I don't know if you are being deliberately difficult here or if you just don't understand the terms you are using.

Transportation is not rivaled, and it is excludable only in the very weakest sense. If you are riding on a train, that does not impact my ability to ride on the train also. You argument about the seat is equivalent to calling oxygen rivaled because if you breathe some of it, then I can't breathe those molecules, which is just absurd.

As far as being excludable, there are all kinds of pricing systems for transit, many of which are free. There is nothing inherently excludable about transit use because there is no transactional exchange of property. You can impose a non-zero price on a non-excludable good (e.g. to transfer the costs of externalities), and that certainly does not change the fact that it is still non-excludable.

I suggest you review your economics.

How is transportation a "public good", as you imply?

It is rivaled; i.e., If I take up a seat on a train, then you cannot use that seat.

And it is excludable; i.e., If I do not pay a fare, I can be prevented from riding.

What other "public good" criteria are you using to come to your conclusion?

If the rail transit where not there where would all of the people who ride transit be? The cost to build replacement highway would far exceed to cost to build and operate the current transit lines not to mention the time lost in longer commute.

The cost of building rail lines are much more expensive than they need to be due to all of the politics and hoops that are required to build a new line or even upgrade a current line.

Who is O’Toole anyway, where did he come from, what are his credentials, who gave him any creditability? Or is he a simple bought and paid for lobbyist of the highway and anti transit interest?

Highways, parking, the hidden cost of imported fuel, lost space, highway and automotive repair and service infrastructure are all huge subsidies to support driving at the expense of transit. This is not a level playing field.

So ignoring O’Toole the Cato instate and other “think tanks” with no real (pardon the pun) “street experience” may not be such a bad idea.

However, all of us who support more public resources for transit would do well to proceed cautiously. The negative consequences of the last 50+ years of public policy, things like sprawl, congestion, and high energy use, were all unintended and mostly unforseen.

There is no reason to believe that we would do much better with a planned transit infrastructure.

While it is clear that some public investment (yes it is an investment) is required, and quite possibly a very large amount, I think it would be a mistake to exclude elements of private, for-profit transit. We don't want to end up with 3 express lines to the Javits Center but no good connector between Brooklyn and Queens.

It is possible O"Toole was referring to transit mode share in Portland, not total ridership.

It should also be noted that many transit activists are also highly critical of these hugely-expensive, Federally-funded transit capital projects due to their poor ROI. But that isn't meant as a criticism of transit in general, just the very stupid way planning and transit is done in the USA.

Charles Siegel: You are correct about how democracies work, which is why the USA was designed as a constitutional republic, and not a democracy. That is, minorities have protection from the majority.

This uncritically reported statement by Cabaldon, which is virtually impossible mathematically and probably vastly exaggerated, mars an otherwise excellent and important post.

News about political science: in a democracy, the majority can vote to pass taxes and can use the revenue to promote what the majority believes is the common good.

Some people are such fanatics about private property that they want all parks, all libraries, all roads, all public transit, etc to be provided by private corporations for profit - but they are an extremist fringe.

As is his habit, O'Toole began by noting that 40 years' worth of transit investments have not produced significant reductions in driving or greenhouse gas emissions. A good talking point, perhaps

Actually, it's not that good a talking point. How is a pittance supposed to reduce driving when we're spending a fortune encouraging driving? And the population is growing, and growing wealthier and demanding more overall travel of all modes. It is ridiculous to not fund transit and then ask it to reduce driving. A better question would be: Has 40 years of transit investment put a small dent in what would have been an even more meteoric rise in driving and greenhouse gas emissions being encouraged by the federal, state and local governments?

Jon: Quantifying the "returns" on any public investment is a nearly impossible task. And unless you can demonstrate (without the gibberish of a 200-page consultant report) that my $100 "investment" will yield a "return" of a precise amount, then I will remain convinced that "investment" is just a propagandist term.

Now, with "pilfering", we are getting somewhere.

I am not a fan of Mr. O'Toole, but he is onto something with private transit systems. As a (poor) example, take the San Diego light rail, which was built without Federal subsidies. True, California had to pay for it, but they were able to work around the rat's nest of Federal regulations.

Now, take that a step further, and think of the flexibility that private investors can have in transit and highway networks. Or, we can continue to wait another 50 years for the next Second Avenue subway.

Incidentally, transit systems in Japan and Hong Kong are privately operated, and put the American systems to shame. (Though some of that might be cultural differences as well.)

In this way, whatever you want to call it, "investment" (or "pilfering" or what have you) in mass transit is probably a good idea, and probably a better idea than continuing to subsidize highways (vis-a-vis cost-to-benefit ratio).

And how is taking $200 billion of taxpayer money for roads not "The coercive taking of taxpayer's property to suit the personal vision of theirs?" How is allowing tax writeoffs for businesses building "free parking" at their stores and office buildings any different?