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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 30 ก.ย. 2024
- Metro Vancouver is experiencing record levels of population growth and overcrowding on transit. Yet, TransLink has no means to expand service. Instead, it faces a funding gap. TransLink CEO Kevin Quinn explains why and what it could mean for you.
We’re doing our part by starting to bridge this growing funding gap through a series of efficiency measures, totaling approximately $90 million annually. We’re taking these steps now, at a corporate level, to protect you, our customers, from any cuts to frontline transit services for as long as possible.
TransLink Efficiency Review Results: www.translink....
Management's Action Plan on the Efficiency Review Results: www.translink....
Probably should have added some kind of call to action at the end of the video. Right now I'm kind just left with "oh... well that sucks"
Lol exactly
Contact Your MLA and MP. It's just an email. I sent
TransLink is underfunded. We cannot have a green city that serves all without public transit. Please find ways to prioritize this critical service
Thank you
I read your comment first, and was still surprised by the ending. I'm shocked that he never said, "Write your representatives...etc.".
Maybe it's a good thing, because maybe it makes us uncomfortable in a healthy way.
I wonder if they're just not allowed to do that
I wish the Toronto Transit Commission would be this transparent.
Why don’t you hope for a better CEO instead. The current one has stepped down.
I know right...thought the same thing when I saw this.
People love to complain about Translink, but they are still one of the best run transit agencies in Canada and the US. Is there still room for improvement? Absolutely! But people in Vancouver who say that Translink sucks have clearly never experienced just how horrible public transit is in other American cities much larger than metro Vancouver.
Thank you Kevin for actually advocating for this system unlike a lot of other transit agency executives. ❤
People who think translink sucks needs to visit literally any other city in Canada right now.
Or the guys at translink havent ever visited transit in asia. Why are we comparing stuff to the worst where americans all have cars and 12 lane highways?
We should strive to be the best, not compare to the trash. Ur logic and way of thinking is why vancouver and canada as a whole do not improve in anything, ever.
@@Mystro256 you should visit Asia (Japan , Taiwan) and you will know Translink is a joke, you are just comparing translink to the worst (Toronto) in Canada why not compare to the best in Japan?
@@jimmy41607the reality is the cost in Asia is lower. Simply puts they can add the same number of buses and keep them running at a fraction of our cost. The problem is we need a lot of investment up front to transition to a more efficient model. Sky trains are efficient and don’t scale linearly when we add more trains. They use electricity and they are cheap.
Adding more bus drivers, burning fuel can be expensive.
The reality is we need a lot of money to rebuild our infrastructure over time.
@Ah-sun in Japan the train companies own the land around the train station. They run the trains at a a slight deficit to continue to increase the value of their land. How much land does translink own around it's stations?
This is before we even consider how much more affordable it is to run a major train network compared to a major bus network.
Is your proposed solution to buy out land and build more trains? If so, we need more funding!
Everyone who sees this and agrees, do what I’m doing now, and write to both the provincial and federal governments. Contact both your MP, and your MLA. They most likely live near you, maybe see if you can arrange a meeting. Take action, don’t just write comments describing how bad things are. Let’s work to fix this.
@@cxffeebr_ak Ask them to provide more money to Translink, BC Transit, cycling, etc. Whatever you like really. Treat them like people.
I've got a meeting set with my MP, I'll mention it. :)
Sent this to my MLA
TransLink is underfunded. We cannot have a green city that serves all without public transit. Please find ways to prioritize this critical service
Thank you
And my MP
@@ericthur4138 How do we get meetings with our representatives? I thought that they could decline due to being too busy.
Are they asking for the public to do something and help them? or just explaining that they are gonna go broke
They're asking you to vote for government representatives that will fund them properly.
@@cmmartti Got it. Conservative it is.
@@maxipadthai Conservatives sell off property at below market prices in a backroom deals for lower quality service.
No more money for highways.
