My city made it free for children to use transit, which is a huge benifit for families Edit to add my city is Calgary Ab Canada

not only is Kansas City's Streetcar Free to ride, but all of the busses were made free to ride in ~2020

Los Angeles Metro established a fare capping scheme in 2023. You'll never pay more than $5 per day or $18 per week. The standard fare is $1.75 one way with a 2 hour free transfer window. Once you reach $5 for the day or $18 for the week, the rest of your rides are free across buses, subways, and light rail lines. Students in K12 and Community College ride for free. Seniors and people with disabilities pay 75 cents peak and 35 cents non-peak. The 1 day cap is $2.50 and the 7 day cap is $5. Very affordable. LA Metro has 109 miles of rail with 101 stations, and runs 114 bus routes.

Fares are free in Tucson as well, and the streetcar is seeing record ridership.

In Estonia, free public transportation across the country was ended this year because of difficult economic circumstances. But it still remains free for kids/teens and pensioners. (With exception of few cities that will keep public transit free, like the capital Tallinn.) We even saw last year 25% increases in ridership in some regions with good public transit. Because of rising cost of living and higher fuel costs. But this was also the case in Pärnu, a city that never joined the original free public transit program, and has allways had a fee. So it’s arguable if free public transportation justifies itself. Free for pensioners and kids/teens is most logical, and should be everywhere so. On other hand we could argue that having public transport that costs to use, is more expensive to maintain, than free public transportation. As in case of free, you can skip in having to have extra staff to check ticket’s irregularly, and ticket machines. (That need maintenance, and cost a lot).

We in Baton Rouge, LA operated fare free during COVID. One issue we encountered was the high number of unhoused individuals who were taking up seats on the buses. Yes, they are people and they do count towards our ridership but the passenger experience/quality starts to degrade.

While completely free transit for everybody is a nice thing, we have a small zone in our city center for the distance between train station and city center, it’s not really the solution. The strategy here in Germany has always been to have somewhat expensive one-way fares but rather affordable monthly passes. For about a year now we introduced a nationwide pass for 49€ a month including all local and regional transit (some states even have discounted 29€ options). This is much cheaper then even the lowest level pass of most transit agencies with a lot more service. With this pass transit is essentially free for anybody who somewhat regularly uses it. It has been a huge success in terms of ridership, but at the quite low price it’s long term viability is at the very least debatable. Because some people were willing to pay a lot more for the same transit. The monthly pass for my commute was 260€ or 20€ per day in one-way fares. Since I only go into office about once every week I paid around 80€ for train service, which is about the same as fuel for the car would cost. Trains on the route were decently full at that price. Now I pay half of this price and the trains are regularly packed, but there isn’t any additional income to run longer trains (frequency was already at track capacity anyways). While it’s great in the short term, having a bit more expensive tickets and discounts for those who need them is probably the better way to generate the necessary funding to improve transit.

All of tucson transit is free too

Purely coincidental, but I’ve been to all of those cities & rode on all of the public transit systems mentioned. I definitely approve this video!

"One of the most common modes of free tansit modes are Airports" (JFK Airtrain's $8.50 fare hides)

Here in Europe more and more popular is idea of making systems free for people living in the city. Few months ago it was done in Montpellier where I lived (I moved out just before introducing fare free transit for citizens) and I think this is perfect example of city using transit as strategy to transform city. Whole city center was already closed for cars several years ago and is frequently served by all lines of trams. Next year Montpellier is going to open new tram line, extension of another line and 5 new brt lines, all streets where they will run are undergoing transformation decreasing amount of lanes and building bike lanes. Imo this trade of with citizens especially for neighborhoods with poor transit connections so far which had to rely on cars great. It's basically like: maybe we will make it more difficult for you to drive but now you will get free frequent transit so it's basically win win situation.

