Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Your solution means that all the customers will have to go further to get to the store though. If you're also increasing the costs of driving a car, that will cause demand for stores that are closer to the customer, so more smaller shopping areas and counter the effect of higher trucking costs. I could see the net effect being more smaller shopping areas than today.
Not only will the customers have to go farther, but the business owners will have to come up with some method of getting the goods to their business from the railroad station. Maybe since cars are so bad, we could go back to horse and wagon.
When you're talking about rail or roadbuilding, that's what "right-of-way" means.
Okay. Understood. Also, not totally relevant at this juncture, as I went on to elaborate what I meant for trucks, which was purchasing time/space on the road.
Quote:
Originally Posted by nybbler
You are mistaken, because such trucks do pay per mile for road use.
Could you elaborate on that? How do they pay? How is it calculated? Whom is paid?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Katiana
I take what people say about "I'm not promoting XXX" with a grain of salt.
Skepticism is a good trait to have. But, as has been made explicit, I'm promoting internalization of previously externalized costs and then speculating what I think would happen. I haven't been promoting any specific form as innately better or worse.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Katiana
Not only will the customers have to go farther, but the business owners will have to come up with some method of getting the goods to their business from the railroad station. Maybe since cars are so bad, we could go back to horse and wagon.
Why do you keep going back to rail? I was very explicit in stating I was talking about trucks, freight prices and suburban form.
Okay. Understood. Also, not totally relevant at this juncture, as I went on to elaborate what I meant for trucks, which was purchasing time/space on the road.
Could you elaborate on that? How do they pay? How is it calculated? Whom is paid?
Skepticism is a good trait to have. But, as has been made explicit, I'm promoting internalization of previously externalized costs and then speculating what I think would happen. I haven't been promoting any specific form as innately better or worse.
Why do you keep going back to rail? I was very explicit in stating I was talking about trucks, freight prices and suburban form.
Why do you keep diverting? I thought you WERE talking about rail. One post, you're talking about this; then I respond and you're supposedly talking about something else. Rinse, lather, repeat.
You still haven't said what you think suburban shopping looks like NOW.
Could you elaborate on that? How do they pay? How is it calculated? Whom is paid?
Commercial truck operators pay the states they operate their trucks in a tax based on the mileage and weight class of their vehicles. New York calls it the Highway Use Tax, Pennsylvania calls it the Motor Carrier's Road Tax, I'm sure other states call it other things. The point is that what you ask for already exists, so suburban shopping could not be changed by bringing it into existence.
Commercial truck operators pay the states they operate their trucks in a tax based on the mileage and weight class of their vehicles. New York calls it the Highway Use Tax, Pennsylvania calls it the Motor Carrier's Road Tax, I'm sure other states call it other things. The point is that what you ask for already exists, so suburban shopping could not be changed by bringing it into existence.
Why do you keep diverting? I thought you WERE talking about rail. One post, you're talking about this; then I respond and you're supposedly talking about something else. Rinse, lather, repeat.
You still haven't said what you think suburban shopping looks like NOW.
I haven't been talking about rail, but I have been using it as a foil for comparison to trucking. I've been very explicit in talking about freight trucking. I started by comparing the way trucks and railways negotiate for use of their medium (rails for trains, roads for trucks). AFAIKnew, trucks didn't pay for road use. I don't know if they pay California for highway use, as they do, albeit circuitously at tax time, in New York. Also, AFAIK, they don't pay for use of local arterials, which a state agency, like CalTrans, doesn't maintain. I'm under the impression they don't pay our transit authority, the VTA, anything, per mile driven, for use of our arterials. This is what I wrote:
Quote:
Originally Posted by darkeconomist
Agreed on the premise, but not on the extent. Currently, the way we "charge" for road use creates massive distortions in the market. Trucks, specifically, are overutilized vs. rail because we, the public, subsidize their use.
Imagine if trucks had to buy right-of-way like rail does. Would trucks be used so extensively? Probably not.
So, while we do gain from their use, their overuse as a direct result of our subsidization leaves us net negative.
This seems a scale above the question of suburban form but, if we didn't have this distortion of the market, suburbs might not have taken the current wide-and-short form wherein everything is spread out. If, say, trucks had to pay, per-mile, for road use, were limited to arterials (or other main streets) and were banned from neighborhood streets, retail might be more centralized in shopping "hubs."
Quote:
Originally Posted by darkeconomist
I'm going to focus on my one point regarding freight trucking and the suburban form. To avoid confusion, I'm not, in this post, going to discuss rail.
Trucks, and road users in general, do not pay anything close to the fully inclusive cost, to the government or the larger society, per mile traveled. If trucks had to pay a per-mile usage fee, like a toll, the suburban form would be different than it is now.
Quote:
Originally Posted by darkeconomist
Anyway, my original point was and is that if cargo trucks, like the kind that deliver to grocery and convenience stores, had to pay, per mile, for road use, the form of retail in the suburbs, and the form of the suburbs in general, would look different.
I haven't responded to your question regarding what I think the current suburban retail form is because, given the volume of things I've had to try and clarify and respond to, your question seemed like a distraction. If I'm already expending a lot to get you to talk about trucks and not veer off to the subject of rail or being anti-car, or being pro city, why would I split my writing further? I've no incentive to.
Just to clarify (though I shouldn't have to), darkeconomist, YOU are the one who brought up rail shipping, three days ago:
Quote:
Originally Posted by darkeconomist
Agreed on the premise, but not on the extent. Currently, the way we "charge" for road use creates massive distortions in the market. Trucks, specifically, are overutilized vs. rail because we, the public, subsidize their use.
Imagine if trucks had to buy right-of-way like rail does. Would trucks be used so extensively? Probably not.
So, while we do gain from their use, their overuse as a direct result of our subsidization leaves us net negative.
This seems a scale above the question of suburban form but, if we didn't have this distortion of the market, suburbs might not have taken the current wide-and-short form wherein everything is spread out. If, say, trucks had to pay, per-mile, for road use, were limited to arterials (or other main streets) and were banned from neighborhood streets, retail might be more centralized in shopping "hubs."
Now you have decided you don't want to talk about trucks, so you choose accuse me of diversions, saying you never wanted to talk about rail.
Your words:
Quote:
Why do you keep going back to rail? I was very explicit in stating I was talking about trucks, freight prices and suburban form.
This thread has gone way off topic, and turned into a personal back and forth between several members.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