Transit is 100 times much more important
Soo Buses will be off-roading?
@@C.O.920 We already have highways.
agreed!
@@AlCatSplat sooo roads never need repair and maintenance?
@@M4MLiving they probably meant reduce funding for NEW highway developments.
Can Translink build Residential towers on top of their stations and rent these to generate more income? This is a model in Asia that allows transit services to generate a lot more income
They made legislative changes on June 23, 2022 to do this and they are fully leveraging their ability to do so at future stations but none of those projects have come online yet and even when they do they will not make up the $600 million per year that they’re short.
About Here has some great videos about this. Basically, it's so expensive to build that it just doesn't make sense.
Rent will be like 4K a month, who would live there?
@@pickupmidland3523 rents are determined by the market. If no one can afford it then it wouldn’t be that high
@@pickupmidland3523 rents are determined by the market. If no one can afford it then it wouldn’t be that high
As somebody who lives in Toronto, i must say it feels out of the ordinary to see the CEO of a transit system actually advocating and lobbying for their transit system. We used to have somebody who did this (Andy Byford) but hopefully now that our current CEO (Rick Leary) is stepping down he will can get back a CEO who cares about their transit system again.
Crazy how this could've basically been prevented in 2015 when the region voted NOT to levy a HALF A PERCENT - yes, that's right, a penny for every twoonie - sales tax to fund TransLink. Car drivers really seem to hate traffic but hate a few extra cents for coffee even more, apparently.
nah no way u really just said the solution is more taxes lmfaooooooooo
@@coupeL0VE you dont think money is the solution to needing funding?
@@coupeL0VEyes that is how public funded services work.
@josha254 idk, maybe not send billions to ukraine
People have to realise that building more roads does not help easing congestion. In return it just makes it worse. The only way to actually relieve congestion is by creating an alternative way to driving. Real freedom should be having a choice to choose whether you want to commute with a car or take transit. If you still don’t believe me about that adding one more lane theory, you can take a look at our southern neighbour.
Roads are only beneficial when the government is incompetent/corrupt since your given more indepence/autonomy with your transportation.
Translink is doing a good job compared to others imo.
I got back from a trip to LA yesterday, and the difference in terms of ease of getting around - both transit and no transit, as I rented a car for the first half and then relied on the Metro for the second half - is absolutely night and day. Not only does one more lane not work, but LA torpedoes swathes of their natural beauty for the privilege. It's so much of a lose/lose/lose/lose/lose/lose situation, it's insane.
That's an interesting point about electric cars decreasing revenue for transit services. Since fueling an electric car is so much cheaper than gas, I wonder if there's room for a very small levy to help transit out, but still keep refueling an electric car much cheaper than gas. Typically, people who can afford an electric car in the first place aren't on the edge of financial solvency, so I think asking them to help out transit riders would be reasonable.
Gas prices go up and the federal government works towards making it more and more difficult for people to purchase gas fueled vehicles in spite of the already high cost of electric cars, and you suggest making owning an electric car more expensive? Any levy that applies to recharging an electric car battery will also impact our usage of electricity in one way or another, consequently raising the price of utilities. I do not claim to have a better solution, but this one seems quite backwards.
Yeah I feel like the tax was kinda dumb because it should have taxed any energy source going into vehicles. The point is to encourage people to take transit, not to avoid gas cars. Avoiding gas cars is important but even if people had 0 emission cars, we would still want people to take transit when possible so that we have less traffic and fund better built system hopefully to a point where it's really convenient to get anywhere with transit. What an oversight. Should probably tax a percentage of personal use vehicles too.
@@angrycockatiel1829 Yeah. I understand where the other guy's reasoning is coming from. I thought of it, too, but to tax electrical usage is backwards. It should be based on tires or something reflecting usage. Some could come from insurance, and some could come from purchasing a vehicle, but ultimately, the consumption would need to be the biggest factor, with incentives to refurbish tires safely, and small discounts for Canada Post, government vehicles, Greyhound and other buses, and so on.
