How do the economic factors involved in public versus private transportation impact US
consumers?
Transportation plays a key role in many people’s lives across the United States;
whether it’s by cars, buses, trains, or the many other forms of vehicular transportation,
people rely on transportation to get from one place to another. Professor Inwood at the
University of Tennessee argues that “access to public transportation is an important civil
right in the United States” (Inwood Joshua, et al 2015). Through this argument, it’s
made clear that people truly care about their transportation. As viewed from an
economic perspective, is public or private vehicular transportation more beneficial for
the consumer?
One way public transportation benefits consumers is by increasing the value of
their property. In the US, home values increase when public transportation is readily
available close by. The Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED)
Foundation aims to provide the means for sustainability to people and where they reside
as well as for the environment. The LEED foundation also aims to create available
transportation for the consumer that is readily accessible without having to cover a long
distance. For example, the two requirements for Public Transportation Access (PTA)
credit are “Rail Station proximity: Locate the project within 0.5 mi (0.8 km) walking
distance…” and “Bus stop proximity: Locate the project within 0.25 mi (0.4km) walking
distance…” (Kunhee Choi, et al 2012). Having this distance greatly benefits the
consumer, such as in New York City. A report shows that “54.6% of the residents in
NYC are commuting by at least one means of public transportation” (Kunhee Choi, et al
2012). Having this big of a market for public transportation is really influential as it ends
up affecting the land value of the area. Table 1 of “LEED Public Transportation
Accessibility and Its Economic Implications” demonstrates what attempts of public
transportation have had a positive or negative impact on the land’s value. The majority
of the impact on land value was either positive or neutral indicating a clear connection
between public transportation and the value of land in the area (Kunhee Choi, et al
2012). Zhenua Chen and Kingsley E. Haynes uses the Granger causality test to
“investigate the causal linkages between regional economic output and surface
transportation infrastructure…” (Zhenua, Kingsley 2014). An example of this would be a
study featured by Jan-Egbert Sturm, professor of macroeconomics, that revealed that
“road infrastructure plays a significant role in regional economic growth and
development through cross-sectional analysis based on 98 countries and a time series
analysis of U.S. data.” (Sturm et al. 1999) Overall it is clear that the effects of public
transportation extend to the economic state of the region and land, this is not only
important for the companies that provide this transportation but the consumers who ride
it.
Private transportation seems economically beneficial as it suggests ownership
and more autonomy over the means of transportation. For example, “owning” a car or
motorcycle may seem a better option as one has the power to use it whenever they
need or want to, and with technological advancements reducing reliance on pricey
gasoline, there may be some advantages in the future. The article “The Future of
Transportation: Ethical, Legal, Social, and Economic Impacts of Self-driving Vehicles in
the Year 2025” by Mark Ryan takes a look at the future of private transportation and
takes a peek at some of the developments that are happening and will happen by the
year 2025 with self-driving cars and electric vehicles in general. One of the great things
about this type of private transportation is that the cost overall can be lower than
traditional private vehicles. Not only do Self Driving Vehicles (SDVs) reduce fuel costs
“because of greater fuel efficiency”, “SDVs also promise to reduce road deaths, which
will reduce costs on governmental healthcare spending” (Ryan Mark 2019) However is it
probable for all these technological advancements to happen by the year 2025?
Sparkes claims that “general sales of a level 4 car are likely to still be more than five
years away, and firms may never actually sell them” A level 4 car described by this
article is, “full automation in ‘limited conditions’ “ (Sparkes, Matthew 2022). Overall it is
clear that SDVs and private transportation, in general, hold some benefits for the
consumer economically, however, it should be made clear that a lot of these benefits
are long away.
In the article “The impacts of COVID-19 pandemic on public transit demand in
the United States” Luyu Liu, Harvey J. Miller, and Jonathan Scheff explain the demands
of public transportation from the consumer and how that has changed by the COVID-19
pandemic. An example of this demand for transit comes from a Transit user server that
found “85% of users do not have access to a car” (Liu et al. 2020) This shows just how
much some people rely on public transportation and how something like a SDV does
not make sense from an economical point of view. Another way public transportation
positively affects consumers is with goods. The Yu Haitao article “A review of
input-output models on multisectoral modeling of transportation-economic linkages”
discusses the use of IO (input-output) models and analyzes the supply and demand of
public transportation. A specific example of an IO model presented in this article is the
“Evaluation of economic impact of Regional Transportation Plan (RTP)” where “RTP
leads to freight operating cost reduction, which subsequently increases final demand for
freight sector.” (Seetharaman et al. 2003). Although this is not the specific transportation
of people, it is still very important for the consumer as the consumer is who creates the
demand. Without public transportation, things would be different. Overall it is clear that
the use of public transportation has some apparent advantages over private even if
private transportation has its advantages.
“With the rapid development of China’s social economy, urban traffic has
increasingly become problematic. To alleviate urban traffic congestion and mitigate
environmental pollution, an important measure is to prioritize public transportation
development.” (Shao et al. 2021) China is a perfect example of what
government-funded public transportation should be like. The article “Optimizing the
Subsidy Calculation Model of Urban Public Transport” explores how traffic and
transportation work in China. The solution that was implemented was
government-funded public transit. In places such as the U.S. with fewer public
transportation opportunities than the rest of the world, big cities such as Los Angeles
California receive lots of road traffic. One possible solution would be for the government
to fund public transportation for big cities where this traffic congestion is common. It has
become increasingly clear that public transportation holds many more values and
benefits than private transportation. The next step for the United States moving forward
is fully supporting this endeavor into the world of public transportation, through funding
trains, buses, and many other modes of vehicular transportation the best way to move
forward is with Government funding.
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Works cited
Choi, Kunhee, et al. “LEED Public Transportation Accessibility and Its Economic
Implications.” Journal of Construction Engineering and Management, 31 Aug.
2012, https://trid.trb.org/view/1215929
Haitao , Yu. “A Review of Input–Output Models on Multisectoral Modelling of
Transportation–Economic Linkages.” Taylor & Francis, 2014,
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/01441647.2017.1406557.
Inwood, Joshua F.J., et al. “‘Where Do We Go from Here?" Transportation Justice and
the Struggle for Equal Access.” Penn State, University of North Carolina Press, 1
Dec. 2015,
https://pennstate.pure.elsevier.com/en/publications/where-do-we-go-from-here-tr
ansportation-justice-and-the-struggle-.
Liu, Luyu, et al. “The Impacts of Covid-19 Pandemic on Public Transit Demand in the
United States.” PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, 2020,
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0242476.
Ryan, Mark. “The Future of Transportation: Ethical, Legal, Social and Economic Impacts
of Self-Driving Vehicles in the Year 2025.” Science and Engineering Ethics, U.S.
National Library of Medicine, 2014, https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31482471/.
Shao, Yunhong, et al. “Optimizing the Subsidy Calculation Model of Urban Public
Transport.” Mathematical Problems in Engineering, Hindawi, 19 July 2021,
https://www.hindawi.com/journals/mpe/2021/5536801/.
Sparkes, Matthew. “Why You May Never Be Able to Buy Your Own Self-Driving Car.”
New Scientist, Reed Business Information, 17 Dec. 2022,
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0262407922022539.
Zhenhua, Chen, and Kingsley E Haynes. “Regional Economic Output and Public
Surface Transportation I.” The Review of Regional Studies, Southern Regional
Science Association, 2014,
https://ideas.repec.org/a/rre/publsh/v44y2014i3p263-279.html.