No (or Different) Urban Mass Transportation Act of 1964

[Twin City Lines]

The Urban Mass Transportation Act of 1964 in OTL encouraged local government takeover of failing (and possibly not-so-failing, but I can't think of an example) private transit companies in the USA by providing capital assistance, but only to transit systems which were owned by government agencies.

One small problem was that wasn't quite the original intent of the UMTA. It was originally written for a few East Coast commuter railroads which were in the process of being taken over by local/regional agencies at the time. There was no intent to provide capital equipment for transit lines in "small town USA", so to speak. However, the wording of the Act opened up the doors.

In US history, there were three waves of local government takeover of private transit companies: First was in the 1910s/20s (examples: San Francisco and Detroit) out of progressive idealism. Second was in the 1950s, when many transit lines could no longer make money and the cities bought them out to keep the service going. The third wave, in the late 1960s/70s was similar, except that UMTA funding was also a factor, in that it discouraged arrangements such as continuing private ownership by means of a subsidy, since private companies were ineligible for Federal capital funds.

Modern economics pretty much makes private, for-profit transit funded solely by fares a no go in America today. But under a different (or no) UMTA, would private, loss-based, subsidised transit companies be more common?

Scenario 1. No UTMA

Scenario 2. UTMA more rigidly written to only include the intended commuter railroads, either by name or by carefully crafted criteria.

Scenario 3. UMTA more broadly written to include privately-owned transit companies.

Also, are there Constitutional problems with Scenarios 2 and 3? I can guess the far Right would think so, but I'm seeking mainstream thought consistent with OTL SCOTUS thinking....

[Plumber]

I think that a deregulation (or privatization) of the rail lanes would only be a good thing like OTL deregulation of airlines. Drew is on these subjects now in Gumbo. You there, Drew?

[azander12]

Originally Posted by Plumber

I think that a deregulation (or privatization) of the rail lanes would only be a good thing like OTL deregulation of airlines. Drew is on these subjects now in Gumbo. You there, Drew?

I think the opposite. One of the reasons many American cities have no public transit to speak of is that the car companies bought up the streetcar lines in the 1950s and 60s and ripped them up, replacing them with buses made by...the car companies. It's entirely possible that privatized rail lines would receive intentionally massive underinvestment in order for truck companies to make more money. The markets don't always regulate public goods that well.

Just my opinion...

[phx1138]

Those are really two separate issues.... Deregulation isn't privatization, for a start, but it would be a very good idea if USG got out of the micromanagement of rail companies & eliminated the sometimes stupid regs. (Governing when a train blows its horn?) And things like requiring the trains to withstand collisions from freight trains, rather than figuring out ways to avoid collisions...

The streetcar lines suffered from a major economic disadvantage: they pay taxes on all their rails (the land under them...), while trucking & bus companies get the road building, maintenance, & snow clearing free--paid for in part by rail company taxes. Change that, give the rail companies even half the money going into highways, you have the best rail system in the world. (There was also an issue of trust-busting: rail companies were owned by power utilities, which supplied them their power... Could be you want an exception to allow that, but if you change the tax laws, you really don't need it.)