The fuel tax shouldn't be placed on trains and buses. My goodness, that's weird that transit has to pay for that.
@@6JLU Also, cities with more traffic lights should pay more for transit, because they have slowed down traffic inefficiently, instead of using roundabouts. Roundabouts would increase satisfaction, and reduce the demand for more lanes, and thus save money for transit.
It would save electricity, too.
Wish there was more info on what we can do about it exactly
Look up who your local MP is and write to them, email them or call them and ask them to advocate for more funding for trans link.
I think this is a very important issue, not only limited to public transport, and the Government departments should pay attention to the butterfly effect generated by this matter. The shutdown of public transport will affect the free flow of labor, which may lead to problems such as recruitment difficulties and a decline in employee attendance, thus affecting the normal operation of enterprises. At the same time, it is difficult for consumers to go to places of consumption, which will cause a decrease in business activities, which may directly affect tax revenue and fiscal revenue, and sustainable development will be affected. At the same time, traffic congestion and air pollution will be unavoidable
Yeah, I'm thinking of niche restaurants, which will have access to smaller markets without transit.
Reach out to your local MP or share! Spread the word, let's do something
Governments need to Stop 1) welcoming refugees, then provide housing & social services for, 2) provide tax refunds for EVs…. Instead, they should reallocate those funds to Transit that we all need…
I agree.
The unpleasant fact is that all, both legal and illegal, foreigners have driven up the demand for basic services.
Even as our population declines, we are forced to pay for new maternity wards for foreigners. This is racist.
OK but... could've probably included a way to help cause rn this video feels like "well that sucks... uhh"
Set up a meeting with all of your representatives. I need to do it, too.
Ask for more roundabouts, instead of traffic lights, to save money. Ask for more transit.
0:53 hey that's my bus!
of ALL buses it's the 314. Peak level snubbery coming from a fraser highway user.
sorry to hear !!
Maybe give the highways back to BC Highways where they belong and focus on transit. I have no idea why you ever got Highways in the first place when you could have been building 3 new Skytrain lines
Tbf they do a good job with the minuscule funding they get.
I feel they can work on highways just the same. Their a transportation "bureau", makes sense why they would worry about transportation.
@@honkhonk8009
Well depending on ones definition of "highway" for local highways yes. I meant specifically B.C. numbered highways they should either all be maintained by BC Highways as roads of importance to long distance cross-BC travel.
The logic at the time was that a transit organization would take the transportation funding, and then be allowed to spend it on transit...as opposed to a transit organization appealing to a road advocatesque government for transit funding.
I would love to see how much money they would save without maintaining roads, while still keeping the funding.
Crazy that Translink can say its not a for profit driven system 😂
How many people at translink make over $200,000 a year? Is it too manager heavy?
This video provides transparent information to the general public, glad to see this and wish to see more, so people would understand what is really happening.
Who do I vote for that will actually have the balls to increase fuel taxes to pay for this? Cagers are heavily subsidized but also get cranky easily.
Good effort on the video. Hopefully, the province/cities step in. This does truly affect everyone. Do you hate traffic jams? Welcome on board.
Everybody ask for service until ask to pitch in. About 7 to 10% of public transit users don't even pay. I see it on buses and Skytrain. That Skytrain gate is always broken because people forcefully pushed it to get in.
R.I.P, if they run out of funds I wont have my channel :sad:
Better make a video about it
I want to know how are they paying for these ads on youtube😮
tax the rich and fancy cars more
We need fiscal policy that can respond to recessions. Support for public transportation infrastructure and large-scale housing construction can help mitigate the impact of recessions.
with the amount of money Gov spends on roads for private cars, funding transit using tax dollars is a no brainer if we want to equitably distribute taxes
One only has to look to many of the large cities in the Arabic-speaking world to see how a large city with no public transit or transit only covering limited areas functions (very badly). The private sector without any regulation will choose the option with the lowest up-front capital cost (60,000 taxis for a city of 1 million), leading to complete gridlock. The result is worse for the end user: transportation costs are often as high as 20% of a worker's total income.
