Visitors and tourists will still have to pay 1.60 euro per trip as southern French city becomes latest in Europe to make bus and tram rides free for locals
That’s why in well designed systems, the price is different at rush hour, and for high traffic routes and times.
Introducing something variable or unpredictable into public transit would probably deter a few people from using it
From an efficiency perspective this makes sense, but I don’t like it to be honest. The long distance trains do that here and it’s very off putting, although I can understand why - the trains are already usually very overcrowded, long and don’t fit in most stations, no funding is available to extend the platforms any further, and companies can’t buy newer, denser, faster trains because the railway electrify project is decades late…
As an alternative I’d propose increasing the frequency of the trams if possible, or maybe even use longer trams during those times if the stops are suitably long
It’s not too make money but they still need money to run it, and in a lot of places a significant portion of that comes from fares. If they’re replacing all of it with money coming from elsewhere then great.
For private business the tickets are to fund the business. But for public transport they are never expected to cover the costs of the business.
It is run as a public service, not to make money. The function of tickets is to prevent overcrowding.
That’s why in well designed systems, the price is different at rush hour, and for high traffic routes and times.
I don’t know anything about montpellier specifically though.
Introducing something variable or unpredictable into public transit would probably deter a few people from using it
From an efficiency perspective this makes sense, but I don’t like it to be honest. The long distance trains do that here and it’s very off putting, although I can understand why - the trains are already usually very overcrowded, long and don’t fit in most stations, no funding is available to extend the platforms any further, and companies can’t buy newer, denser, faster trains because the railway electrify project is decades late…
As an alternative I’d propose increasing the frequency of the trams if possible, or maybe even use longer trams during those times if the stops are suitably long
It’s not too make money but they still need money to run it, and in a lot of places a significant portion of that comes from fares. If they’re replacing all of it with money coming from elsewhere then great.