This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.
Much blog space has been taken up lately over Seattle’s Ride Free Zone. Erica Barnett says we should get rid of it, and John Jensen says we should hold onto it for now, and get rid of it later. There are reasonable arguments to both of these positions, but I think both overlook at least one basic fact.
A one mile ride should not cost the same as a 14 mile ride. We’re looking at $3.50 for a round trip ride of exactly one mile downtown. Now, downtown trips are much different than cross-town trips. A cross-town trip is generally a commute trip – a way of moving from home to work. There’s value in that trip – you don’t have to drive, park, fight traffic, etc. In my book that’s worth $3.50.
But a one mile trip is a different animal. The alternative does not involve the high cost of car travel, but consists of walking for 15 minutes, paying $5 for a cab ride (ok, $10 round trip, but if traveling as a group of four this is a $2.75 round trip), or simply not traveling (for example, shopping downtown instead of in the International District or just not shopping).
Can we squeeze $3.50 per round trip out of would-be pedestrians? For many/most, likely not. There goes Erica’s source of funding light rail.
If the RFZ is removed, then the only way to actually collect much money from the downtown area would be to charge a lot less than full fare. One fair and profitable method would be charging per mile, rather than per trip. This would encourage local transit use in Rainier Valley as well (a good thing).
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