Written by Nicholas Vetrisek
“History repeats itself, first as tragedy, second as farce,” and third as an overpriced electric bus.
In another flash of genius by the wonderful people at the San Diego Metropolitan Transport System, $12.5 million has been wasted put to excellent use in a brand new program designed to reduce carbon emissions.
Joking aside, if this were a private company that was working to decrease carbon emissions by funding the venture with its own money, that would be perfectly fine. They are not using their own money, however. Since they are public, they are using yours.
When looked at that way, the project is absolutely ridiculous. It’s strange enough given the fact that public transportation is already one of the best ways to reduce carbon emissions, but it’s even more absurd due to the fact that the busses already run on natural gas, a much cleaner alternative to diesel. In essence, San Diegans are paying for a slight upgrade, at best.
That’s not all though. As a result of the busses being electric, they would cut the travel distance in half from 300 miles with natural gas to only 150 miles with electric. The busses would be less efficient and would need constant charging.
Along with that, each individual charging station would cost $60,000 each, adding to the already massive cost. While this program was designed to help conserve the green all around us, it clearly was not meant to conserve the green in our pockets.
Best of all, this only paid for eight busses. Imagine how much it’s going to cost over the years when the entire fleet becomes electric by 2040. Truly a government planner’s dream.
Once again, this is a poorly thought out plan by MTS that probably won’t work and will likely only exacerbate the problems it sought to fix while raising taxes and increasing the local deficit at the same time.
Photo by Josh Esh