One thing I haven't heard being talked about is fare evasion. I see it on a regular basis and it's frustrating. It's people who are repeat offenders pushing through the fare gate at skytrain stations, or people not tapping when they board the Rapid buses.. This OBVIOUSLY hits Translinks funds and it makes it more expensive for everyone who does pay..
That being said, I do think Translink needs more funds for various legitimate reasons, of course. It literally helps run the economy and connects people, helps students get to their institutions, literally for the future of all of us... smoothly...
well whats happen to lougheed and braid.. its been out for over 6 months.. their building the bridge faster then u guys fixing this connection..
People complain about Translink a lot. The service is disrupted constantly. And while yes it is justified people need to try and remember. Demand is currently higher than what Translink can afford to supply. Meaning if your first bus in the morning gets canceled due to a mechanical issue. It will take more time to get another bus out there if they even can at all. Due to the fact those buses that are supposed to be on backup. Are most likely already out there on the road. Translinks situation is no different than the current housing crisis. The demand for housing is much higher than the current supply. What caused all this is simple. The Liberal government let the flood gates open.
Immigration was not a controversial issue until the current government came to power. Why? Because there used to be a consensus. Let the population grow as our Economy, Infrastructure, and the point of it all Transit system grows. Of course when it comes to the housing crisis that also comes down to corporate greed. But as a publicly funded network. Translink does not benefit from corporate greed. BC is the fastest growing province in Canada. Yet we are so far behind provinces like Quebec and Ontario. And with no BC politician offering a clear plan for the future. We as people need to stand up and fight for our region. Let our politicians know what the people want. Let them know they serve us. By slowing immigration into BC and allowing our economy to catch up. We can solve the housing crisis, the transit crisis, and the infrastructure crisis of our province. Supply must always be slightly higher than demand for people to live comfortably.
Increase foreign ownership tax.
Better yet, ban foreign ownership, by making them pay for the entire transit system. Watch them sell of their properties like hot cakes.
Wow eye opening. As a person that has seen what happens when there is service cuts, Greyhound for example, it is not a very good feeling. Transit must be declared an essential service.
Just don't send my tax dollars to Israel and Ukraine 🇮🇱🇺🇦🤬🤬
Maybe roll back the executives' salary a little bit? You Kevin, CEO, currently gets paid over half a million dollars each and every year with a 10% annual increase? 18 other executives are all getting paid over $200k each. Think about that for a second.
wow. incredible. this will successfully shave of like 0.25% of the 600 million dollar a year deficit they are in. you are truly a financial mastermind
I like that you are raising awareness about this.
Translink should consider broaden their customer base. As a driver, there are many times I wanted to take the skytrain and buses for short local trips but it would have been more expensive than me driving. Offer discounted rate for non busy hours ( the bus would have been running regardless with no one sitting on it). Lowering 1 zone ticket prices on non busy hours, the current rate for 1 zone is too high for a people who already own a car. In the long run, 3 zone fare system is a huge hinderance to increase customer base as translink network gets increasing complex. It loses a lot of customers who lives on either side of the boundary lines, it deters people who already owns a car to take transit locally( it would only make sense to take transit for people to go downtown on weekend because of parking fees).
I would rather see them raise prices for rush hour fares. Morning rush would be significantly higher, while late afternoon rush would be only slightly higher, and mid day would be slightly *lower*.
that already exists, during non peak hours (6 PM and after) the skytrain becomes a 1 zone fare
@@JoelVaz-dh4kn No, it doesn't exist. Midday is the same price as both rush hours.
By the way, evening service doesn't start until 6:30p, and not 6:00p.
so what are we supposed to do? like write to someone or do something?
