I don’t pay much attention when I commute. I take the bus to and from work, looking up occasionally to make sure I don’t miss my stop. With my head buried in a book, I enjoy this time away from worrying about the other drivers, traffic (though it still sucks), and gas prices.
On a recent morning commute though, I started paying more attention to the downtown Minneapolis corridor. Streets are laid out to keep bus and car traffic separate. Two way streets are really “one way for cars” and the other way for buses. Having a dedicated bus lane separates the vehicular traffic from the buses and seemingly frees up the buses to make their scheduled stops as close to on-time as possible, especially during rush hour.
Oddly, there’s also congestion pricing on the bus. Rush hour costs more to ride the bus. I say oddly because there doesn’t seem to be an equivalent up front costs up motorists to drive during rush hour. There are the obvious costs of one’s time. Being stuck in traffic cuts down on time at work or with family. The carpool lane does seem to provide people who drive alone with the option of paying to use the lane, and more during peak times, but this is one lane (and I’ve only noticed it in a few places).
In reading Natural Capitalism, while on the bus, I came across their discussion of consumption taxes. Will congestion pricing take hold and serve essentially as a consumption tax? Based on a conversation with a coworker who was lamenting the disappearance of parking lots (and if you read my op-eds, you know my thoughts on those) in a vibrant Minneapolis neighborhood and the contaminant cheap parking, it doesn’t look likely, at least not in this corner of the country. I’ve lived in enough parts of this country to feel pretty safe betting this isn’t isolated to this region.
