Re: [AUS] Radio forum on public transport

[Leif <leif.hanlen@studentmail.newcastle.edu.au>]

It was written:

> Bullshit.  Car thieves concentrate on places like transit parking lots,
> where they know the owners of the cars are going to be away for a good
> long time.

Car thieves concentrate on cars. They concentrate on places where there
are cars. Parking lots outside train stations come a very poor second to
most shopping plazas in terms of profitability for car theft.
 
> 
> Only fools waste their time and risk their property by using transit scams.
> How many wealthy people do you know who use transit scams on a regular basis?
> Successful people use cars, not transit scams.

Successful people use whatever is more convienient. It is a fool who
will stereotype the entire public transport system as you have tried..

But seriously: There are three executives that I know *personally* who
catch a train to work every day.. one of whom doesn't actually own hold
a driver's license. This particular individual is well over the 100k per
annum mark, so I would have to suggest that he must not fall into your
"successful" category. :o|

I don't know a lot of people who earn this type of figure, but I woud
suggest that rather than spouting such froth, you might try serious
argument.

Much of the "success" attrinuted to driving a private car is that the
average executive dirves a corporate car - often along roads running
parallel to the main transit systems, because the cars are part of the
worker's salary package. "fringe benefits tax" has done little to
alleviate this - so we tend to see corporate execuitves in cars, rather
than trains, because the company wil sponsor a car as a tax dodge. I
wonder what would happen if someone suggested first class style rail
seating? (I'm not advocating such... but I wonder what would happen...
corporate sponsored rail seats...)

A system - not a miss-mash as we have in Australia, but a system - will
encourage people to use it. Take two extremes:

Houston opted for the drive-my-car-cause-I-damn-well-can approach: the
city is large, it is sprawling, it has a serious amount of space devoted
to either car parking lots, or road surface... to try to put public
transport into a city like Houston is (and I have seen the attempt) a
waste of time.

Rome opted for the catch-a-bus-or-train-you-idiot and actually banned
cars completely from the CBD. People use the system... including the
highly paid individuals who may still own their own ferrari at home. The
system is there, people use it. 

Melbourne has a dogs-breakfast as far as getting anywhere, so you drive
a car... because that's what you think is necessary... and so, to cope,
the city spreads out, making public transport les and less possible. A
sprawling city does not accomodate itself to a public transport system.
I think it's fairly obvious why.

Sydney to a lesser extent - certainly the western suburbs look like a
pre-shooler's drawing as far as planning goes.

What I can't understand is why it is seen to be necessary to waste
perfectly good infrastructure: we have the capability, we have the buses
the trams the trains AND THE TAXIS, yet we still insist on building more
roads.

Leif.