wbur.org: Making Boston's buses free is a bad idea

[Scsmedia]

Making Boston's buses free is a bad idea
https://www.wbur.org/cognoscenti/2026/03/04/wu-boston-mamdani-new-york-free-buses-mbta-rich-barlow

Good article on why free buses are not free and the tradeoffs of providing free buses. 

Steven Scharf

207-415-4662

SCSM...@AOL.COM 

[Todd Russell]

There was a good one on the other side last month in NYT: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/13/opinion/free-bus-rides-mamdani.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share

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On Mar 5, 2026, at 7:35 PM, 'Scsmedia' via Portland Bicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Committee <PB...@googlegroups.com> wrote:



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[Rauschpfeife]

Color me skeptical. Of course it's obvious that making buses free isn't possible without a commitment of more money altogether from the municipality or super-un-democratic public authority, so the idea of a fixed budget is a straw man. Did the TA's budget come down from Sinai? But I had to laugh at the idea that $1 billion would buy 41 new miles of subway. In New York? Pull the other one. Maybe in Calcutta. Anybody remember the 2d Avenue subway extension? 

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Best, 

Michael Smith

anacharsis.substack.com

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[Zack Barowitz]

The BUR article fails to look at the offsets, I.e., fewer cars on the has both external and calculable savings particularly if you add congestion pricing. And there is an inherent value in moving more people to work. Plus transit is already subsidized why not make it free like education? Or make the fare by donation—it seems to work for podcasts. 

And yea that billion dollar figure is a whopper. The 2nd Ave subway was “under construction” for almost my entire lifetime and the cost is about 5 billion per mile at this point. 

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