The ballot-qualified socialist party in California has had fare-free mass transit in its platform forever, and as a goal, I support it. I believe that, in principle, mass transit should be as free to use as highways, roads, streets and sidewalks. This is not just a matter of abstract philosophical principle, but of material reality. I refer back to the point made in this video, that ABQ found that it was actually costing them more to collect fares than the fares they were collecting. Fare collection introduces several points of friction into the system, not just at the individual collection point: it requires equipment and labor to collect and process the fares, and to maintain and repair that equipment, and to enforce payment and punish non-payment. And it introduces another point of social friction as well, more things for people to be pissed off at each other about, one way and the other. The whole thing would work a lot more smoothly if getting on and off mass transit were like getting on and off an elevator in a high-rise. (Imagine if elevators had fare boxes!) In the current reality, however, I acknowledge that the most efficient and equitable method of funding mass transit - with public funds - isn't how it's done or likely to be done anytime soon. So, given that fare collection is going to continue to be a part of every transit agency's budget, there are some reforms that could make it work better and hurt less: 1. Fares must not be a barrier to entry. There are those who disagree, who advocate for fares explicitly for the purpose of keeping the smelly poors out. They address a very real problem by making it worse for the people who suffer the most from it, for the sake of their own convenience and comfort. They need to re-examine their moral center. The rest of us understand that nobody needs mass transit more than those who have nothing. A free transit pass should be a part of the aid package for people without means, along with food and housing. 2. Some groups of people should get a free pass regardless of income level - youth, retirees, disabled people are three that come to mind. 3. Fare collection needs to be made as frictionless as possible. Tap cards vs cash (and btw, free/discounted cards should be visibly indistinguishable, idk why they use a different color, other than to shame poor folks). One tap card for every transit system in each major service area, with free/discounted transfers. Minimal emphasis on enforcement, with an eye on making sure you're not spending a dollar to chase a dime, and also not creating a hostile atmosphere. 4. Those who benefit the most should pay the most. By that, I mean first and foremost, big downtown employers and retailers, whose profits rely on getting lots of workers and customers to their locations. Businesses should pay for at least a portion of their employees' transit pass costs. And there ought to be a way for retailers to comp their customers' transit fares the same way they validate parking (why should cars be subsidized & transit not?). (This is all off the top of my head.)

In Scotland, all day buses are free to those under 22, and you also get discounts on trains and subways which is pretty neat for me since I'm 18 so I don't even need to worry about learning how to drive :)

Tacoma, WA had a free rail service once upon a time. It was only six stops between downtown and the greyhound/amtrack stations, but given how far apart everything is in Tacoma, it was a blessing. However, they recently expanded the rail line to include six new stops, now making the medical center accessible and now they charge fares for riding. I think anyone under 18 rides for free, but i don't know any kids who ride the line to verify that.

Here in Worcester Massachusetts they made the bus system free since COVID and it's been received really well especially since there is a pretty good homeless population here it's really beneficial for them too. It's been so long since it's been free the city actually decided it wasn't even worth it to reinstall the fair machines now so probably it's gonna be free indefinitely which is super awesome!

I think free transit is good if the network is developed or the fare collection system is expensive, but improving quality of service should take priority.

I once thought our taxes pay for public transport, so why do we have to pay again?

Great video. Though you forgot to talk about *fare capping.* Fare capping is a great way to strike a balance & is the best compromise. In my opinion Trimet in Portland, Oregon does this best 😉👍💯

Calgary 🇨🇦 allows free use of its LRT system in the downtown section of the corridor

Personal Injury Attorneys advertise on public transit because people who have been injured usually can’t afford a car.

i think the most interesting example of free transit ive experienced is the rhode island department of transit making ferry service between the town of bristol ri and providence fare-free because of the ongoing closure of the main bridge into the city. i remember the ferry not having a ton of people a few of the times i’ve been on there, and i think its probably a really costly endeavor for not much reward, but as someone who usually takes the bus from that area whenever i want to go to providence for fun i think it’s a pretty fun way to provide fare free transit in a vacuum lol

Great video! My city RVA currently has free transit and I have mixed feelings about it. While it's great not to have to pay, the lack of fares encourages people to take shorter trips which causes the ride to take longer. Another factor to consider are "ne'er-do-wells" who just take transit not because they have somewhere to go, but because they're trying to escape the elements. Again, not ideal!

I think there's a good argument for fare free transit in tourist zones or busy commercial areas, and (in the US) for things like transit from the airport to the downtown of a city. Doing that would make transit by far the most appealing option for getting around if you just want to visit a city and shop and see the sights, which would probably bring more money to the local economy. I'm in Seattle, and unfortunately Pike Place Market still doesnt have a streetcar connection. Given the number of people that would fly in and dump their tourist dollars there, it seems like a no brainer vs the $3 per person on the light rail or bus, or the $3/hr you'd pay for parking. Not only that but getting cars out of what should be pedestrian areas. If you can ride around downtown for free instead of driving, it makes the whole space better and more people will hang out and get coffee or lunch or drinks.