TBH, I think we should change the model of how we operate and fund transit. Let translink manage and own, lease and rent out properties on top, near and adjacent to stations as well as develop malls, even better have skytrain directly go into malls. Luxury accommodations etc. So we don't have this forth and back and get more expansion more quickly. Also make compass more useful as a currency.
TBH I do not like bus too much, more cable cars and trains. As well as last mile monorail or people movers.
Add more buses in richmond!!
When are the new skytrians lines coming out??
probably not right now because they dont have money
control the population
Thank you for this video
If Poilievre gets elected, we’re going to seriously need to lobby the Tories if we don’t want our system to degrade. Transit is a necessary service and we should move away from pro-auto policy anyways.
Believe it or not polievre is pretty pro transit and wants to help densify cities and ramp up the production of fuel etc. This would be good for translink
@@SilentZyko 1: How is he going to do that?
2: Why should I even trust him?
@@SilentZyko His party has sold off public infrastructure. Where have you heard that his is pro transit? Honestly, if he just gave us a token amount of funding, then I would consider that a huge victory.
@@blinkx1070 I'm disappointed that he hasn't responded to you. This implies to me that he isn't correct.
Time for the broadest shoulders to carry the most of the load
Roads Never Earn a Dollar, why are buses expected to?
do you not know what taxes are? the buses has a driver that needs to be paid thus you have to pay a fare just as you pay taxes to build, expand and maintain roads
Do y'all pay for electricity? Feels like that's something one crown corp shouldn't be paying to another crown corp, especially for pollution reducing infrastructure. Will that raise hydro rates? Sure. Seems like a good shift of expenses.
If they do not have to pay for electricity, there will be no motivation to raise the efficiency of their own systems (think investing in more modern technology and decommissioning unused equipment), which may shift the problem to the hydro provider to meet a demand that may not have been there in the first place. Taking certain fees away may be the way forward, but being under certain budgetary constraints drives accountability on the part of TransLink management and is a positive thing. Writing off some of their expenses will not solve the funding problem.
@@angrycockatiel1829 I agree. Paying market prices is the way to encourage transparency.
The exception to this is the carbon and gas taxes. Transit is the solution, so the money should come back to them, anyways. Electricity isn't the same.
Translink should flip properties near stations.
If you can believe it, it used to be illegal for them to do that. The provincial NDP finally changed that last year.
@@sachamm i'm genuinely shocked.
Take a pay cut
Canada line is horrible; taking that line during rush hour is like entering meat grinder. Stationsn not big enough for on and offloading, not enough carriages too.
Yeah, they need more funding to fix that! So happy people are recognizing this
so whats the deal? government of BC wont cough up the cash? do they not realize Ontario has been writing transit funding cheques left and right for its operators?
Ontario has been gutting transit budgets. especially outside toronto.
@@yukaira Ontario is undergoing the largest passenger rail expansion on the continent. Try again
@rollingthunderinho unfortunately that's mostly just capital funding (funding for new projects) and operating funds are much more scarce
@@rollingthunderinhoExpansions yes, toronto is particularly well funded. But other cities have had their budgets gutted. Ottawa had Millions cut from it's transit budget.
:)
TransLink has a TH-cam channel!!! Horrary! It's about time!
Wait they have been on TH-cam since 2006?! They need more subs. How are they going to get enough revenue without growing it
Take a pay cut ceo
We're suffering with inflation too. Adding more funding from citizens will just lead to more suffering. Time for fiscal responsibility by government and I'm guessing some unaffordable transit expenses exist too
Raising taxes and fares just raises the cost of living. It's a deadly spiral.
hmm, is it possible for TransLink to get into collabs and selling merches?
They already sell merchandise on their shop website.
@@vincenta_2 but not efficiently enough. in japan you get customized cards for relatively cheap increasing demand. in translink they want an arm and leg. lol
There's no way that will that will ever make up the funding gap. TransLink is a transit company, not a clothes company
Same old same old same old, money money money
oh no daddy, we cant have that. What are we gunna do ? How can we help ?
