Transit system riders pay only a fraction of the costs of running the busses, but that can be rationalized as providing vital transportation to the poor to get to work of job interviews. But ferry riders are viewed as affluent folks who have good jobs in Seattle but live across the Sound. What percent of ferry system costs are paid for by those who use the ferries and how much is subsidized by those of us who don't? I want an answer with facts, not arguements.

Actually, I was a Boeing manager who rode Metro for years with the taxpayers picking up most of my commuting expense. I want to thank you who helped pay for my commute! Of course you had no choice. So don't feel altruistic about it.

-- Arthur Rathjen (liberty@coastaccess.com), September 01, 1999

Answers

The data on the ferries for 1997 (last figures available on the DOT site: http://www.ntdprogram.com/NTD/Profiles.nsf/1997+Exceeding+200000/0035/ $File/P0035.PDF Total costs for the year, $300 million (ops 123 million, capital 127 million), fares 17.43 million (covering 14% of operating expenses or 6% of total costs). Incidentally, the ridership on weekdays averages less than the ridership on either Saturday or Sunday That's a pretty large subsidy, even as transit systems go. Obviously some of it supports tourism as well. Just info, for what it's

-- Gary Henriksen (henrik@harbornet.com), September 02, 1999.

in 1996 farebox revenue was was about 15% of operating revenue or about 8% of total costs.

http://www.ntdprogram.com/NTD/Profiles.nsf/cae315c87a9d3b9685256605005 4bf26?OpenView

$17.3 Million fares $117 million operating expenses $84.5 million capital expenses

As a matter of fact, all transit systems in Washington State have pretty high subsidies relative to the national averages. There is an extensive file at : http://www.ntdprogram.com/NTD/NTST.nsf/NTST/1997/$File/Ntst97.pdf

Specific figures for the larger transit systems in the US are available at : http://www.ntdprogram.com/NTD/Profiles.nsf/1997+Exceeding+200000

if you hit their index and go up one level, it'll give you the numbers for the smaller (under 200,000 service area) transit systems. Washington state systems have farebox revenues in the 6-20% range of operating costs mostly. Nation wide it's over 30%. These are just operating expenses. If you include capital expenditures the farebox revenue (basically (1-farebox revenue) equals percent subsidy) is an even smaller percentage of total costs. Unfortunately, USDOT doesn't have 1998 data posted yet.

-- Gary Henriksen (henrik@harbornet.com), September 02, 1999.

DB in answer to your question.... read this Date: Mon, 06 Sep 1999 04:38:41 GMT see the little GMT??? that means Greenwich Mean Time Now any thoughts on the subject??

-- maddjak (maddjak@hotmail.com), September 06, 1999.