But public transportation is just a deficit!

Many would believe that investing in cars is the best possible action to do in transportation to benefit one's economy, because the government has to do little capital investment, and that investing in public transportation is just throwing money at inefficient institutions. A recent article had even suggested to reduce the salary of bus and Métro operators, many of which must struggle to wake up early in the morning and deal with split shifts at unpredictable times, while being unpaid during mid-day breaks (Journal de Montréal).

Many have thrown around the idea of automatization would be able to reduce the operational costs of particularly the Métro system. However, if we do some quick napkin math, we could observe that it would take decades for it to be actually cheaper. This is because, when you automatize a Métro there are two large costs: a new signalling system (typically CBTC or Control Based Train Control) and platform screen doors or platform edge doors. Toronto recently installed the CBTC system on Line 1, which is 38 km long, for 610 million dollars (Steve Munro). Assuming that we only autonomize the Orange Line in Montreal, which is 30 km long, which adjusted for length, would cost an estimated 482 million dollars. Now for platform edge doors, the STM has already planned the installation of them by 2031, but only for 13 stations of Orange Line. Therefore, to install them at all 31 stations, it would cost an estimated 372 million dollars (Radio Canada). Together, we could estimate conservatively that the automatization of only the Orange Line would cost 854 million dollars; however, the final cost is likely to be much high due to inflation. As of 2011, there were 303 Métro operators (STM). Lets assume that every Métro driver makes a 120,000 dollars per year (they do not, in fact they make much less, but lets assume). Which translates to 36.36 million dollars of costs per year saved. This means that it would take 23 years to recoup that high cost of automatization. However, keep in mind that this only one line. This means there are still operators needed for the other three lines, and therefore lets assume that only a 120 operator jobs are removed, and that means that it would take 59 years to recoup the costs!

How about we cut the salaries and remove managerial jobs. First of all, I do not believe at all it is appropriate to discuss about salaries. Imagine if the company you worked at, said well, you have to take a 10% pay cut, you probably will not be that motivated to come to work tomorrow and start searching for a new job. This is exactly the problem that transit agencies are facing. In fact, EXO is the most impacted, as it contracts out it's bus and commuter rail operations to private companies, and these companies pay some of the lowest salaries in the industry. Result? EXO is cancelling departures left, right and center just because there are not enough bus operators (Les 2 Rives). This problem is not unique to Montreal, in fact this is common among the public transportation industry. In fact, the Boston transportation agency (MBTA) did exactly as this journalist wants the transportation agencies in Quebec to do, and cut massively salaries and cut the amount of operators because of the shortfall during the pandemic (La Presse, La Presse, La Presse). Well, now the MBTA is faced with a massive shortfall of operators, and cannot expand service until 2025 and beyond, despite planning a 25 percent boost in bus service proposed, because they employ fewer employees than pre-pandemic (The Boston Globe). On top of that, the MBTA is lacking 20 to 25 percent of the workforce needed to currently maintain the system at a proper level of repair. The result, was a train on fire, hundreds of slow-zones, and dramatically reduced service operating at the same subsidy.

Spending money on our roads is the true deficit.

On top of that, is it really sustainable to spend 30 billion dollars on roadways for which only a fraction of the population uses and that cause hundreds of deaths and thousands upon thousands of injuries per year? (La Presse). As will be explored in a future section, this investment causes limited returns for Quebec, and actually causes it to be behind it's peers. This is because driving a car causes society to subsidize more than 6 times more than taking the bus, despite both modes using public roads. Therefore, for the government to reduce the amount of road maintenance and capital investments, investing in public transport services and the creation of robust bike networks across Quebec is the best solution.

Cost of commuting per mode for personal costs and societal costs. (Strong Towns)

On top of building car-dependent roads, it induces car-centric developments, which reduce the tax returns of the government and therefore hinders it's ability to provide services. As explained by Strong Towns, an old, blighted block of buildings exceeds tax revenues by 41% compared to a new car-centric development (Strong Towns).

It is to be noted that the 31.5 billion dollars for roads is only for provincial owned roads: highways and regional roads. This excludes the amount that municipalities have to pay to maintain and expand their own road networks.

It is not inherently bad to spend money to maintain infrastructure, even road infrastructure. However, we must ensure that when we do these investments, they should result in a lower deficit, rather than spending more and more on maintaining roads every single year, because it is unsustainable. That's why when we pay sums to rebuild key infrastructure, we should make sure that it's new version is more sustainable, and this means adding dedicated public transportation services along with high quality stations and stops, bike lanes, etc.

Electric buses also dramatically decrease the efficiency of the ability to deliver services, as electric buses cannot be replaced one-to-one versus conventional diesel or hybrid buses. Some agencies are reporting that they require 150 electric battery electric buses (BEB) to the job of a 100 conventional buses (Christof Spieler).