Thank you for the unbiased video and for representing Phoenix/Tempe well! The Orbits (except Earth and Saturn) and the streetcar are highly popular with University students because of the zero fares.

The entire state of Colorado every year for the past four years has made public transit free for three months from June to September

Yes, if you have SNAP or some other benefit card, that should be an easy in

Here in Graz Austria the system isnt free for the most part. But the Tramways in Downtown (7 Stations) are free, encouraging tourists to use them, as most tourist attractions are in this area.

The entire state of Connecticut made their bus network free during Covid, and the governor extended this several times, but they went back to charging fares again recently.

Systems that have radial routes that end in a central core of a city (typically a downtown) have a unique opportunity to create a fare-free zone, especially inbound routes. Denver’s RTD is an example of a system that can have a fare-free zone in the central city that connects passengers to routes that would need a payment to continue so losses on those going a decent distance is negligible.

Albuquerque has had free transit for a couple of years now as a pilot project, and only decided to make it "permanent" in November. They had to reduce the frequency of many of the routes because of a shortage of drivers and mechanics. They are working on recruiting more to be able to restore more frequent service. Unfortunately, security is also costing more because of an increase in assaults on drivers and riders.

Good video. Did you mention that SAFETY is a key issue in many cities? I have heard several New Yorkers, Angelinos (L.A.) and San Francisco area people comment in newspapers and social media that until safety improves, they would rather pay more and drive. Please address this more, so that maybe discussion on how to improve safety can get more people to use mass transit, in addition to convenience, economical costs (or free), cleanliness and access to destinations as valid topics.

In my city, buses are overcrowded even with ticket prices... Couldn't imagine what would happen if it was free😅

I’m all for free transit, but I’m glad that you highlighted that it’s not all sunshine and rainbows. In an ideal world, our tax money would go towards funding both capital projects AND operating costs of transit agencies, but we don’t live in that ideal world right now. Until then, I think it’s fair to charge for public transit. Also, more people need to realize that transit is an absolute STEAL compared to the cost of driving.

Surprised you didn't mention temporary free system wide transit for events or sports games, which is what the Twin Cities does. Miller Lite sponsors the transit for the Vikings and Twins games, pretty sweet stuff. Good video though as always

Some german cities (I'm sure there are also others around the world) have/had the possibility to get a free ticket if you watch 2-3 adds on your phone. The adds therefore pay for the ticket. But I'm not sure if this actually covers the cost or is just kind of promotion at the moment.

Have a system like this here in Perth, Western Australia for YEARS!

Here in Washington State, a funding package called "Move Ahead Washington" was put into action that allows all people 18 and under to ride for free. You are not required to get a "Youth" card, but it is encouraged to have as proof. All you need to get one is to have documentation such as a school ID to receive one. I got one for my sister a year ago and it has worked out for her really well!

5:23 Its definitely annoying seeing those specific advertisements everywhere I go...

My city introduced free transit for seniors last year, at the cost of $xxx. The transit commission reported a deficit of almost exactly $xxx more than the previous year.

Loving all the footage of the phoenix valley hehe I was born here so it's nice to see it get represented.

jesse, we need to make transit free

Richmond VA, GRTC, made public transit free too

I’d never seen dual-sided door buses used in the U.S. Is ABQ the only major city?

Cool video, but I feel like there's not much data in it. It's worth noting that they didn't just do this out of the blue last year. They did a ~2 year pilot of free fares and after gathering that real data came to the conclusion that it was superior to charging. They're already past the "Let's see how this will work out" phase. Much of the data showing increased ridership and satisfaction is available online. Anyway, on the topic of dwell times from the video, if this initiative increases ridership so much that dwell times just from more people boarding matches or exceeds the old dwell time of people having to fish out a payment card or sufficient change then that's a huge success. They've also said that the fare-free program costs roughly 3% of the transit agency's budget. Not negligible, but not terrible. The topic of transit lines needing to make up some deficit with fares is an interesting one, but c'mon, their entire transit agency budget is 4% (with the free fare program being just three one hundredths of that slice) of the total city's budget compared to over 25% for public safety. Requiring fares instead of just paying for it with taxes is a policy choice, nothing more nothing less.

