TTC Fare increase being considered

[gweed123]

Sounds like another vote to run streetcars in their own median ROW so they don't have to deal with private cars blocking their path and cutting them off. You'd think that would have you supporting Transit City.

Except that Transit City doesn't plan on replacing any streetcar routes or upgrading any streetcar routes, except for the South Etobicoke portion of the 501 route, and bits of the Waterfront route. Nice try though.

 

[nfitz]

And that was WHEN the TTC was getting funding from the province AND during a recession...

Does anyone know the details behind that fare increase?

I wasn't in Toronto back then ... but the recession brought a huge drop in transit usage. Presumably there was a huge drop in revenue ... and presumably also limitations on funding on both the provincial and city level as their revenue would have been way down too. Remember Rae days? In the current recession the feds and province were capable of increasing spending because they were pretty much deficit-free before it started, so that had a lot of ability to run a deficit. But when the 1990/1991 recession started, the deficit was already a huge problem, so increasing it just wasn't the option it was in the recent recession.

But I'm only guessing.

 

[W. K. Lis]

I would have accepted a TTC fare increase, IF they do not cut the services. However, now with no fare increase, it looks like they'll go ahead and cut the services, as planned, to save money.

 

[k10ery]

Ah, of course, I figured someone would buy into the narrative they've been trying to spin.

Fare increases are not by definition bad. When they're paying for expanded service or are done to forestall cuts, they're par for the course. This proposed fare increase was to come WITH A service cut. Literally the very definition of paying more for less.

Of course it was all a distraction. Now we're supposed to feel appreciative because we're paying the same for less.

This episode is a sign to me that Nick Kouvalis is not as clever a strategist as the media are making him out to be. You'd think they would have been able to multiply 5x12 and see people would draw a parallel between Metropasses and the PVT. It took Jonathan Goldsbie all of 5 minutes to tweet on this I think.

 

[drum118]

Given the fact that we will be seeing a fare increase in 2012 as well on a yearly base after it, maybe the time has come for this so long the money goes toward the fare bottom line.

NJ Transit is taking bids for naming, product-advertising rights to its facilities, locomotives

Published: Tuesday, June 07, 2011, 9:00 AM Updated: Tuesday, June 07, 2011, 1:07 PM

By Mike Frassinelli/The Star-Ledger
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Jennifer Brown/The Star-LedgerNJ Transit could soon put corporate names on trains and train stations.
In the not-too-distant future, a commuter going from Newark to Hamilton might board a Minute Maid express train and take it to Sprite Platform at Coca-Cola Transit Center.
Such an itinerary could result from NJ Transit’s intention to sell advertising rights to its stations, terminal facilities and locomotives.
This planned sale of naming and product-advertising rights has set off a frenzy among companies trying to pay NJ Transit tens of millions of dollars to broker the potentially lucrative sales.
It also has led to a formal protest from one bidder, who contends the transit agency would leave almost $12 million on the table by renewing with the advertising company that now holds the contract.
Craig Heard, president and CEO of Gateway Outdoor Advertising in Hackettstown, said NJ Transit did not allow his company into the final round of bidding even though Gateway's $65 million offer of guaranteed revenue was nearly 20 percent more than the $53.3 million guaranteed by the current contractor, the Titan Outdoor advertising agency.
RELATED COVERAGE: • AT&T secures naming rights to SEPTA station at Philadelphia Sports Complex
• Guest column: Let's get creative to fund transportation in New Jersey

Gateway filed a protest that prompted NJ Transit to pull an agenda item — awarding Titan a five-year contract — from Wednesday’s NJ Transit board meeting. NJ Transit spokeswoman Penny Bassett Hackett said Monday the agenda item has been removed while the formal protest proceedings take place.
“The companies have a right to protest,” she said.
Under NJ Transit’s guidelines for the five-year contract, the “advertising revenue contractor" would pay the transit agency a designated share of its net billings — or the guaranteed amount — whichever is greater. The exact percentages vary from bidder to bidder, but both Titan and Gateway would guarantee NJ Transit at least a 60 percent cut of the billings.
Selling advertising space on bus, rail and light-rail equipment, stations, platforms, terminals and trestles decreases reliance on subsidies and fares, said the agency, which last year imposed a record-tying average fare hike of 22 percent.

