>>2046124Free Busses are a double-edged sword. I live in Kansas City, Missouri and our city leadership made busses free back in 2020. Granted, this is a heavily car-centric city anyway, but making the busses free has been a mixed bag. At first, it did help to increase ridership. But in the long term not so much. The municipal authority that oversees the bus system is KCATA. Historically, the bus system was funded primarily through bus fares. They took the fares away, and diverted tax funds to make the busses free. This was fine.
Here's the problem. The bus system didn't only go through Kansas City. The KCATA bus system also went to many suburban communities, many of which are small municipalities entirely surrounded by the city of Kansas City. Like Gladstone, MO - it is surrounded by KCMO to north, south, east, and west. Anyway, having the bus go through there wasn't an issue, because riders in Gladstone, many of whom worked in KC and commuted on the bus, just paid their fare. Well, now the far is free. And so the KCATA is now demanding that Gladstone pays $200k per year for the bus system. Gladstone doesn't want to do this because it means they'll have to tax their citizens more, many of whom don't ride the bus.
The result? The bus system now doesn't have any stops in Gladstone. You can't get on the bus or off the bus in Gladstone, even though it drives through the area on the same route.
This is happening in other municipalities here like Raytown and Belton and elsewhere. They make the busses free, but then demand that these other places pay hundreds of thousands for the privilege of bus service.
That's been one downside. Now that the bus is free, the network isn't as extensive as it used to be.