Wenatchee, WA made its buses free to ride during COVID and then decided to keep them that way. The whole area is a typical example of car-centric land use and infrastructure design, but they have been painting some bicycle gutters onto some of their streets, as well as the bus thing, so maybe they're headed in the right direction

NMRR goes from Santa Fe to Belen.

I think free makes sense if the system has less then 10% farebox recovery and small systems.

Fare-free is worth the tradeoffs. In Charlotte, fares only account for less than 1% of CATS funding. Equity is more important than efficiency, but more often, it's not mutually exclusive and just outright overlaps with efficiency. The higher ridership is, the better. Period.

Free transit would also enable mobility for those who can't afford it, including homeless people. Yes, I said homeless people. Free transit would enable them to access critical services that would otherwise be out of reach. Many homeless people also hold jobs too so making transit free would provide them with greater opportunities and put them on a path to stability as well.

Interesting video, and I have a lot of comments with my own experiences. Now I'm not from the United States at all, I must clarify, I'm from Denmark, but here the support for making public transit completely free is gaining a lot of traction, though I feel like its often an overreaction. Here in Denmark we've sadly been in a public transit death spiral for nearly 2 decades now ever since a county reform by right wing minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen (who somehow still keeps getting votes every election and even has been nicknamed the Kingpin) was done in 2007 which got rid of the counties and instead enlargened municipalities and introduced regions. 5 across the country. All having less financial independence and the regions not even able to collect their own taxes, with their annual budget allowance entirely set by the national government. The national government also limits how much both the municipal and regional governments are even allowed to spend by a financial law thats the most stringent in the whole EU, dictating that the public spending deficit must never be greater than 0.5% of GDP, which has wreaked havoc on public services here. Even in cases where municipalities have billions of kroner, enough to build whole light rail lines in their pockets, they're not even legally allowed to spend it, or even the amount of money they collect annually in a year. This also means that nearly all transit expansion must result in cutbacks elsewhere, like a new light rail line forcing cutbacks to bus service elsewhere, which people are especially mad about, and now protesting new rapid transit projects as a result, as they see it as a threat to their local, if infrequent, bus service or train request stop. All of this combined with the national level politicians demanding a systemwide farebox recovery ratio of 50% as a standard means that the systems haves struggled with making ends meet which results in forced service cut backs and fare increases, which drives more people away and hurts the bottom line, which leans to more service cutbacks and fare increases, time and time again. It was especially bad in recent years post covid when we got a new minister for transport who refused to provide adequate emergency funding in mid 2022 to cover losses caused by covid and increasing costs of fuel and electricity. This was right as ridership was recovering, but the following cutbacks and fare increases forced by this basically undid everything, with us getting 5-10% fare increases annually since then! Today, if you compare ticket prices in say Copenhagen with Vancouver, Canada, the transit in Copenhagen is on average twice the price of transit in Vancouver. And so of course this radicalizes people into wanting the exact opposite of fare increases, that being making transit free. Some municipalities across the country have already done this a long time ago. Mostly on islands, but a few inland municipalities have done it as well to all their intra-municipal bus routes or even on some local trains so kids can get to school in the large town without paying for the train. However these routes usually also have poor coverage and schedules to begin with, with service stopping as early as 6pm or having no bus service on weekends. However in one example on the island of Ærø, an island with around 6000 residents, they made their buses free to ride. They have a decent schedule with hourly service from 5am till 8-9pm which is very respectable by danish standard, and making the buses there free to ride caused a ridership increase by 500% from 50.000 annual passenger trips in 2015 to 250.000 annual passenger trips in 2023, and the services there being completely unaffected by the pandemic! These numbers are downright absurd but they prove that people have had enough of the high fares here. Though Denmark's third largest city, Odense (population 182k), have recently also trialled extra cheap transit tickets in order to get more people to ride their newly built LRT. And while they expected a loss of 2 million kroner from the project, they actually made a profit of 6 million and got a vast ridership increase. 6 million is enough to fund several additional bus departures on routes in the city, which it definitely needs! Overall I think that free transit isnt the way forward apart from select cases, but lower fares DEFINITELY IS! People say fares arent important but coming from arguably the place with the most expensive public transit on earth, I can assure everyone that making the fares too high WILL make people stop taking transit, especially if they can avoid it.

