Heh. I was just typing this story up, myself.

Here's what I don't get; if ridership is up, but the number of functioning buses has stayed the same, doesn't that mean that Tri-met is making more profit per a dollar spent on gas?

How many more riders would Tri-met need to break even at the current ticket price? How many would they need to drive ticket prices down?

Seriously? Ugh...

^^^^^^ My thoughts exactly... Good show old boy.

The Portland Mercury should pay for its employees to get Universal Passes. I think they are about $700/employee. The company I work for offers them to employees.

Costs are skyrocketing because demand is outpacing supply. Deal with it. You can use google maps to determine what the cost comparison is, it'll tell you tri-met prices versus driving.

For the record, I bike about 40% of the time.

I drove from Idaho Falls to Portland last fall, and it cost $100. Prices have nearly doubled since then. A new TriMet monthly pass will cost about the price of a tank of gas.

Get your green-friendly ass out to the sidewalk and hop a bus. Breath mints optional, but please shower first!

What we need is not higher prices to keep people off the bus, but more buses, more often, on more routes. There's no reason for single-occupancy vehicles to be the primary mode of transportation. This would require governments to reprioritize what they invest in, though.

James X. is exactly right. I've done the math at $3.75 a gallon, and at this point it costs less for me to drive my fairly fuel efficient Toyota the 3 miles to work than it does to take the bus. Same goes for my partner's commute, and because of that, she typically drives.

The day it's actually cheaper to take the bus is the day I'll be able to convince her to hop on the #8 each day (which is fortunately a frequent service line, and it's right by our house). If TriMet raises the fare, that day is much further off.

If my commute was only three miles, I'd just bike it.

Dunno if you folks have seen this, but the Google Transit app is pretty badass and it will give you a car vs. bus cost comparison -

http://www.google.com/transit

Amy:

All that election math got your wonderful brain fried? Gas is only a quarter of the expense of driving a motor vehicle. The greatest expense by far is depreciation. But fuel is the recurring marginal expense so that is what people focus on.

Here is my deal:

I probably could afford a beater, but for my infrequent real needs Zipcar is a much better alternative. I Zipped up to Terry Bean's to schmooze Barney Frank, for example. (Ahem! Real uptown, eh?) I spend maybe $300 each year on Zipcar.

Over 65, I get Tri-Met all zone monthly passes for $23. Less than $300 yearly for those.

But my primum mobile is the YELLOW KHS FIXIE with custom "crow's foot" laced 26 inch wheels. Costs for this are about $500 per year. As with any vehicle the major expense is the thing itself; second for a bike is all weather clothing.

The real synergy is with the bike and Tri-Met. The KHS is light and tough, and I set it up with short straight bars to fit easily on bus racks. It quickly gets me to the bus and to my destination at the other end. Show time too: after years of accumulated research I have perfected the FIXIE FLIP to rack it.

Bus drivers are amazed! You will be too! Allow me to demo!

tk.: yep, I know. sometimes I'm lazy (the first mile is a steady incline, which is incredibly unappealing on a monday morning).

Jim: our car's been paid off for ages, and has been miraculously free of mechanical problems. Other than gas, our yearly auto expenses are less than $1500, which is little enough that the bus doesn't beat it. (I'm awaiting the day it dies, and—since we can't afford a newer car—we go car-free.)

WOW! MS. RIUZ,

You’re not actually hammering TRIMET too badly this time. Just a little badly, which is unusual for you.

First of all, in a prefect world they wouldn’t be fighting an illegal war in the middle east but rather taking all that money and giving it to Transit agencies so that the public could get where they are going AT NO COST.

But alas, we live in a stinking shit hole of a world where killing take precedence over mass transit.

That said, HOW IN THE HELL DO YOU EXPECT TRIMET TO KEEP THE COST OF A BUS TICKET THE SAME WHILE GAS PRICES ZOOM?

Come on Amy, even a TRIMET hating news reporter such as yourself should know better than that.

So for cost of one gallon of HIGH TEST, you can buy yourself an ALL DAY PASS, and ride around the TRIMET service area all day, which it can take sometimes to get from point A to point B.

Public transit is a hell of a deal, money wise.

There are plenty of reasons to not take transit but cost efficiency is not one of them.

Amy, if you subtract gas from your car's costs, then divide what's left by two, a TriMet annual pass is still cheaper.

James X: True, but that would assume we're selling the car (and no longer paying for insurance, the only way to ditch those non-gas costs). And that, my friend, is a fight you will never win with my partner. (If you figure out how to make that case, talk to me... if that's possible, then perhaps I can convince her that we should get chickens, too.)

I'm a book of tickets person myself. That annual pass works out to more than one trip a day—or more than 400 a year—which isn't going to happen (unless someone wants to buy one for me). I get by on less than two books of tickets a month, or 20 rides. Then bike the rest.

Hey, move to fare less square, you remember that place don't ya?

You did an article on it A-M-Y!

Then you don't pay nothing!

Most Sincerely,

Al M (your pal)

Actually, A-M-Y,

This might be a good time to re-visit the whole concept of fare less square and transit equity.

What ya think Amy, maybe we should re-think the whole issue of fare less square!

Get rid of that stinking fare less square and not raise prices for the rest of us.

Gee, I do remember making this point some time in the past.

Funny how times change eh Amy?

Al M (your pal)

Al M

Now that you got me on a rant A-M-Y;

You see, what we have here is the problem in a nutshell.

People want SECURITY, people want FREE SERVICE,

GIVE GIVE GIVE, nobody wants to pay.

Well that might work in like, SWEDEN, but this is AMERICA baby, and in America it's pay pay pay.

So commuters of Portland, so sorry that gas prices have gotten outta control, if you want mass transit you gotta pay for it.

You can't keep asking the business community to foot the entire bill!

Al M

Personally, I have no major issue with paying a bit more for the bus. Yes, I do think it should be subsidized but since I gave up my car, sometimes it's the best alternative. I walk, bike and Zipcar also.

Oh, and A L M, what's with writing A-M-Y over and over again? It's fucking creepy. Her name is Amy.

Me and A-M-Y or old buddies from way back,

Right A-M-Y ?

I mean, when I think of Amy Ruiz I think in capital letters:

A-M-Y;

You don't understand the history!

Most sincerely,

Al M (your pal)