The naming of transit stations after corporations and selling space on the outside of trains for sponsors was once unthinkable, but challenging financial times call for creative measures.
Mets fans no longer attend games at Shea Stadium; they see baseball at Citi Field. Travelers on the Garden State Parkway could soon see advertising on toll booths.
Heard estimated the naming of a major transit station, like Newark Penn Station, could bring in $2 to $3 million per year.
Heard said Gateway made it to the final four of bids, but despite making the highest offer, was not one of the two finalists, nor was final four contender CBS Outdoor Advertising.
He said the final two were Titan and Interstate, which mainly do billboard advertising.
Proposals from potential bidders were weighted, with 60 percent of the final score to be awarded for "financial return to NJ Transit," leaving Heard perplexed over how Gateway didn't make the final round.
“Why wouldn't you invite four good and strong companies, let them all fight it out and get the most for taxpayers?" asked Heard, who in the '80s was CFO and president of a company that persuaded NJ Transit to put ads on its buses.
Representatives for Titan, which has an office in Fairfield, didn't respond for comment. The website for Titan, the largest transit advertising company in North America, shows examples of its work, including an ad with a giant screw on the side of a bus and a hanging banner ad outside the Guggenheim Museum in Manhattan.
The Metropolitan Transportation Authority in New York last year terminated its advertising contract with Titan Outdoor Holdings. It replaced Titan with CBS Outdoor after Titan defaulted on its contract by failing to pay about $20 million due to MTA for 2009-10, according to the authority.
Gateway, which has 30 years experience in transit advertising and handles contracts in New York, Tennessee, North Carolina, California and West Virginia, used MTA as a reference.
Among its ideas, Gateway wanted to open four offices in New Jersey, creating 35 new jobs, and give frequent NJ Transit customers reward points that could be used for gifts or discounted rides.


http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2011/06/nj_transit_taking_bids_for_nam.html

 

[CDL.TO]

Given the fact that we will be seeing a fare increase in 2012 as well on a yearly base after it, maybe the time has come for this so long the money goes toward the fare bottom line.

Sadly, across the river in Philly they have already sold naming rights to a subway station.

 

[Amy Rose]

Lol at first I thought it was just a shop in the middle of no where

 

[Still Waters]

How the heck are you supposed to know where "AT&T Station" is if you aren't a regular user? When the advertisers change over, you have to relearn the system? Even if the permanent station name is allowed to continue to exist on some wall somewhere in the station in small letters, how exactly does this improve the wayfinding in the system?

 

[gweed123]

How the heck are you supposed to know where "AT&T Station" is if you aren't a regular user? When the advertisers change over, you have to relearn the system? Even if the permanent station name is allowed to continue to exist on some wall somewhere in the station in small letters, how exactly does this improve the wayfinding in the system?

It doesn't. But this is what happens when you believe that the free market should rule everything, and that taxes and government are evil.

 

[Long Island Mike]

Philadelphia's Broad Street Subway Pattison Avenue Station...now named for AT&T...

Sadly, across the river in Philly they have already sold naming rights to a subway station.

CDL: I am in Philadelphia presently posting this reply...when the naming rights to the Pattison Avenue BSS Station was sold they took all use of the Pattison Avenue name away...I feel that this was a bad move by SEPTA allowing AT&T to make that decision...

If it were up to me the station name(s) would have been:

"The AT&T Station at Pattison Avenue" or "The AT&T Sports Complex Station"

Philadelphia's three major sports venues are there:

Citizens Bank Park (MLB Phillies)
Lincoln Financial Field (NFL Eagles)
Wells Fargo Center (NHL Flyers and NBA Sixers)

Note the naming rights on all...I am no fan of this and I believe the WFC is the 4th name that arena has been known as...

I am very much against changes like this especially if there is a total station name change like this one was done...
I do feel that it can be confusing to an occasional rider...

LI MIKE

 

[drum118]

Expect to see an $.15 to $.25 fare increase come Jan 1, 2012, based on what was said at TTC meeting today.