Hard News: If wishing made it so ...
186 Responses
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Sofie Bribiesca, in reply to
If I use EFTPOS to top up my HOP card, it’s not revenue for the transport provider until I complete a tag-on/tag-off transaction, likewise any other stored-value fare system.
What's wrong with that though?
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The Standard fisks another couple of graphs. Usual warning about reading the comments applies.
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Sacha, in reply to
You can't use eftpos on the actual train or bus or ferry. Something still has to be used there. The new system is designed to be really fast, to speed up the whole system.
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I think you will find many instances of brilliant ideas designed to make social services (public transport, power, telephones etc.) a little more efficient, reliable and equitable, have been stymied by the "need" to monetise them. Free is the new price for such things. The social benefit of affordability of the basic needs of society greatly outweighs the need for a few individuals to become wealthy and should be the blueprint for infrastructure, nationalisation is the only way to achieve that goal. Unfortunately the mantra that the Private Sector is far more efficient than Public Ownership is still the battle cry of the right wing.
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Matthew Poole, in reply to
Geez ,that’s not very nice.
It may not have been the politest of wording, but it's incredibly frustrating when an organisation that's trying to improve provision of services to its largely-working class clientèle gets smacked with the "anti-worker" stick.
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Matthew Poole, in reply to
What’s wrong with that though?
Nothing, but there still needs to be infrastructure on the buses and train (platforms) to take care of that revenue transfer to the transport provider. EFTPOS takes a very, very long time. Even Snapper takes too long (over a second) to read the card for use in really high-volume scenarios. Imagine 700 people trying to pass through a barrier that takes over a second per person just to read their card before opening the gate, which is the situation that'll be faced at Britomart once this is rolled out on trains here.
I'm really getting confused at your objections to this system.
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Matthew Poole, in reply to
Provision of free public transport is a discussion that would be worth having in this country, but we're a long, long way away from it being in any way fruitful. Direct subsidies are communist evils, you understand, and we can't be having any of that. Much better to hide the subsidies to road users by transferring externalities onto the taxpayer and then spend billions of dollars on roads. For what's being wasted on the Roads of Dubious Significance we could have fare-free public transport across the entire country for many, many years.
However, given the evidence that no value is attached to things that are given away, it would still be better to have at least nominal fares. Detach their cost from any kind of farebox recovery, but charge something.
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If I use EFTPOS to top up my HOP card, it’s not revenue for the transport provider until I complete a tag-on/tag-off transaction, likewise any other stored-value fare system.
Matthew, isn't it the case that money topped up on Hop or any other device accrues immediately to the organisation running the device? In which case the money stored on the prepaid device becomes a large float. How this is accounted for with respect to real expected future costs is a matter for the accountants, but it could be that this buffer constitutes an interest free loan. Asking in ignorance.
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Matthew Poole, in reply to
Matthew, isn’t it the case that money topped up on Hop or any other device accrues immediately to the organisation running the device? In which case the money stored on the prepaid device becomes a large float. How this is accounted for with respect to real expected future costs is a matter for the accountants, but it could be that this buffer constitutes an interest free loan.
Yes, pretty much. Was having this discussion with my brother just this morning. In theory the money is not the provider’s until you’ve claimed a transport trip (ETA: hence my statement to Sofie about needing a way to transfer the value to the provider), but as there’s no provision to have money refunded I don’t know exactly how the technicalities add up.
It’s a large cash asset that offsets an equal-sized liability that’s recorded as “prepayments”. In Infratil’s case, that means a private, profit-making company can earn interest off their customers’ money and return it to shareholders. The same will be true of Auckland Transport when HOP is fully online, no doubt, but I’m much more comfortable with a public body (and all its accompanying oversight) holding the money and accruing the interest.