"Electric buses aren’t the most effective way for transit to help the climate — getting people out of cars is. And riders care about how often the bus comes and how reliably it operates, not the fuel it uses. Still, there’s no doubt electric buses are good. But when I talk to people who plan, schedule, and operate transit systems they’re really worried, and for good reason. I’ve heard about three big issues with converting bus fleets to battery electric buses: infrastructure, reliability, scheduling. (Generally, agencies aren’t considering trolleybuses; they should.)"

(Christof Spieler)

We need to start looking for long-term financial sustainability.

The inefficiency of car infrastructure proves the point that long-term financial sustainability is impossible with a car-centric development pattern. This means either two of the following consequences will occur: increase in taxes or decrease in the amount of infrastructures and services. The only way to be sustainable is move to a more sustainable development patterns and cease road rebuilding opportunities to minimize future deficits and maximize long term economic returns for the region. This can only be done by optimizing our existing spaces and choosing the most efficient mode of transport.

Throughput of a single 10 foot lane. (National Association of City Transportation Officials)

On top of the low throughput for roads that cars use, the expansion of our road systems also shows that we want to induce car trips. Induced demand is often thrown around with a negative connotation, but it matters more which mode we choose to induce which influences if it is good or not (Oh The Urbanity!). This means, if we decided to construct a bikeway or a transitway, it would induce demand on to that particular bit of infrastructure since the capacity of that infrastructure had been increased. This type of induced demand is actually good and sustainable, because the throughput is high and the use of unit of space per user is low. This is contrary to induced demand for car infrastructure, which is not sustainable, because it's maximum capacity is reached within a few years or even months, due to the inherent inefficiencies of space by cars, even electric or autonomous ones. However, this is not to say that we should tear out roads everywhere and replace them with giant sidewalks, bikeways and transitways. But instead, we need to stop expansion of our deficient roadway system, and rethink the use of space in urban contexts.

Road space dedicated per mode. (PUM 2050 - Ville de Montréal)

But I pay a lot to operate my car, therefore I must be paying my fair share, right?

"Motorists underestimate the total private costs of car ownership, while policymakers and planners underestimate social costs. Cars are expensive because of their high ticket price and depreciation and the additional costs incurred by insurance, repairs, and fuel purchases. Mass motoring’s social costs—known to transport wonks as negative externalities—include carbon emissions from burning petrol and diesel, congestion, noise, deaths and injuries from crashes, road damage, and costs to health systems from sloth. Other subsidies, such as the copious provision of free off-street car parking, are often mandated in building codes. America's 250 millions are oversupplied with an estimated 2 billion parking spots yet spend 95% of their time going nowhere."

(Forbes)

If public transport has to have buses filled to the brim and still unable to operate a service that is financially sustainable (they should not have to have buses filled completely for public transport to make sense), then how on earth cars could break even, let alone make a profit?

Comparison of private and societal costs of per annum (Gossling et al. 2022)

On top of that, it is to be considered that the majority of cars being purchased in Quebec are currently SUV's. Despite the Mercedes being a luxury SUV, the cost is more dependent on the size of the car. In 2021 alone, 71% of car sales are SUVs. They are also responsible for 50% of the increase of greenhouse gases in Quebec (Équiterre).

Most SUV owners do not even need a SUV (Équiterre)

"Clearly, automotive advertising has succeeded in convincing many people that they need an SUV when they don't necessarily, especially since SUVs don’t align with what the report says are the most important purchase criteria: price, safety and the cost of gas. It’s well documented that light-duty trucks, including SUVs, are more expensive to purchase, more dangerous to other road users, and are typically less fuel efficient than smaller vehicles."

(Équiterre)

Car companies want to sell more SUV's because it solely increases their profits, while pushing it's negative externalities on to society and some on the owner itself. In fact, the only reason that car companies want to make SUV's for the North American market and claim that smaller and more fuel efficient vehicles is impossible, is because SUV's are not cars, they are light trucks. Light trucks fall into another category of emissions standards, and therefore these vehicles can pollute more without car companies needing to pay penalties to the government (The New Yorker). Therefore a term was coined, the SUV loophole.

So why should public transport be subsidized at the end?

"Transit is deeply deserving of public subsidy because its use produces societal benefits that economists call positive externalities, such as reduced emissions and traffic crashes, while also helping to achieve social goals related to equity. It is entirely appropriate for federal, state, and local governments to provide financial support, particularly in ways that make transit service more frequent and reliable (and therefore useful)."

(Bloomberg)

These so-called positive externalities is exactly what makes investing in public transport different from investing in car dependent infrastructure. Cars generate negative externalities, such as: congestion, pollution, lengthening of distances between home and work and the corresponding urban sprawl, downtown devitalization, the trivialization of landscapes, impossibility to catch up to demand, constant deaths and numerous injuries on roadways, expensive healthcare system, etc. (Dupuy 2020). These positive externalities then lead towards a long-term sustainability as society saves money and expenses on the negative externalities caused by cars.

In fact researchers found that more a road is used, the larger the deficit it generates, because there is more wear and tear, more pollution, more crashes, lost productivity costs, etc. (Journal de Québec).