I love the hipocrisy of the public transit system in this city. Not only do most of the busses, idling for fifteen minutes or more, have “Don’t idle” ads on them, as other people have said.
But, the main complaint here is that it’s 2.25 (Old news, I know), to ride the bus. Which doesn’t sound that expensive until you consider the huge amount of people that actually take it. And how often they do. Until you consider the fact that it is cheaper to buy a bus pass, for 70 dollars a month and, get ready for it SIXTY-FOUR if you’re a student. (Big savings there, all you university goers. I know you’re not starving or anything).
Cheaper. Yeah, to buy a 70 dollar bus pass a month. That’s nearly 1000 dollars a year not including tax. I don’t know many people who can easily afford that.
Bus tickets aren’t much better. (In fact, they might be worse). Almost 40 dollars for a sheet of 20. For anyone that has to bus out, and then home, that’s good for about 10 days. Less if you have to take more than one bus, and your transfer doesn’t stretch for that amount of time. Calculate that one.
What is the point of making the public transport system so inaccessible to the public? Not only that, but they still don’t have a bus from Bedford to Beechville, Lakeside, Timberlea. Considering the huge amount of people that take that bus… something’s wrong there. Try making it to work in one place, or the other on time everyday when you have to take (generally) three busses. Now try to get to work on that, and be on time, every day.
— K.M.
This article appears in Aug 27 – Sep 2, 2009.
Do the math, asshat. $4.50/day, $22.50/week, $90/month. Monthly pass = $70. So…..methinks a pass is cheaper. Is it just me?
Straight change, tickets or pass – it’s all cheap. I usually get a pass: I live in downtown Dartmouth but work in Halifax, so I use the bus and ferry every working day. The pass will set me back $840/yr if I buy one every month (there is no extra tax on these things; $70 per month is what you pay).
However, I get tax credits on those transit passes. To wit, about $125 directly off my computed tax. That’s not bad at all.
And consider that I am paying *only* $840/yr for the vehicles, fuel, maintenance, operator salaries, parking & facilities and so forth. Did you know that that is roughly the average annual cost of _maintaining_ a car in Canada? Not paying for the car, not paying for fuel, but just maintaining a car. So in comparison I’d say I’m doing pretty well.
You assert that many people you know could not afford passes. I don’t doubt for a second that some people can’t. But if you’re so brokedick poor that you can’t afford something like that (and I’ve been there), you learn to bicycle, walk, and cadge lifts from people. In any case, I respectfully suggest that most people on minimum wage _can_ afford a transit pass (based on personal experience).
Full time students at certain places get a FREE bus pass (free being when they pay their fees). I work full time and don’t mind paying the $70 a month to ride however often I like, what routes I like.
Transfers have gotten better – you used to only be able to use them to complete a one way trip. Now, you can get the 1 from DT to the mall, and get the 1 back as long as it’s within 2 hours!
What are you complaining about? It’s more expensive elsewhere.
I live in DT Halifax, and work in Burnside. Per month, I would have to pay for a lease on a car, the insurance, the gas, parking (as I have to pay where I live). Plus $57 a month on bridge fare (or a little less with a Macpass). I’ll stick with my $70 bus pass thanks very much.
“Cheap” is a relative term but the OP’s suggestion that the service doesn’t go far enough to accommodate the HRM population is not uncommon. To have the price of a service increase without increased quality will rub most the wrong way but, again, “cheap” and “expensive” are relative terms.
70 bucks a month is cheap for transport, regardless of the area that is serviced. I agree that MT needs to have more routes to serve the city better, but fuel isn’t cheap as well as repairs, etc. I’m sure I’m just echoing others here, but repairs, gas, insurance, everything associated with a car is far more expensive for a year. Also, if you cannot afford bus fare, you really need to look at your expenses, even a minimum wage job would allow you to have enough to pay 70 dollery-doos a month for a bus pass. To the point of people living in the BLT area, and having a bus go to Bedford, um, yeah… there’s a realistic request. I used to live in the BLT area. There’s barely enough people that use that bus to justify half hour service to Lacewood, let alone a bus that runs to and from Bedford. There’s no need for it. Also, a transfer lasts for an hour and a half. If you would have to travel from Bag-town to North Preston to have it expire on you and having to pay another fare. What are you concerned about? Pissed off you can’t deliver all of your drugs on one bus fare?
cheap may be a relative term this is true, however here are the numbers from other canadian cities
montreal 2.75
toronto 2.75
vancouver 2.50
ottawa 3.00
Relatively speaking, halifax is cheap.