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Sacha, in reply to
given the evidence that no value is attached to things that are given away, it would still be better to have at least nominal fares
lest bored hordes ride the buses all day and night
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Matthew Poole, in reply to
lest bored hordes ride the buses all day and night
Apparently the Link drivers start to get grumpy if one sits on the bus for a few complete circuits. I don't know why they should give a damn (outside peak hour, of course), but people I know who've done the loop (in the days of there only being the Green Link) report getting asked to vacate.
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Rob S, in reply to
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Richard Aston, in reply to
unless we’re proposing to make public transport completely free
Now there's a thought. I read years ago ( citation needed) a Russian city did this. They were already subsidizing bus transport that charged and on analysis found the cost of process the money,tickets admin etc was so high they ditched the tickets , upped their subsidy slightly and made the bus service free.
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Sacha, in reply to
Would be interesting to see most public services costed for universal delivery with reduced admin costs. And progressive taxation to pay for it, perhaps with universal basic income to knock out most of the welfare system too.
Make a nice change from neoliberal approaches that regard people as fundamentally untrustworthy and needing to be charged fees to motivate responsible behaviour.
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Lilith __, in reply to
bored hordes ride the buses all day and night
Anarchy!!
I know a few grey-haired folk who do this, just quietly, during off-peak hours.
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Matthew Poole, in reply to
neoliberal approaches that regard people as fundamentally untrustworthy and needing to be charged fees to motivate responsible behaviour.
It's not even anything to do with being trustworthy. The issue isn't vandalism or other abuse, it's a lack of concern about existence or quality. Make public transport fare-free but reduce services to hourly and the response "You're not paying for it, so why do you care?" comes into play, and not just from detractors.
It's a fundamental human need to attach value to things.
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Sacha, in reply to
There's collective value and concern as well as individual. Neoliberalism seems to attract the selfish. Who is really going to 'over-use' public transport if the fare is zero. What does that even mean?
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Sacha, in reply to
It's not even anything to do with being trustworthy
Agency theory sure is.
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Lilith __, in reply to
Who is really going to ‘over-use’ public transport if the fare is zero.
In pre-quake days the Chch city shuttles (looping around the CBD) were free, and a great convenience for shoppers, tourists, and anybody else who wished to use them. They were electric (battery powered) and stopped often so were not very speedy, but they were well-patronised. Because there was no fare to pay, people could climb on and off at both front and rear, which made it possible to carry a lot of people with minimal delay.
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Richard Aston, in reply to
Same in Auckland when Farmers had a free trolley bus service - it was well used and frequent
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Sofie Bribiesca, in reply to
I'm not objecting, just don't see why it has become such an ordeal when there are many examples in the world that work.
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Tamara, in reply to
I use HOP and it's a big improvement on the old system but still slower than it should be. Plus, if the reader doesn't work properly a couple of times that slows things down more. You have to hold the card up to the reader just right...
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Matthew Poole, in reply to
I use HOP and it’s a big improvement on the old system but still slower than it should be
You mean the real HOP, not the bastard Snapper hybrid?
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Matthew Poole, in reply to
just don’t see why it has become such an ordeal when there are many examples in the world that work.
Mix well a fragmented bunch of providers who have no contractual obligation to make it easy, combing with one owned by a company that has a competing product (and didn't win the tender), then add a meddling Minister as the icing on a cluster-fuck cake.
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Steve Barnes, in reply to
There’s collective value and concern as well as individual. Neoliberalism seems to attract the selfish.
Indeed it does, the attitude is “My “Hard Earned Money” no longer makes me special now those plebs can travel for free”. Hard earned my arse,. When the greedheads get to own our assets and pay the stuffed shirts and skirts fistfuls of filthy lucre for sitting at a big table plotting the next ripoff, the rest of us will all be worse off and that, my friend, will make the bastards feel special. Let’s just dump the financial system all together and revert to a barter system then we can say “Oooh, look at you with all your bits of paper covered in complicated numbers, what have you got to offer, what can you do?. Sod off ya wanker”
Whilst we are on about these sad excuses for people I see that Whitey gets to go home again
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