[Jonboy1983]

Originally Posted by electricron

SEPTA has high fiaebox recovery?

I'll admit I don't know, but what do you consider high? 25%, 50%, 75%, or 100% ?

SEPTA farebox recovery can be found looking at its financials reports.
FY2010 http://www.septa.org/reports/pdf/opbudget10.pdf
Suggest looking at page 23 Consolidated data.
Passenger Fares = $414,326,000
Expenses = $1,131,844,000
Subsidy = $664,979,000
They even break down the revenues by sources.....
Federal = $32,200,000
State = $554,622,000
Local = $75,457,000
Other =$2,700,000
Note how much the entire State subsidizes SEPTA every year. I suppose citizens in Harrisburg, Pittsburgh, and Allentown gets their fare share? Ha!

By the way, here's the math:
414/1131 = 36.6% ; Slightly more than a third.
Even a worse statistic, the Local funding sources of (414 + 75) $489 million is less than the entire State funding sources = $554 million

Farebox recovery of 36% is relatively high compared to other transit agencies in America, but I wouldn't be bragging about it..
When State governments are being asked to provide more funding than locals transit users, why are we so surprised to read that States are wanting to reduce subsidies by reducing services?

Yeah, funny you should mention Pittsburgh's system. Port Authority's budget calls for not only higher fares but also for a 35% reduction in service, including cutting 46 more bus routes and trimming the remaining 54. The T is also getting cut back.

Port Authority has its BRT and T lines, so why can't they just integrate their existing bus routes into their T and BRT lines?

In any event, it seems that SEPTA run a number of bus routes out of a hub-and-spoke network out of the 69th Street Terminal. Hub-and-spoke systems do make sense, but why can't they have multiple hubs out of other regional transportation centers? They could have a series of bus lines feeding into all of the regional rail/subway/light rail lines. All in all, I see this as a way of boosting ridership as well as farebox revenue in both metro areas, as I agree that 36% is not very impressive...