There are no benefits to transit "Public transit helps the poor, saves energy, and cleans the air, right? Not really. Transit is a subsidy to the wealthy as much as it is to the poor, and it really isn’t any greener than driving." More below. Some low-income people ride transit, but the people most likely to use transit to get to work are those who earn $75,000 and up. According to table B08119 of the Census Bureau’s 2015 American Community Survey, 6.6 percent of people who earn $75,000 and up take transit to work, as opposed to just 6.2 percent of people who earn $15,000 or less.
Nor is transit particularly green, at least, not according to the Department of Energy’s Transportation Energy Data Book. The average car uses about 3,100 BTUs per passenger mile while the average SUV uses about 3,500. By comparison, transit buses and light rail average about 3,800. While heavy rail averages just 2,150 BTUs per passenger mile, that is heavily weight by New York City. Outside of New York, the only heavy-rail lines more energy efficient than cars are in San Francisco and Atlanta. By operating mainly during rush hours, commuter rail does okay at 2,700 BTUs, but many commuter lines, including those in Dallas, Minneapolis, Nashville, and Philadelphia, are worse than driving." So, why? What could be driving this? And there is a very dirty little secret that the transit agencies (and electric car manufacturers) are not telling you: "For fossil-fueled transit, air pollution is roughly proportional to energy consumption, though Diesel-powered vehicles produce more nitrogen oxides while gasoline-powered vehicles produce more hydrocarbons. Electric-powered transit can actually be more polluting than petroleum-fueled transit if the electricity is generated by burning fossil fuels, because it takes 3 BTUs of fossil fuels to deliver 1 BTU of energy to electricity customers." It pollutes more, and burns more energy than the alternatives. We do not understand this because we fail to see the total cost of producing the electricity, in essence we measure the electrical energy at the wheels, not based on how much actual fuel it takes to produce the electrical energy. So our efficiency calculations are wonky. "The average gasoline-powered car emits about 222 grams of carbon dioxide per passenger mile. The Washington Metro produces about 256 grams per passenger mile, while light rail in Salt Lake City produces more than 400. Electric-powered transit systems on the West Coast, which gets most of its electricity from hydropower, do better. But it makes more sense to make cars that are more energy efficient and use that hydroelectric power in places of fossil-fueled energy consumers, such as heating homes and offices, than it does to build more rail transit in California, Oregon, or Washington. You might be able to personally save energy by riding transit. But most transit expansions actually use far more energy and emit more pollution and greenhouse gases than they save." So, again, Why? To control you, to control how you get around, to force you to live in an unwanted high density city. They are Stalinist at heart, they know what is best for you, even though it obviously is not.
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