorder even if it isn't recognized as such. It is an indicator of a society that is in the process of failure. It goes hand in hand with the sudden dicriminalization of shop-lifting of other petty thefts. It won't be too much longer before burglaries are similarly decriminalized followed by muggings. We are in decline- full stop.
And I have to wonder this- how many people refused to talk to the reporter? This is a key stat that is missing in his story. The people responding to the query are self-selected.
Howard said...
Don't be grumpy. Otherwise, they win
It is time to ship the turn style jumpers and all the other democrat voters to Afghanistan.
How about pay to avoid the automated pneumatic spearguns? The first hip-hop millionaire to get his Louis Vuittons pinned to his forehead will make turnstile vaulting very unfashionable.
Looks like the handicap lane has the poor design. Do we still call these turnstiles? And do we still call it turnstile jumping when it’s just a little extra lift of the leg to get through? I didn’t get why you would have to swipe going both ways until the DC Metro riders explained they are trying to charge for distance travel. That reminds me of Charlie on the MTA:
Well, let me tell you of the story of a man named Charlie
On a tragic and fateful day
He put ten cents in his pocket, kissed his wife and family
Went to ride on the MTA
Well, did he ever return?
No he never returned and his fate is still unlearned (what a pity)
He may ride forever 'neath the streets of Boston
He's the man who never returned
Charlie handed in his dime at the Kendall Square station
And he changed for Jamaica Plain
When he got there the conductor told him, "one more nickel"
Charlie couldn't get off of that train!
But did he ever return?
No he never returned and his fate is still unlearned (poor old Charlie)
He may ride forever 'neath the streets of Boston
He's the man who never returned
Offered as a fable for our times.
Kansas City has a single light rail line that's about three miles long, has insufficient trains, and because it shares the street with car traffic, is only as fast as the traffic and stop lights allow. Its only purpose is as a "demonstration" project and tourist curiosity. So to encourage ridership, it's free.
Perhaps predictably, the rest of KC's transit riders complained that this was unfair. The city fathers addressed the complaints by making the entire system free.
"I was going to suggest putting up something like a chain-link barrier to make turnstyle jumping impossible ... "
Fortunately, the FDNY would not allow such a barrier.
"I was going to suggest putting up something like a chain-link barrier to make turnstyle jumping impossible ... "
Fortunately, the FDNY would not allow such a barrier. (Imagine a fire during rush hour.)
I despise laws that are not laws.
"I was going to suggest putting up something like a chain-link barrier to make turnstyle jumping impossible ..."
Fortunately, the FDNY would not allow such a barrier. (Just imagine a fire during rush hour.)
@Mattman26: "Also: I imagine almost any turnstile is jumpable, but these seem ludicrously easy."
They had the camera pointed at an wheelchair / stroller gate. Those are placed right next to the staffed assistance and monitoring stations, and I suppose this was meant to discourage gate jumping. But, everyone turns a blind eye as post-COVID ridership is 25% of historical levels and as the system is surely bleeding massive amounts of money.
Most of the DC Metro gates are just wide enough to walk through and waist high.
Also: I imagine almost any turnstile is jumpable, but these seem ludicrously easy.
NYC has some that are not jumpable, like these. But every station also has the regular kind that is easy to jump, I suppose because they're cheaper and can move more people in and out of the station at crowded times.
And there was this Darwin prize winner from earlier this year.
What keeps "chumps" from jumping is just plain honesty. Many times I see most people dutifully swiping their cards at the same time as someone is hopping over. It's the same thing that keeps CVS stores from falling victim to mass shoplifting even though, as was pointed out, anyone can walk out with whatever they want without paying.
Kudos to Left Bank of the Charles for harkening back to 1959's Kingston Trio "At Large" album (which, betraying my age) I happen to have on vinyl....
For your listening pleasure:
https://youtu.be/7Tc1GUXxr2o
Part of the problem is it becomes difficult to care about something when the organization that is supposed to care refuses to act like they care.
It is also difficult to care when the organization that is supposed to care about the entire system does not seem to care about doing their jobs in general. When the trains do not run on time, the stations are filthy, and crime is rampant, worrying about fare jumpers is of minimal interest. These days, it is even of less interest given that a fare jumper can beat a person to an inch of his or her life, then be released without bail the next day.
Worrying about fare jumpers is a luxury good of a well-functioning system.
To use Seattle's new light rail system, one sweeps a credit card. Or not: it's on the honor system. Only 30% of riders pay, proof again that people of the left have no moral compass.
Petty crime is contagious. A number of times I've been in bumper to bumper traffic, the kind where it is an endless column of cars across the highway. Usually everyone just begrudgingly waits. But sometimes one person decides they can't wait and they pull onto the emergency lane and drive forward the quarter mile to their exit. Whenever that happens I always immediately see some others decide at that moment they can no longer wait and do the same thing.
It seems like a small thing - fare jumping, $40 million lost in one of the nation's more populous cities, locals don't care - but it's a symptom of a much larger problem.
The breakdown and impending collapse of our civilization.
When people don't care about the rules, don't care about the law, don't care about order, just care about what they want to do, everything and everyone else be damned, just another helpless victim whose eye has to be stitched back into her head, just another child or spouse or parent whose life is suddenly cut short because the street pirate with a gun got everything he demanded but still felt like shooting the employee.
ColoComment said it well. In the present times, the default choice by many people seems to be, if you believe you can get away with it, do it. If you don't suffer an adverse consequence, do it again.
If you read the Twitter comments
So many complaining about it being expensive to ride, but the people paying are subsidizing the ones not paying. Then they complain about it being too crowded with long wait times, yet also want it to be free.