Did I missed the solution?
@@IamJohnnyFan write your MLA
yeah, more pay.
Thinking about it for 5 seconds longer
Too much management embezzling funds. It's pretty simple
I guess the audience are wrong, not mass prublic but some powered personal or some groups.
Mass public might want direct, clear actions or message, but not an open ending with a company logo on it.
Yet it might be a way translink PR teams would like to deliver to us in a western speaking manner. A way to balance all possible parties.
Then Kelvin just explained translink is short in funding.
If translink is not for profit then why should he mention develop more stream for profit?
Talking to simple term, if 1/3 of metro vancouver ppl is using transit ,then it is 520,000 ppl. Ticket evasion is everywhere in skytrain and bus which demotivating me buying for the monthly pass regulaly.
And if the profit is not going to cover the cost ,then components of the cost should be reviewed again. Above average and living wage paid transit superviors ard paying 94k a year and ask for another 15% raise early this year.
Transit technicians are paying 55.41/hr with 4 days working shift....
Clearly tranlink is running with high operation cost over the profit
If you task the government to replace a light bulb theyll take 3 months and be $1 million over budget.
veritable
Raise property taxes?
Bc you guys complain about wage increases every several years. This year, it was a 25% increase. That is where the money is going.
i dont think they are receiving less funding. it just mismanagement on money. they are giving too much bonus to employee making over 200k per year and over hiring unnecessary positions.
💯
Hmmm, I wonder who the new people using transit are?
Here are some options
Increase fares
Use a car
Too many executives
@@polgo1764 No? The ceo makes 500k a year which is basically nothing compared to the millions they need
Transit sucks in vancouver. I want to know where all the fundings went
it actually takes a lot of money to add and maintain transit infrastructure to one of the greatest metropolitan areas in canada!
i think we're gonna need more bike lanes
The future lives here. or not
So which North Shore services are you planning to cut down this time?
Keep the trains open at night. More people will ride instead of buying a car.
🚴🚵🚲
didn't you make more than 500M annually?
Is it 2026 already? Damn time flies
0:53 of all bus routes to display SORRY BUS FULL for this video it's a route that sees JUST 4% annual boardings of the actual busiest route.
👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍
Maybe cut executive bonuses?
it really isn't that high. their financials are public and the CEO only makes 500k a year
cut executive period
Lol if you cut executive pay too much you push out all the people who can actually do a good job. Look at Toronto, they had Andy Byford and he worked wonders on their system, then New York sweet talked him into working for them, and Toronto was left with an incompetent leader named Rick Leary who drove the system into the ground and caused all people who actually cared to quit. Imagine Toronto paid him $1M per year instead of
Oh yeah, all those dozens of thousands are sure gonna go a long way.
$500k a year to fund a $200M funding gap lmfao.
Most literate socialist
Well Kevin Quinn. You know how you’re losing money by people switching to EV’s? This is where you should have seen this trend and maybe started to work with BC Hydro to help get a bit of a small boost that could help. Especially if people want to get to work on time and not rely on other forms that get too expensive for them.
recharging a car is cheap, no way Translink makes up anywhere near what they made from feul
@@A_Baguette_ it would still be useful to at least try and get money from it instead of a total standstill for the transit system like many a folk need to use daily to commute or even the roads that people use to travel on.
@@GranTruismo4head Yeah you should write to your MLA about allowing TransLink more money
Put less buses on the least busy lines. Ditto more on the busiest.
Do Vancouver riders "want Skytrain to UBC"? Or do we just want to be able to get to UBC in a reasonable time? Skytrain is one way to do it, but it's by far the most expensive. The decision to build Skytrain to Arbutus was a flawed decision that means that we won't have the funding to solve pretty much any other transportation problem. Building out to UBC will compound that.
