I’m sick and tired of all of the bitching from people about how Metro Transit is raising the bus fares to 2.25! I ride the bus everywhere I go and, honestly, 2.25 isn’t that much! This is the first fare increase introduced in over 4 years, and the price of everything else has gone up, so why the shock that transit has raised their rates? The increase is required to offset rising operating costs and future growth, which means more buses, more routes and better transit services for all of y’all. Over the past four years, Metro Transits service has grown by more than 60 percent to accomodate the increased ridership in the city, so more money is needed, end of story! Finally, despite this new price increase, Metro Transit still has one of the lowest transit fare structures for cities of comparable size across Canada. So please, everybody, shut up!
—Halifax Rocks
This article appears in Mar 5-11, 2009.
To be honest, I don’t ride very often… I just think it’s bad because their service blows goats (which is WHY I don’t ride often).
I’m not saying it’s all the drivers that suck or the urine soaked buses that are the issue…. it’s the total package.
It DOESN’T take over a year to get the fucking GPS working on these things. Because of that, we rag on drivers missing their timings when gotime should be live updating by now. Because the drivers get bitchy or hostile, they go off on us for little things….
or cut people off in traffic. Then we bitch about it, making transit look bad and the war rages on.
I have more on this issue over at the news page.
I agree with Halifax Rocks, Metro Transit can do no right in this city, they could have the best service in the country and charge a dollar per ride and people would then complain that it should be free. It’s the cost of business people, people seem to think that buses are soooo much better in comparable cities which is hog-wash. Look at Moncton, 2.00 fare and most buses run hourly and Sunday service ends around 8pm. People need to appreciate that we have a great service considering the money, or lack thereof, we receive from outside sources. Go Transit!!
Oh yeah and to zZz, if YOU think you can get a couple hundred GPS’s in sync with thousands of bus stops around the city, go ahead and do it ! You’re probably still trying to figure out how to program your VCR !!! Haha
I suppose it was only a matter of time, but did they have to go up THAT much?
Truth be told, we currently have one of the lowest fare structures in the country, not just among similar sized cities, but among any of the top 20. Now if we could just get weekly passes, we’d be a little less crappy.
Plastic Diver Guy: What do you mean “THAT much”? It’s a friggin’ quarter, dude! What were you expecting?
To be honest, a dime was what I was expecting. A good balance between needs and growing the ridership. The people will accept a quarter a ride, but they don’t have to like it. Also missing from the major papers was how the fares are going up again in 2011 to $2.50.
Every other LTWWB member is affected in their pocketbooks. I’m affected in that I have to hear about it frequently for a while.
I have no problem with the fares going up, but they damned well better improve a few of the major flaws.. Metro Transit has been making me so mad lately 🙁 Why, WHY is the 14 always so late that some times it just doesn’t show up at all?! Most of our buses are fine, some of the drivers could take a chill pill now and again, but there’s definitely a few routes that could use maintenance..
The increase bothers me because I’m being charged more to be environmentally friendly. Why doesn’t the city plough more money in to the transit system from their budget and charge drivers more for parking in the downtown core etc?
I take the bus every – four times a day. I have a bus pass – and the price of that is increasing. I’m on a tight budget – my concern is that I might not be able to afford it, or I might have to cut down on my food budget in order to buy my bus pass.
It’d be nice if they increased the cash cost of the fare, but kept the prices of the passes and tickets down, so they it would incourage people to buy the bulk amounts, and then the locals who use the bus all the time wouldn’t have anything to complain about. Make it more expensive for the occasional user (and tourists and such), so that it makes more sense to use it all the time.
I bet the arsewipes who are complaining about the horrendous increase of 25 cents wouldn’t bat an eyelid if StarFucks raised the price of the pony piss they serve….Now if beer were to go up 25 cents, that would be a catastrophe, let’s get things in perspective
I don’t feel much sympathy. I take the 68, which is constantly late, plus I’ll now have to pay $70 for a bus pass. Regardless, I’m pleased to pay the little bit extra to be able to get to work, home and anywhere else the bus will take me. Could Metro Transit be improved? Sure! But it’s still a great service for what it is!
Senile – I don’t drink that piss poor crap they serve at SF.
Sorry.
Coming from a home town with a district based Bus systm and little or No Service on WEEKDAYS, let alons weekends, I would happily pay $2.25 to go anywhere I wanted to in the HRM. When you are used to a good thing and a good thing starts to cost more… it sucks, but when you have Nothing of value, a good thing is cheap at any price
I suppose, after thinking about it 2.25 isn’t that bad…esp since I’ve got the same experience as trmacd. Growing up in the valley meant little independence if you didn’t have a car.
I spent my childhood in Halifax and really did know what I was missing when I lived outside HRM, and I appreciate MT a lot more because of the crap ass bus service (i.e.: no bus service) they had where I lived in my teen years.
hrmboy, I’m pretty sure I could get it working in under a year by myself… and with not much difficulty.
Even if I didn’t know as much as I do about GPS and computer programming, I could still use countless other cities with this already in place and get information on their system setup and potential hurdles they faced.
If this were the FIRST city to do this, then yeah, maybe it could take a while but there is certainly nothing unique about our city with regards to GPS and server technology (other than the lack of funding for it).
AND if the lack of funding was the cause of them dragging their heels, then don’t announce that you’re doing it until it’s almost ready to be piloted.
and who the fuck still even HAS a vcr?
you can get a dvd player for $20 and they don’t even make vcr tapes anymore.
Kings Transit costs $3.50 in Windsor. If anyone is familiar with the town/area, I’m sure you would agree 2.25 isn’t too much to ask.