[PRCo] Re: PAT's cuts

[Derrick Brashear]

> As for the SEPTA transfer fee, that was just an increase in the existing transfer fee.  I thought the racist charge was when SEPTA tried to do away with transfers.  SEPTA went to discounted transpasses which are swiped across a reader on top of fareboxes.  Transfers, tokens and dollar bills have seemed to almost disappeared in Philadelphia - I've been surprised at how universal the transpasses have become.   Pittsburgh still has transit vehicles sitting at a transit stop while boarding passengers struggle to feed dollar bills into the GFI fare boxes.

The newer (non-GFI, RFID-ready) fareboxes are harder to feed cash.
Come use one sometime.

> Tolling I-80 was a non-starter from the get-go.

Yup. *That's* the posturing.

> In this case, the federal highway people carried out the federal law, as written.  But what went unnoticed is the bonds issued by turnpike to provide funds for state highways and transit past several years.  Your grandchildren will be paying for those bonds for years to come.

That would be an interesting trick of genetics. Also, only if they use
the turnpike.

My parents' grandchildren may well still be paying for 3 Rivers
Stadium, and it's *gone*.

>I remember 4-5 years ago one of the consultants - I think it was Gannett Fleming - claiming that Act 44 would include a toll on the railroad tracks crossing Pa parallel to I-90.  He was under the impression that railroads were like highways - owned by PennDOT.

All state owned railroad tracks near Erie could be tolled. The $0
revenue would do its part.