
Amidst all the depressing funding news surrounding our region’s transit ambitions, here is some positive transit news from the City of Light. The Transport Politic has a full run-down of Paris’s 125-mile, 72-station, €20.5 billion ($29.5 billion) expansion plan for their Metro. Amazingly, work is scheduled to begin in 2014, with the first stations opening by 2017 and the entire expansion complete by 2025. I’ll believe it when I see it.
It’s startling to see how much money can be raised so quickly by such a large city when the political institutions favor central-directed action:
Of total funding for the new lines, €4 billion will be granted from the national government, €1.5 billion from local governments, €7 billion from loans, €7 billion from new taxes on commercial activity and real estate (€500 million will be collected this year alone), and €1 billion from existing taxes. The state intends to use eminent domain to redevelop land around each of the stations. It will use the funds it accumulates through sales and added-value taxes to help pay off debt.