🚀 go-pugleaf

Tom Wetzel wrote in message ...
>
>Richard Mlynarik wrote in message <3CC5D2A9.3B743CB@POBox.COM>...
>>Tom Wetzel wrote:
>>>
>>[...]
>>
>>> Actually the cable cars are very close to covering their costs of
>operation
>>> from fares, due to the high tourist fare.
>>
>>Please, stop being such a comedian.
>>
>>http://www.mtc.ca.gov/publications/statsum/StatSummary01.pdf page 21 for
>FY1999-2000:
>>9206000 passengers
>>130000 revenue hours
>>$233.33 per revenue hour operating cost, (up from $130 in FY1996-7)
>>$3.29 per boarding operating cost
>>**354** full-time employee equivalents
>>**0.37** vehicle revenue hours per employee hour (down from 0.51)
>>**13.1%** farebox recovery (down from 36.1% in FY1996-7)
>>
>>If _every_ boarding were a $3 cash fare, then maybe it would come
>>withing striking distance on operating costs.  Then again, if the
>>cable car operations were less feather-bedded by guys who like to
>>hang out at the end of the lines having a smoke while lines of potential
>>riders snaked around the block we might get a little above 13.1% farebox
>>recovery also.
>>
>>NB that even this incredibly low 13.1% farebox recovery is still
>>50% better than the insanely pointless Santa Clara Light Rail system,
>>and hundreds of millions of dollars cheaper.
>>
>>I do like the cable cars just fine and think they're worth subsidising
>>as a civic and cultural amenity, though not as a welfare program for
>>Muni's finest.  I don't care for innumeracy in defence of anything.
>
>well, then your fellow RescueMuni exec board member who told me
>they were close to breaking even didn't know what he is talking about.
>another reason to wonder whether RM leaders know what they're
>talking about.
>


It's possible of course that there was miscommunication. Maybe he
meant to say something such as: If the cable cars were to operate
according to the actual schedule, then they'd be close to breaking
even. In any event I didn't check up on his statement because
the cable cars don't interest me that much, as I tend to regard them
as an outdoor amusement ride. In reality that was the aim of
the city leaders back in the '50s when they chopped the California
line and got rid of the Washington-Jackson line -- the routes
then used by city residents rather than tourists to any considerable
degree.

Tom Wetzel