Just wondering - we consider 'fare free' transit abnormal. Do any cities charge for use of their streets, either on a period (day/month/whatever)? Should they? Or is use of the streets by drivers considered 'free' and 'normal'?

Ayyy! In my state (Washington), the transit in our Capitol is free

A comment for the algorithm!

Debatable for if it counts, but the only free transit I’ve ever been on is at Walt Disney World 😂😂 it is technically free bc you don’t need to pay for park tickets or hotels to use them, so hypothetically any local who wanted to could take it for free lol

Breaking Bad reference

Public officials should “have to” ride public transit and for free…

I think free transit is a very bad idea since building new lines and even making existing lines work -- with good frequencies -- is very expansive. I do not want free rides, I want to have metros and trams and trolley-buses and buses going everywhere in my city without being more than 5 minutes waiting at a metro or tram stop, and no more than 15 minutes at a trolley and bus stop. However, it is possible to reduce drastically the price for the few people who definitively cannot afford the regular price. In some countries, it can be the employer who pays, at least a part of the subscription. BTW, when I see your video, trams seem to be empty while in my city (Lyon, France) they are full even without free transit. So I do not agree that free implies more transit, the huge majority of people uses public transportation when it is the best option (destination, time, comfort, security, etc.). BTW, it costs me more to use public transportation to go to work than my Tesla, but the tram or even my bicycle are more convenient or/and faster.

First off I am all for getting people to use mass transit, here in Salt Lake City, Utah, we have free transit in the downtown part of SLC and in winter when we have really bad air days they will often do free days, or even sport game days. It certainly does get more riders, I ride every day and I can tell when there is a free day. In fact, my first experience riding our transit was on a free day. But free... has issues. One of the biggest problems that seems to happen with free days (not just here but in other places I have been) is as soon as you say something is "free" the homeless and the drug addicts move in. Especially in the wintertime. What will happen is once the homeless realize they can ride the transit for free they will "move into the transit" and make it their home. There is almost this feeling that if something is "Free" it has no value. This happened a lot when I was in Chicago because the trains run 24/7 and during the winter the homeless would break into the trains and built tent city inside the moving cars and attack people they would also defecate all over the train and would leave trash everywhere. Then people would be so grossed out by it, that they wouldn't want to ride it, and many didn't. However, even just charging a dime for a ticket or having the ticket have an expiration time/date seemed to prevent this. So while I personally am all for the free transit being an option... I do think just giving it, or making it free for people who need it to be free/low cost works better, like for instance students (who can show their student passes) or those who are younger than 18, or who have a ticket to a sports game or something like that. Or those who are handicapped or disabled, low-income, etc... just seems to help with the issues, while still giving the benefits of free transit, I'm not opposed to giving free days for people to come and try it out, after all, that was how I got my first experience riding it. I do realize this is more of an issue with homeless populations, but since they tend to live in downtown areas here in the USA, it also tends to be where the mass transit is, so the two often follow each other unfortunately. This leads to people thinking of mass transit as the "worse option", when really it should just be the "better option". I think, Kids, Students, the Elderly, Disabled, Veterans (maybe a nice gov perk), Verified low-income, sporting events/graduations, or other special classes should be free, but everyone else can pay a low fair, It just seems to work better in my experience. With of course some free days to come and try out the transit works great too. Also free transit from the airport is super nice keeps traffic at the airport low, plus most people are just trying to get to and from the airport anyways, they don't need to take/leave a car.

How does public transit make money without free fares?

"Free" means more taxes.

The main problem with fare free transit is it turns transit into a moving homeless shelter, especially in larger cities, which discourages ridership from people who actually want to use transit as a means of travel. "Normal" people don't want to sit next to a smelly crazy homeless person who has pissed themselves and is yelling at imagined demons.

Wait, this is incoherent. How is can you say that it is good that fare-free transit will increase ridership, and say downside of fare-free transit is increased dwell time because too many people ride it? is'nt it good when many people ride it?

I think your main two attempts at a con for fare free is 1. more ridership 2. we don't presently fund transit to grow and expand without fare, neither of which are problems or problems of fare free itself. I think you missed the opportunity to push for expansive, progressive (meaning high class heavy) taxation and funding, and instead blamed the system we should be adopting for things greater than it.

IT'S NEVER FREE BTW!!!

It's not actually free dammit