I have yet to see a minimum wage that can afford average rent in the HRM (or anywhere). Again, “cheap” is a relative term and it’s relative to the rider’s bank account, personal circumstances and their local economy, not to the price of bus fare in some other city!
As for the cost of transit… this is where your tax dollars go. Be thankful you can see and feel and smell your cash hard at work in your community.
Plus, MT just launched a new bus service called the MetroX or something like that???
I worked minimum wage for two years, lived in an apartment where my rent share was $400, and could still afford groceries, bus transportation, and spending money.
Brit, you must have been thrilled to have to have roommates. Good for you! *gag*
Interesting how communistic principals are embraced and expected when you live on minimum wage in this country
Kay: what communist principles are those?
What do you think you’re doing when you share a resource like a home? It’s communal living where strangers (not families) do their share to service the needs of the many (roommates contribute to rent, utilities, yard work, house work, sometimes food, etc) and uphold communistic protocol (like don’t hog the bathroom). The family environment is a better example of communistic living but shhhh, let’s not tell the majority this is a most natural (and necessary) thing for a group of living creatures to do lest the democrats get all offended.
I did the math. A pass to get to and from work 5 days a week, for a month, is 2 bucks cheaper than tickets. Not much, but still, saving is saving. Plus I can go anywhere else I want, which I can’t do with a limited number of tickets.
My only beef with the buses here is the bus that picks me up from work comes at a different time everyday. Could be 4:35, could be 5:05. And I never know if it’s going to be the 52 or the 21. And Go time is full of shit. It will say the 52 arrives in 7 minutes and it will be the 21 that arrives…. 30 minutes later.
The U-pass isn’t FREE, TBAC — it’s about 120 bucks, which *is* a steal considering the new $64/mo price tag. But alas, the u-pass only lasts from sept to april *sigh*
also, either taxes are included or there is no tax because 70 bucks is all you pay…plus you can claim it on your income tax *shrug*
OB needs to go to another city and ride their transit. Last time I checked it was $102/month for a TTC pass in Toronto, and upwards of $120 in Ottawa for a rural express pass (would be the same as a link pass here)….fares in Ottawa back in 2006 were $3 for a regular bus, $4 for an express (like the 34 or the 35 here) and $5 for rural express (like the link here) and have probably gone up since. So quit whining. MT doesn’t have THAT many people riding it in comparison to other cities, and the province/city’s $$$ contribution is pathetic.
I think MT is doing the best it can with what it’s got, and it’s still cheap to ride when you consider the price of operating a vehicle on a daily basis and when you consider the price of public transit in other cities (shit, it was $2.50 to ride king’s transit in the valley back in 2005 when I lived there….so…)
Kay: family living is about as far removed from a communist ideal as it’s possible to get. The children have very little say, for starters.
As to communal living, it might or might not approach a communist utopia. If all the roomies pool their incomes, property is communal, and they fulfill or exceed their domestic chore norms as stipulated by the bi-weekly committee meeting, they’re getting there. Otherwise, as is typically the case, it’s a purely capitalistic method of getting by coupled with some basic courtesy.
OP, you do realize that MT runs at a loss, right? The point that I was going to make has already been made a few times (few cities in Canada, if any, have fares under $2.25). Even when I was making $9 an hour and before the tax rebate, I had no problem paying for an adult pass. All you gotta do is budget your money better.
As for getting from Timberlea to Bedford, I count 2 buses required, a 21 and an 89 (3 on a weekend as the 89 is only M-F). LTWWB is likely not read by our planning department. Anything else I have to say has already been said.
