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Thread started by MOM_RIDAZ420 at 07.9.08 - 4:17 pm
Hey Just wanted to let y'all know that they (sheriff's) are now getting on the train and checking for tickets in between stops every now and then...so if you jump fare be warned...i just got a ticket yesterday for it...but i deserved it...
The last I heard they ARE talking about putting in turnstiles. In the meantime, pay your fare; it's cheap enough considering the alternatives.
Yes, one could make a reasonable argument that mass transit should be free, but on the other hand it reminds me of something I saw on "60 Minutes" years ago that seems to say something about human nature: a certain company that actually treated its workers well put in vending machines that were FREE. The result was that there was a huge amount of waste. People took things just because they were free. So they made it so that everything cost some nominal amount (like a nickel) and the amount of waste went way down. The moral for me is that (in our society at least) people don't value things that they get for nothing.
They don't slow any one individual down enough to cry about, if the station isn't crowded. Cumulatively, in a crowded situation, it's a different story. Also, they cost more to administer.
Rlrz, you are correct. The plan is to install a bunch of unnecessary turnstiles in the subway and (possibly) light rail stations on Metro. Basically, it's a sweetheart deal for a politically connected provider of fare collection/control technology. Now that's a bona fide waste of taxpayer money, to the tune of millions.
You claim fare checking is a waste of taxpayer dollars in the same thread in which you admit to dodging fares? Are you going to continue to ride for free or will you now start paying? How many others who read this thread are going to start paying for their rides, too?
I'm guessing you aren't someone who is paying a whole lot of taxes or else you wouldn't be so blase about stealing taxpayer dollars. If you don't want to pay a fare, pedal your bike instead of riding. I pay a huge sum of money to various government agencies every year and I have no issue with some enforcement of the very minimal fare that is charged.
You think you are simply entitled to free transport, perhaps?
It isn't a waste of taxpayer dollars at all, even if individual sheriffs don't collect enough in ticket revenue to cover their own salary for the simple reason that It is way cheaper than the turnstile infrastructure that would be required to check every fare, yet is random enough so as to require a very high percentage of riders to actually pay their fare in order to avoid getting caught in a sweep. So long as the fine is prohibitive enough to encourage ticket purchases and goes up exponentially with repeat offenses, I suspect they can save tons of money over turnstiles. Money which will be far better spent making real public transport improvements.
whilist i was in the LBC this past monday i had the wonderful experience to take the blue line downtown.. while i was waiting for the train i talked to a few officers who were checking tickets when i arrived and was citing one person.. i usually dont pay for the train except that one time i got in to that free show at h&h for a metro ticket.. but those two officers (one of which had those sweet special edition white and black ray ban wayfayers, so sick) and they were teling me how sooo many ppl dont pay for a ticket they are forced to stand there and the two major stops and check tickets so i have decided to pay for my ticket on the blue line.... but i believe we should have the transfer still in affect considering my family lives in oc but i live here in sm... so i dont really wanna pay 1.25 for three stops on the red. wack ness is what i say..
I disagree Rollerz. You have helped me twice for free, and I appreciate you more then you will ever know.
To get out of the ticket, get ahold of day pass from the day you got the ticket. You can show the judge you paid and didn't have your ticket available when they checked you. It works if you haven't received a fare evasion ticket before.
@ Sexy: thank you for that. Maybe I should qualify my statement by saying that the dynamic is different on a one to one level, where the individual is choosing to give freely of their time & effort, as opposed to the anonymity that makes some people undervalue the things they are given for free or to find it acceptable to steal from the government or large corporations.
Sorry, Kyber. Somehow I got it in my head that you were the original poster on the thread. I do that a lot because the original author gets placed above their post, and the next poster's content winds up looking like an extension of the original post, with the author at the bottom. My apologies for casting aspersions.
If I ever skip payment, it's because the ticket booths are not near the train platform (eg: rosa parks station on blue line, LAX green line) and because the trains come every 15-25 minutes sometimes. Can't blame me, I just don't want to miss the train.
Now, if those trains came every 5 mins, different story. That's not to sci-fi to fathom, is it?
I think the turnstiles are more about keeping bums off the trains. I'm all for that. but they cost more to run and they won't really be able to get rid of the sheriffs for security reasons.
I want to know how they are going to deal with selling tickets if they ever get serious ridership. If people ever start using the trains the way they do in other cities that have subways, the busy stations don't have nearly enough ticket machines. Of course, that presupposes that the trains will actually become useful for more than 20% of the area, so I guess they have lots of time to get new machines installed.
They only times I haven't bought a ticket have been when I could hear a train pulling in. There's no way I'm missing a train in order to buy a ticket when missing the train may result in a 20-45 minute delay (I've ridden the red line maybe 10 times, and I've waited more than 30 minutes on two of those occasions, both around 9pm).
This is what a well utilized metro looks like (this crowd is big enough to get video-d, but crowds that are 80% of this crowd are totally commonplace in Moscow. This is why trains run 18 seconds apart in rush hour)
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