The real question is, who made the decision to install those pathetic turnstyles? They should be responsible for the $40 million lost.
Per Robert Cook, in NYC we do need the subway to get around. Driving is impractical—parking is scarce and expensive—buses are impossibly slow and taxis too pricey for the every day commute. I’ve seen school kids jumping the turnstile and have been tempted to chew them out—tempted but too timid or too sensible, take your pick, to actually do it.
Arresting and or fining fare jumpers is, wait for it… racist.
New Yorkers expect their subway system to be paid for by the taxpayers of other states. That is why they don’t care. Stop using federal tax dollars to subsidize the NY subways and they will start caring very fast indeed! Just another way that socialism is bad for humans in general and the people who are the most subsidized by others in particular.
In most major American cities and in much of the rest of the country, public funding is based on the principle: white people and Asians pay; black and brown people get it for free.
One wonders how sustainable this policy will be once whites are in the minority.
Many subways have tall revolving doors to LEAVE the platforms.
Why can't they use a similar device to enter?
You put in your ticket or swipe you card into a machine, then step into the revolving door.
No tickee, no entry.
Yeah, maybe it would be slower. But at least there would be no jumpers.
"To use Seattle's new light rail system, one sweeps a credit card. Or not: it's on the honor system. Only 30% of riders pay, proof again that people of the left have no moral compass."
How do you know what percentage of those not paying are "people of the left," (sic)? It could be more "people of the right" than "of the left."
("Leftist" or "lefty" is not a catch-all term that applies to anyone whose behavior annoys you, but that seems to be how it is used so profligately on this blog.) Even most registered Democrats are not really "people of the left," except, perhaps, in contrast to the increasingly hard-right lean of Republicans and unaffiliated conservatives.
I was in Frankfurt Germany a few years ago and rode the train from my hotel to downtown. The trains ruin all over the city like a signature or bus system would
You have to buy a ticket from a machine but there is no turnstile or anything to prevent you walking onto a train. Istr the ticket was for a period of time, like A day or a week.
On the way downtown, nobody checked. On the way back, someone in a uniform strolled through train and everybody showed their tickets. I didn't observe any inspection of the tickets, just that everyone had one. Very casual.
Apparently enforcement is very lax but if they do catch you riding without a ticket, punishment is swift and severe. Russian front maybe?
Nice honor system and I wish it worked here. Otoh, I prefer our anarchic society to the typical blind obedience to and belief in the State.
I do agree that perhaps we overdo the anarchy at times.
Still, for all its faults, I remain convinced that to much govt is worse than too little.
John stop fascism vote republican Henry
That's understandable in NYC where everything is old as hell, and not likely to be replaced. It's not so easy to see why DC puts up with it.
make the turnstile more challenging >>> reveal / discover potential sports legends!
Blogger Interested Bystander said...
" We visited NYC 10 years ago and used the subway quite a bit. Never saw anyone jumping the turnstyles. This is a new behavior since the safe days of 2010-2012. Amazing how quickly things can go to shit. "
i ride the trains several times per week. Saw 1 or 2 turnstyle jumpers in the past few years-kids.
There's the NYC you rubes read about in the Post and the one that exists in reality-2 different worlds.
Blogger Steven MqCween said...
"In most major American cities and in much of the rest of the country, public funding is based on the principle: white people and Asians pay; black and brown people get it for free.
One wonders how sustainable this policy will be once whites are in the minority."
Polly want a cracker?
M said...
" New Yorkers expect their subway system to be paid for by the taxpayers of other states. That is why they don’t care. Stop using federal tax dollars to subsidize the NY subways and they will start caring very fast indeed! Just another way that socialism is bad for humans in general and the people who are the most subsidized by others in particular."
Fake news Sparky. Like most Blue States NY pays far more in federal taxes than they get back in revenue. Actually same is true for their state taxes and revenues.
https://www.osc.state.ny.us/reports/new-yorks-balance-payments-federal-budget-federal-fiscal-year-2020#appendix-a
This behavior is a violation of trust and community. In order for large numbers of humans to live closely together in peace, there needs to be a willingness to be considerate of others, and an agreement on acceptable behavior. As a society becomes more diverse, both of these things are no longer givens, and in fact there is often a large disagreement about them.
Where I live people routinely violate traffic laws such as running red lights, driving on road shoulders, and turn signals are an endangered species. Why? A large segment of the population are uncivilized barbarians who think rules are for suckers. And we import more of them every year.
Or maybe people know better than to dare to criticize criminals to reporters from liberal newspapers.
Mutaman: wrong on several crucial points. Upstate New Yorkers are bled dry to support city transit they do not use and homeless problems their politicians did not create; the statistics regarding federal funds paid to and withdrawn from federal taxation are cooked, excluding payroll tax for example, and bloc grants for another, which are showered on New Your City by decent taxpayers everywhere to subsidize the vast underclass and illegal populations there, and if we also factored in the extraordinary federal disability funds paid to something like half of still-working, doubled dipping L.I. Railroad employees, the scales would tip ever further.
Tina Trent said...
" Mutaman: wrong on several crucial points. the statistics regarding federal funds paid to and withdrawn from federal taxation are cooked,"
Link please.
"Link please. "
I didn't think so-just another Cracker shooting of their mouth and not being able to back it up.
Yes, Metro losses money. But that isn't the worst of it.
The fare evaders are criminals. They just add to the lawlessness, criminal assaults, vagrancy, and general chaos on the Metro. Mostly minority urban youth generously peppered with outright criminals. These are people you would NOT want to have in your Metro car, let alone in a seat near you.
This is just a way for officials and authorities to abdicate their responsibility to the public. If they allow this, they need to allow concealed carry across state boundaries.
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