I like the 89. Not only does is go past my apartment and provide an extra bus home from lacewood, it chops the requirement of catching the 80 on the bedford highway which is just a pain in the butt.
I just wish the 89 and the 16 didn’t run at roughly the same time — because it would be nice to have a bus going towards lacewood and back to parkland from lacewood at more staggered times.
Also, the 16 isn’t usually brimming with people, but they expanded service into saturday (more frequently too — every 30 minutes which is more than the hour run past 6 or 7 during the week) which is *thumbs up* because it’s nice to be able to get a faster route over to d-town on weekends.
Let’s see, live in Halifax on a minimum wage of $8.60/hr or live in Toronto on a minimum wage of $9.50/hr. Now there’s a no brainer with the cost of housing in Toronto.
Bro, it’s not as bad as it could be therefore the cost of living is a good or desirable thing? huh? You and my Mom walked to school together uphill both ways in blowing snow, didn’t you? Raise the bar, Bro! Then compare have a look at the number of homeless, the number who live in poverty and contrast that to the crime rate of the regions. After viewing the numbers most would feel safer alone and broke riding bus in downtown Toronto.
Realist, “family living is about as far removed from a communist ideal as it’s possible to get. The children have very little say, for starters.”
Hello? I’m sorry, who said the kids have any say or power in communistic society? Most societies do NOT allow the juveniles to make important decisions. And maybe you should by looking at “independent living” to contrast to “communal living”… just for a start
*double-take*
The one thing I wish MT would do is to break apart the 52 on each side of the bridge as delays in BLP cause people to be stranded in Burnside and vice-versa. It would mean transfering to catch the connecting bus but would at least ensure a quicker turnaround for a late bus getting back into the area that has the delays without disrupting the other end of the route.
The Dartmouth side could service the Bridge to Burnside area, the Hfx side could service BLP to either the Mumford Terminal (meaning a #2 or 4 transfer coming across the Bridge from Dartmouth) or bring it down to North & Gottingen then send it right back out towards BLP, people could catch any bus across the bridge to Dartmouth and transfer to the other #52 if needed to complete the journey.
Hey, kay, did you know that communistic principals would require us to give up everything that we consider freedoms?
You’ve got to be kidding. We pay less in rent, have better, reliable transit in toronto, , lower tuition, cheaper groceries and oh, a MUCH better salary for my husband, and higher min. wage in TO, ( and it’s going up again in march 2010) and you sing the praises of a washed up town with not much to do?
Please, stay in halifax. Getting out of that useless dump of a city was the best thing we ever did. ( mind you moving TO it in the first place was the stupidest.)
There’s no comparison between TTC and MT. It takes me all of 15 minutes to go to downtown from my home, a distance MT couldnt cover in an hour.
I guess, if you live in Halifax, you’ll say anything to convince yourself how wonderful it is, but MT is NOT a bargain.
Of course, we also aren’t sneered at for being “from away”, and people are far friendlier here than Halifax, happier.
But yeah. Stay there. Please.
HellifaxSucks, cheaper groceries? When was the last time you shopped for milk or bread or eggs in an Ontario store? How about smokes or gas? They cost (a lot) more too. The only things cheaper in NS vs ON are car insurance (never mind the cost of annual inspection required in NS) and (maybe) rent. Either way, minimum wage does NOT allow for independent living and a quarter difference in bus fare makes no difference at all when you don’t have enough to get by in the first place.
Fever, “…did you know that communistic principals would require us to give up everything that we consider freedoms?”
How so? We have yet to see a functioning communistic society not get ripped apart by democrats so please go ahead and qualify that statement. Do you really know what goes on behind the curtain? North Korea ain’t tellin’. And have we ever witness communism at work without dictatorship? I’m pulling from Karl Marx texts on “ideal” communism and I’m about to look into the Mennonite way of life (low expectations) and (ancient) Native Indian societal configurations here in Canada so please qualify your statement.
HellifaxSucks, I re-read your post and I see you agree it’s cheaper to live in ON. Sorry about that.