What is the alternative? Skytrain alternatives bleed money. Automated trains are profitable.
Translink please fix bus route in my area 746 to Albion been 8 plus years of asking you to fix this route we still have buses that run ever 1-2 hours no service on weekend’s Saturday/ sundays / holidays no bus after 7pm don’t start running early enough or late enough should be service untill at least 12am
Fancy new r3 rapid bus but we can’t even get to it or home from it we just get dropped off at the station with no local service left stranded more people would use the service if it were actually accessible
they broke how they gonna fix it bruh did you watch video
Same story with tri-cities bus routes. TL needs more buses, and more money to maintain the buses and hire more drivers, they have none of that right now.
I'm not gonna lie. I don't use public transportation much but I know its benefits. It's the link between cities that cannot be replicated by highways.
Well it's a good thing I don't live in vancouver anymore then.
heat
go off king (please I need the bus)
this is bigger than translink. The whole traffic network is fucked with 3 second left turns, 2 way highways with speeds of 60km/h and very bad drivers the list adds on.
Roundabouts could solve so much of our traffic congestion.
Dont tell us, tell the gov
We are the ones that vote for the gov and there is a provincial election coming up in the fall
@@MotionCC you are right, I forgot this part
Translink is great. But really, the number of people who DON'T pay - ie, jump the gates - is staggering. Catch them - there is so much revenue being lost. I'm not saying this will fix it, but really, those of us who pay shouldn't be taking the loss from those who don't.
They have an entire police force already, Transit Police, dedicated to catching them. They can't be everywhere at once. Who's gonna pay to hire more officers?
A third party needs to do an audit of Translink’s spending going back at least a few years. All we ever hear is that they need more money.
They got a 3rd party audit.
because transit infrastructure for the entirety of metro vancouver costs a lot of money and if you knew anything about anything you would know that
Best speech for announcing fare increases ever. 400,000 paying riders a day should cover the cost of the bus system , as they are doing their part generating revenue. I think there's many other areas of top heavy expenses that should be looked into, if you're talking about cuts. Leave the buses alone.
Should be enough because your feelings said so?
maybe to keep the lights on, but definitely not enough for expansion.
Where is the transparency on how they are cutting costs? Don't beg for more money, get better and more efficient.
if only they could get someone who knows how to run a business well
They're not supposed to make money. No transit lines are. Did you even see the video?
@@A_Baguette_ In Hong Kong the metro system makes huge amounts of profit, is never in debt and they move 10x the amount of people we do here. Its because they get creative and have other forms of revenue like owning large amounts of real estate. Translink should do the same and think more like an enterprise.
@@ryanpereira2825 And I don't doubt that translink is working on that, However up until this year, It was illegal for translink to own residential real estate
@@ryanpereira2825 Iirc TransLink has not been allowed that kind of creativity. Hong Kong also is the ideal use case for public transit. Without getting into the weeds, it's not a 1 to 1 comparison
Transit is over crowded but isn't breaking even? It shouldn't even have to be over crowded to break even.
like they said, no transit system is designed to profit or even break even. In order to break even they would have to raise prices to the point where nobody could even afford to use transit.
A transit system that breaks even doesn't save money. It's like a coupon or a bulk purchase.
start taxing EV's per km.
Toll roads would be a good idea.
It couldn't have anything to do with the hundreds of millions you spent on fare gates...
Exactly. Since the planning phase, they knew fare gates would cause them to lose money over all, even with potentially increased revenue taken into account. But they still spent millions implementing fare gates, and have since spent more money each year on upkeep. They're committed to their bad idea.
They've shown can't even be trusted to spend their money in a way that makes sense. Transit is a net good and I don't have a problem with a transit system getting government bailouts in theory. But when Translink begs for money it just leads to the question 'why aren't you spending your money better?'. Because that's clearly at least part of the problem. There needs to be oversight and at least some degree of reform to how they spend their money if they are to get a bigger budget and more bailouts (which are inevitable).