Actually, the societies you cite do not qualify as Communist. In fact Mennonites and the Natives all function under a Theocratic Patriarchal system if you wanna get really technical. Marxist Communism breeds dictatorship because humans are greedy and have the concept of ownership (which is something we all have . If that were to disappear, we’d have an argument for it. You might want to sit down and talk to my grandmother who had to flee her farm in the early parts of the 20th century that her parents and her grandparents had farmed on for years. But, you don’t have any perspective, as you live in Canada and you’ve never had anything taken away from you in the name of a sociological/political ideal, at least not to that degree.
I agree!
the buses are too exspensive we should ahve a better service for the price we pay IE buses running later at night
the way i see it, if you can’t afford a car, take the damn bus and shup the hell up. why whine and cry when you have to pay a lousy 70 bucks. how would you like to pay insurance,gas, licenses, safety, and the upkeep, of even a new car or truck. you have it lucky there is even a transit system in place. years ago when they had the old electric buses,they only moved in the city,and that was from sears to scotia square today.yeah,i used them,so date me on that. but the fact remains, that a car versus bus is lots more expensive. and if not in a hurry, you can relax and watch scenery go by,and blabber on your cell phone and read a paoper or book, without fear of being busted by the gestapo cops.you know who i mean,the ones ticketing you for a small infraction,while someone is roobing the bank beside you.
I think, Dr feelgood, that Kay’s point was that there has never BEEN a successful Marxist-style communist country to use a a “measure”. It’s not the system itself, it’s corruption and greed.
I think if you listen carefully to your grandma, you will hear that it was the change from a property-owning system TO a state-controlled system that caused her the pain, not the system itself.
If you’re happy living as serfs while the wealthy oligarchy laugh at you and your hard work…convincing you that you are “free”, go ahead…
What is “freedom” anyway? Can you eat it?
HellifaxSucks and Kay: I’m not convinced that either one of you knows what the hell you’re talking about, but every survey conducted for years unequivocally concludes that TO is the priciest city in Canada. But, hey, who are we to let facts intrude?
Sure, you can always go off anecdotal evidence, and compare apples to oranges, or just be fucking clueless in general. Everyone has that prerogative. Just don’t purport to know what the hell you’re talking about. Thanks, have a nice day.
Oh, HellifaxSucks: I’m happy for you that you can get to downtown TO in 15 minutes. Here’s a newsflash – 90 percent plus of Torontonians can’t. And BTW, in case you didn’t notice when you were here, we’ve got bridges, a big fucking harbour, and a peninsula to deal with. It may come as a surprise to you, but this complicates the transit problem.
Hey Frosty, it was the fact that if they didn’t hand over the land, they would have been killed, not this “state controlled system” bullshit. My point is this: Humans are greedy simply because we evolved to be. Therein lies the problem. It’s nice idea, but it’s a massive load of shit.
So, Hellisucks, what do you call affordable? The corner of Jane and Finch? It’s great as long as you can stand the gunfire. Besides, every city has a affordable housing issue. In terms of home ownership, it’s 300 K to buy a postage stamp in North York, and only 200 K to buy a backyard in Halifax/Dartmouth. Hm, back it up with some numbers. Finally, of course the TTC is far more efficient, but T.O. is three times the size and has quadruple the income of Halifax. Is like comparing a guy who drives a Mercedes SL500 to work every day compared to a beat up 1990 Ford Taurus.
Frosty… reow! *wink*
A truly equal society could not be maintained without a totalitarian regime. Thus nullifying the philosophy. So it sort of is the system itself. It just couldn’t work in any scenario!
Hey Kay, maybe you and Frosty should hook up… I think both your politics and your sense of sardonic wit would make the sparks fly… Talk about chemisty… Wow.
Plus he’s a musician, which if I recall, is right up your alley, so to speak…
No thanks required… Just be sure to send me a wedding invite…. *wink wink*
The Marxist system may look good on paper, but reality is a different thing. There are no successful communist states. I know, you’re going to yell China. Sorry, it’s only working slightly ok (and I’m sure I’m wrong on that but I’ll Give it the benefit of the doubt) because they are in the captalistic realm through manufacturing. But that only gives the government and favourite people money. The average joe still lives in abject poverty.
Look at Marxist Israel.
“”There are no successful communist states.””
Indeed.
And what do you consider a “successful state”? Those western countries that have used their military might to gobble up the lion’s share of the world’s resources at the barrel of a cannon?
You’re happy with the way the world is because you happen to be born in Canada.
How “successful” would you find the run-away capitalist western world, masquarading as a “democracy” if you had been born in Cuba, for instance, where what can be supplied by the state, e.g. health care and education (free) etc is only crippled by the giant Monty-Pythonesque foot ‘o disapproval of Uncle Sam? they would be flourishing but for the embargoes from the US that was terrified, under its 1950’s style paranoia, to let a communist state flourish (duck and cover! DUCK AND COVER!!)
You wouldn’t find our system so “successful if it wasn’t for our relative affluence…earned at the expense of, and on the backs of, the rest of the world for the past 300 years…
You’re so proud of “democracy” because it has co-incided with your cushy iPod buying, Nike-wearing, Lexus-driving western materialistic lifestyle…
…You’d be playing a totally different tune on your little guitar-hero ukelele in your mom’s basement…if you’d been born in the biggest democracy the world has ever known…India, where 200,000,000 freedom-lovin’ democrats are going to bed hungry tonight…
good grief
Yeah, Frosty, let’s take India as an example. Yes, there are are about 200 million freedom-loving, democratic people in India that starve every night. However, let’s take the “communist” paradise that is China, or even Cuba for instance. Let’s take away all of Cuba’s political sanctions, all of it’s economic sanctions, so on and so forth. There would still be people suffering, people starving in the streets. Wherever there is humans, there will be suffering. Marx didn’t account for one universal human truth: greed. He felt that we could arise above that, and what he didn’t realize is that we’ve evolved to be greedy. Not to mention it goes entirely against our social structure, and how humans organize themselves.
One thing that Metro Transit should have that it doesn’t, but that other cities have, is day and week passes, and weekend discounts as well perhaps. They’re handy. A day pass could be $5.50 and a week pass $25, for example, so if you take the bus three or more times in a day or five or more times in a week, it’d be worth it. It would also encourage more visitors to use transit.
And we need a Metro Transit connection to the airport! Besides driving yourself, $21 for the Airporter, $53 for a cab, or having to rely on a friend or family member is bullshit!
Other than that, the system works pretty good for a city of Halifax’s size.
qpm, you’re completely right on that front. This would be especially great for tourists or infrequent users.
Cuba’s free medical is not all it’s cracked up to be. The hospital in Holguin (which serves Holguin Province is smaller than the Cobequid Centre and is in terrible shape (at least from the outside). Cuba was supported by its big brother, the USSR, for most of Castro’s reign, which dodn’t make people’s lives any easier. What IS helping the ordinary people there are the tourists that leave the PEOPLE items and money (in the form of tips and black market cigars [which the government turns a blind eye to]) they need. The PEOPLE also see what the tourists have. Because of this, the Cuban government over the last few years have allowed the people to own cell phones and more computers (with access), and even go to the resorts. Now most of this is out of reach for most Cubans, but change is happening.
Great idea qpm! When I was in Montreal, I bought a 3 day pass and used the hell out of it.
North Korea seems to be holding it’s own although, again, we see it as a dictatorship. Who really knows how unhappy or uncared for or how “free” the people of North Korea really feel. Maybe they actually agree on things and share technology and such. I don’t think the world knows a whole lot about what really goes on nor why it has held up despite pressure from the rest of the world. I mean, every single one of us was born in a time where it was “common knowledge” that we do things the “right” way here while any other way is certainly “evil”.
BTW, India is a democracy (where the people agree it is criminal to kiss in public, mmhmm)… there seemed to be some confusion in earlier posts so thought I’d put it out there.
Oh, and I agree… 3-day passes are a great idea! “Family” passes too.