@@cleigh3796 They do get oversight. The overseers are also feeling the pressure to keep the fare gates. They need to ditch the gates.
The 21 km of Sky Train is the big killer. And here's the thing: That new sky train will inflate property taxes all along it's route. But those people will still pay some of the lowest property tax rates in the developed world. This has happened numerous times and the land along the Sky Trains was never developed in time to take advantage of the increased transit. In fact, there are still detached homes outside several Sky Train Stations (same with Toronto but they also pay 4x the property tax).
Look at the Sky Train route and tell me: Has there ever been such a long stretch of LRT going through low-density neighbourhoods, farmer's fields, golf courses, and then finally ending up in a VERY spread-out car-dependent suburb? The answer is no. Based on all metrics and parameters this Sky Train is insanely expensive. Nobody has been able to beat this argument and they either lie or bring up their own personal self-interests to justify the project.
The smarter move (which would have saved hundreds of millions) would be to improve transit in the densest areas. You could have just extended the Surrey Sky Train to the other large center in the city. It's becoming the most populated suburb and should therefore be the first priority for transit expansion.
People promoting the Sky Train own land along the route. They're buying it right now. People have already done this with previous Sky Trains and it effectively squanders hundreds of millions of tax-payers money for the benefit of very few.
Invest for the future my friend. All those single family homes are posed for densification.
@@loganwenzel1615 The issue is that in the past they did the complete opposite. Hence the part about detached homes still existing outside existing Sky Train Stations. The Langley line is worse yet in that it's in close proximity to things like golf courses, farms (farmable land will become hugely important in the coming years, trust me). I even forgot to mention that much of the land is a flood plain.
They should focus on improving service in the already populated areas.
@@randomCADstuff Yes I am sure that you, random internet person, knows better than Translink, the experts. Can't just call it a flawed decision
@@A_Baguette_ Currently, in Canada, a random person is probably equally or more trustworthy than any public (government) entity. Translink is definitely one of the better run public sector entities but they also receive tons of funding; that means a lot of damage can be done if those funds are misappropriated.
And my conclusion isn't just off the top of my head: The parameters of the Langley Sky train are way off the map compared to any other project. There's actually objective facts behind my conclusion and zero people have been able to refute it; they just make statements similar to yours without any actual real argument.
The problem is real, your solution is crazy.
What can I take from your comment:
1. Vancouver should increase property taxes
2. Development along transit corridors should be allowed, and incentivized.
Well, the provincial government just did #2, and the process will be complete in a few months.
And yeah, property taxes should go up, but good luck convincing the majority of this.
I wonder if you know that most bus drivers in Vancouver simply allow passengers to board at rear doors and the driver doesn't know who paid and DID NOT PAY their fares. I have seen countless people boarding at rear doors and don't swipe their cards for few years now. No wonder, Transit or Translink is losing billions of money!!. The bus drivers simply don't care at all.
True, it's annoying, but it's just really not worth it to stop people who do it, except in major cases when a big group of people go in without paying i'd say
The labor costs associated with catching fairs skippers always exceeds the money it brings in.
Transit cops cost something like 10x more than what they cover in fare evasion fines. Fare evasion is basically a non-issue. All fare revenue added together is only like 20% of translink’s annual funding.
Fare evasion is only a small fraction of their revenue. It costs more to reliably enforce the fares w/ security and police than they would make from the fares themselves
true public transit should be free anyways, if only we had proper funding….
I mean, Kevin Quinn's salary in 2022 was $474,000
even if that salary was $0 that would not even buy one bus
If it was less than that no one qualified would wanna do the job. You pay for what you get. That figure seems fair to me honestly, to run a company as important and big as Translink.
Ok? That doesn't sound like 600 million nor is that crazy of an amount for a north American ceo
...which is a drop in the bucket for an entire day's worth of operating day expenses of CMBC