Correct me if I’m wrong, and sorry for getting off topic, but is Vancouver not WAY more expensive than Toronto? I thought this was the ‘survey’ conclusion for the last few years. I left Halifax for Toronto, am making a little less money to work in my field, but not paying out much more here in expenses. Just bought a condo in a nice, new area of the city down by the lake and pay $109/month to get to work everyday on the street car. I gave up my car that I took here with me because parking is ridiculous here. Only top execs can afford the $24/hour that it costs in my building’s lot. Plus I get extreme road rage driving in the city. So I am saving money really now using the TTC, whereas before my car insurance cost the same as a transit pass, plus I had gas, annual emission testing, annual safety inspection, plate renewals, with worst of all being maintenance of an old car when parts go. I think basically overall, everybody makes choices on how they live. Being here makes me happy, so nobody has any right to bitch about that. I won’t bitch to people living in Halifax. But if you can’t afford your basic necessities like daily transportation, I hope you’re at least a student who will graduate with a degree that gets you a better job! Good luck!
I think it would wise of you to leave “evolution” completely out of the equation, if you want to be taken seriously in any debate over human nature, lol.
Homo-sapians of today are virtually unchanged genetically from homo-sapians of 100,000 years ago, and are the same species. However, the concept of “wealth and property” is something that was undoubtly unknown to hunter-gatherer societies where each member had to carry everything he/she “owned” on their backs!
So “greedy”? Many humans are, but it’s not the result of having “evolved” to be so. It’s cultural. There are many societies around the world where sharing is a way of life. Perhaps what you meant is that when humans are exposed to “excess and decadency”, they feel a natural attraction to this lifestyle, as history has shown that the wealthy are safer from famine, war, disease and so on…
And yet, who’s to say that in a “perfect” system, where there is no fear of these things, we wouldn’t be happy with our lives, loves, music and art, WITHOUT the kind of desperate “grab” for affluence that pervades any society where the “poor” are at risk…like our own…
kay I do hope you are kidding about N Korea. We know what’s going on in N Korea. The starving of the masses. Things in N Korea are so bad that China is wiping their hands clean of them. How do we know what’s going on in N Korea? The same way we know about what’s going on in other places. Intelligence from sources within, satellites, and other sources.
Bro, “Intelligence from sources within, satellites, and other sources.”
I think the most obvious piece of knowledge about N Korea is that they protect themselves very well. No passport is getting you into that country (or out of it). Even diplomats are invited to fuck off. So, what do you really know? All we know is what we saw during the Korean war which was one nation failing to conquer another… ugly business but, frankly, Americans leave a big mess behind during war times too. Face it, satellite topographies tell us nothing about how hungry the people are or are not.
kay. it’s obvious you know nothing. Keep typing and prove it over again.
Oh, wait. kay, your right. How foolish of me. N. Korea is a paradise where the people live in mansions and have caviar everyday. They party all night with all the lights on, dancing in the streets.
I’m sorry I doubted you.
You’re right, Kay. No one’s been in or out of the country since the Korean war. No reports have been given to anyone, ever. In fact, it’s been so long that Korean can’t even be translated into English, so we’ll never know. The border is protected by dogs with bees in their mouths and when they bark they shoot bees at you.
Oh, wait, wasn’t Bill Clinton there LAST WEEK? He must have shape-shifted into a N. Korean and hopped over the demilitarized zone, since “no passport is getting you into that country (or out of it).” Try saying nothing if you’ve got nothing to say, kay.
Kay, & anyone else who’s interested to find out a bit of information on North Korea. February 2009 National Geographic magazine has a very good (IMO) article with interviews with North Korean’s who have escaped to China & most of these escapees, if they can escape China… go to South Korea.
So if you want to find out about how hungry etc. they are , would the stories of the depravations that these refugees tell, many of them haven’t even met each other, but the stories are all similar. Does that count as plausible proof ? If thousands of people coming from many different locations in that country are all saying the same thing… I’m will to listen to them, & give them the benefit of their stories being true !
But More, that’s just Western propaganda, used to make the N Korean leadership bad. kay is right it is a paradise. 😉